During these times in the great unknown of COVID-19 I have to dig deep inside and reflect. Looking at myself in the mirror I feel stress, worry and frustration. I sit in my cell in the Ironwood State Prison and know that COVID-19 has taken over. It has rocked all worlds upside down, both the free world and the steel bars world.
Everyday I’m so anxious, I find myself ducking and diving like the boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. All programs, yard time and phone calls are cancelled. I worry daily about my children’s and family’s health, and the health of the world.
One thing COVID-19 tried to take away from me but couldn’t was my ultimate high in life, sports. My getaway from reality for three-and-a-half hours. It is a safe haven, a religion on its own where I can be internally free. I put on the Champions League 20’s with full blast surround sound audio and I am at the game with my son. Watching great athletes LeBron James, Tom Brady and Mike Trout at the peak of their powers is pure beauty and joy.
COVID-19 has helped me to be more grateful, humble, self-disciplined and compassionate towards others because life is so precious. I now possess all the coping skills so I won’t revert to old beliefs, addictions or patterns. I won’t lose the fight.
When emotions are high, common sense is low. I look and see inmates get angry and disrespect fellow inmates and corrections officers (CO). I ask myself, why? We are all cut from a different cloth. Everyone has their own way of coping with this pandemic. I can only control my thinking and actions in life. I will continue to educate myself, learning and growing in self-help work, studies and meditating.
I respect, admire and appreciate all essential staff and CO’s here at Ironwood State Prison who are keeping us safe during a pandemic. Putting their own lives on the line, which must be hard and stressful for them. They are humans with emotions and feelings, who have family and loved ones waiting for them at home.
I will continue to respect all staff. That way I am part of the solution moving forward and no longer the problem that makes their jobs harder than it should be.
I want to thank God for keeping my family safe and healthy as well as giving me the ultimate strength and courage to keep pushing forward on my journey. I am truly saddened and my heart and prayers go out to all families who have lost a loved one during the pandemic.
This may sound strange but COVID-19 has made me a better man, father and son. It has helped me to figure out a lot of things in my life. It has brought peace to my heart, patience and it has made me prioritize the most important things in life. It’s a true process. I will not stop or give up. I will continue growing as a human for my victims, giving back in any way possible. I will keep surrounding myself with positive mentors and influences. Change is possible even when there is a pandemic!
Republish this article
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Here are our ground rules:
- You must credit Prison Journalism Project. In the byline, we prefer “[Author Name], Prison Journalism Project.” At the top of the text of your story, please include a line that says: “This story was originally published by Prison Journalism Project” and include a link to the article.
- No republishing of photographs, illustrations or graphics without specific permission. Please contact inquiries@prisonjournalismproject.org.
- No editing the content, including the headline, except to reflect changes in time, location and editorial style. For example, changing, “today” to “last week,” or San Quentin to San Quentin, California. You can also make minor revisions for style or headline size, and you can trim stories for space. You must also retain all original hyperlinks, including links to the Prison Journalism Project newsletters.
- No translation of our stories into another language without specific permission. Please contact inquiries@prisonjournalismproject.org.
- No selling ads against our stories, but you can publish it on a page with ads that you’ve already sold.
- No reselling or syndicating our stories, including on platforms or apps like Apple News or Google News. You also can’t republish our work automatically or all at once. Please select them individually.
- No scraping our website or using our stories to populate websites designed to improve search rankings or gain revenue from network-based advertisements.
- Any site our stories appear on must have a prominent and effective way to contact you.
- If we send you a request to remove our story, you must do so immediately.
- If you share republished stories on social media, please tag Prison Journalism Project. We have official accounts on Twitter (@prisonjourn), Facebook (@prisonjournalism), Instagram (@prisonjournalism) and Linked In.
- Let us know when you share the story. Send us a note, so we can keep track.