They sent me over to Peggy Sue's house today.It's the sexual offender program house. I knew that going in there.
I was not at all prepared for what it was like. Not one bit.
For one thing, there are no cells, nor doors. All open wings with between 36 and 60 inmates in a wing. That was a real odd thing for me, to walk into a room with 60 inmates running around loose.
They mostly police themselves. All of these guys have to finish this program in order to qualify
for early release or parole. So they behave themselves in there. They want to finish so they can get out of prison. I can understand that. And when one of them screws up, they band together and make him turn himself in.
They were quiet and polite.
They got out of my way when I came into a room. They called me "Sir".
That made me suspicious. I kept prowling around trying to catch somebody doing something stupid. I prowled around enough that it was starting to make them nervous. And I still couldn't catch them doing anything.
Because they weren't doing anything! They were all in their little support groups or studying at their bunks with other inmates.
I couldn't even catch anybody smoking in the bathrooms.
I don't know how Peggy Sue does it.
That place is weird as hell!
It's a total culture shock! I did the same "prowling" for the first couple of weeks. Even made the staff nervous. I've slowly gotten used to it. Still find myself twiddling my thumbs alot. Don't know if I'll ever get used to the slow pace. It's stressful for people like us to be so laid back.
ReplyDeletePeggy Sue- I felt like a wolf in the fold in that place. I kept prowling around and saying to myself "I don't need to be in this place!"
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