The Novelist Portent

Johnny Mahaffey says: "It's never easy, for a detainee!"

9-21-14

Many changes have taken place these past few weeks; and I'm not just talking about my book being published, or the other--"Zombie Island"--coming out very soon. I'm speaking of the prison. Gangs from the Lee Correctional, are steadily being dispersed throughout the state-what used to be a somewhat safe prison yard, is no more. We had two stabbings take place (within 5 days of each other), that first week of this month!

Their idiots; and their just getting started.

Now, don't get me wrong, there's some good guys in the mix--I'm only speaking of the so-called "members" who stab random people just to get in the gang. Many hide their click with religious front. The really dumb ones are the wanna-be members that allow themselves to get hit in the jaw by all the existing members--and after he's returned from the hospital with his mouth wired shut--he's a member. Some of the clicks participate in a bunch of homosexual activity...and justify their actions by their circumstances. I'll stick with writing books.

I'm always in danger of becoming sidetracked, and stuff like this going on around me doesn't help; but I'll get through it. In "Anna Karenina", Tolstoy wrote, "The ugly sport of fist fighting...is a sign of barbarism." And he wont on to conclude that, "...the love os such spectacles is the surest sign of low development in the spectators," in which most educated people would undoubtedly concur. I've yet to read his "War and Peace", I just haven't ran across a copy yet. I once asked my dad's brother to order me one, but it never arrived. Leo Tolstoy was a great writer.

He had written his "Rules of Life", when he was 18:

"Have a goal for your whole life, a goal for one section of your life, a goal for a shorter period and a goal for a year; a goal for every day, a goal for every hour and for every minute, and sacrifice the lesser goal to the greater....Keep away from women....Kill desire by work."

Prison's doing its best to keep the women away physically; but it's still up to me to purge them mentally. That's not something I can do easily. As a matter of fact, I just spilled coffee on my foot because I was distracted by the alluring Alyson Brie (Annie in "Community")--I just hope my longing itch hasn't caused me to get a big blister on my foot. I would certainly fail the marshmallow test--if the marshmallow was a woman!1 It's said that, "Character and willpower bend depending on the environment and the individual's level of motivation."2 My environment is (physically and mentally) volatile, compounded by the taste of every ex still lingering upon the tongue of my mind, taunting me--making the journey before me very difficult, and painful! Still, despite these factors and my overall circumstance: I am still glad that I am me; I and glad that I know what I know; I am glad for those in my life I met, those I've had the privilege to befriend, or love (emotionally, and the animalistic liaison). Despite the fact that I'm in prison, and removed from my children--I would not wish to be anyone else.

I guess with the "gangs", they just don't know any better; and no one has never really showed them any other way. So, it's to this "barbarism" they have digressed. There could be hope for them, perhaps even in one of my GED classes--or CWI. All I can do is continue doing what I feel to be the right thing, and hope that good becomes of it. I have to quell this unquenched thirst for a woman, a wife, a love--and, "Kill desire by work." My plan: to write, write, and write some more! It's perfectly normal for prisoners to feel tide of resentment welling up inside them, threatening to consume every last thought; but to give in is death. I refuse to become a common criminal! I will not. No matter what the state claims of its inmates, from what I see, prison creates criminals out of those that were previously not--yes, many come in with criminality on the brain--but many more than you's think leave here with it drilled newly into them exposure. So many you and pliable minds, that accept it as a way of life....

Not me!

I have my goals; and they're being achieved!

1. A professor of psychology as Columbia University, Walter Mischel, and his so-called "marshmallow test", (outlined in his book, "The Marshmallow Test") is a test og willpower: Put a candy in front of a child, leave them alone with it, and see how long it took before they eat it--they have permission, it's a test of restraint.

2. Psychology Today, September/October issue, pages 46-47 "Would Tolstoy Pass the Marshmallow Test?" by Kaja Perina

*Yes, there's typos in this post, but this is my last typewritter ribbon for a little while--so sorry, no redraft, you're getting the rough. Ross once jumped all over Rachel for her improper use of their/they're...