My name is Heather Jarvis. It’s dead winter. Laura Taylor’s eyes are calm and cool, like the crisp air outside at the picnic table we’re sitting at. We can’t breathe in there. We needed air. We needed Earth and grounded. We needed to feel the wind.
Laura is a 45 year old and has been incarcerated since she was 16 in the state of Ohio. She’s more than the system thinks. She’s an artist and a deeply spiritual person. With each question I ask, she dives deep into her mind and contemplates the answer carefully. She fully embraces her zen lifestyle today. She knows the things she puts in the world have consequences. She stands strong in her belief of doing unto others. She firmly believes in doing better today than you did yesterday, and she places strong value in education.
The system made her feel as though she wasn’t worth the time or effort an education requires while incarcerated. She was going to die in here. Why would they educate her? But she fought. It was a combination of blessing and persistence. Instead of commissary, she paid for her own classes. She paid her way through because she knows the world owes her nothing. She believes redemption is a solitary act. She understands the scrutiny of life losses and the balance of blame. “Redemption isn’t something you see,” she told me, and I couldn’t agree more.
Her time before prison was short. She’s been incarcerated 29 years, since she was a child. She remembers a house of abuse and incest that trapped her in. She wishes, now, she would have realized she did have a way out and it wasn’t far. She wishes she would not have been a coward. She wishes she would have left. She wishes she would have spoke up. At the end of trial, she was coached not to speak. At home, she was coached not to speak. In prison, she’s told when she can speak. So today, let’s let her speak. Here’s Laura.
“Letter of resignation. Dear controller of my days, I want to be you, earning the inalienable right to rule over the stooped women of waywardness. My desire is to have my polyester pants weighted down by the keys that secure each cell door. I wish to rule what’s behind each one of them and have no clue to what key goes to what door. I want to laugh about that with the captives. A dream of setting the tone, at 6am, for the offenders, by refusing to answer simple questions, slamming doors or glaring at them. My mood would make or break their day. I want your rights. I’d feel enlivened having inmates clear a path for my presence without me uttering a word. Behind my booming voice, I would observe these same women keep lowered gazes while jerking, recoiling, and scurrying out of my way.
Every day, I sit for many hours but run to protect my pals from the danger of a 90 pound detoxing depressed female’s fingernails. I want the constitutional right to look down on those that put themselves there. I want your innocence. I wish to sleep soundly after a cleansing thought of those people getting their just dues and safer communities. I want to slip into your smooth, purified skin and know what it’s like to have never done anything that bad in my life. I want to feel guiltless over how I treat them. My clean conscience entitling me to a queen throne. I’m un-plagued with questionable acts in my past, as I surely would be. I smirk and never question my motive, my character, or my spirit, as you.
I want your life. When I get promoted, as I most assuredly will, I will thank the minorities, the addicts, the poor, and obviously the dumbest criminals. I’d be guaranteed stability via the misery, mistakes, circumstances, and sufferings of another. I wouldn’t flinch while building my career on a graveyard. Surely, I’d see this place with its electrified fences, its mace loaded assault rifles and revolving door, as a necessity. I long to be you. If I were you, walking past me, I’d feel so much better about my life. I could do a quick comparison, clear my throat and look for someone to speak to that’s just behind me. I crave thinking of vacation time while whistling just like you. If I were you, I’d ignore me. As a matter of fact, I want a do over. My name is Laura Taylor. I’m a life worthy of progress.”
These commentaries are recorded by Noelle Hanrahan of Prison Radio.