Finding Freedom

one of my favorite pieces of writing anywhere....

By Jarvis Jay Masters, Finding Freedom

“When I first entered the gates of San Quentin in the winter of 1981, I walked across the upper yard holding a box called a “fish-kit” filled with my prison-issued belongings. I saw the faces of hundreds who had already made the prison their home. I watched them stare at me with piercing eyes, their faces rugged and their beards of different shades—all dressed in prison blue jeans and worn, torn coats—some leaning against the chain fences, cigarettes hanging from their lips, others with dark glasses covering their eyes.
I will never forget when the steel cell door slammed shut behind me. I stood in the darkness trying to fix my eyes and readjust the thoughts that were telling me that this was no home—that this tiny space would not, could not be where I would spend more than a decade of my life. My mind kept saying, “No! Hell no!” I thought again of the many prisoners I had seen moments ago standing on the yard, so old and accustomed to their fates.
I dropped my fish-kit. I spread my arms and found that the palms of my hands touched the walls with ease. I pushed against them with all my might, until I realized how silly it was to think that these thick concrete walls would somehow budge. I groped for the light switch. It was on the back wall, only a few feet above the steel-plated bunk bed. The bed was bolted into the wall like a shelf. It was only two and a half feet wide by six feet long, and only several feet above the gray concrete floor.
My eyes had adjusted to the darkness by the time I turned the lights on. But until now I hadn’t seen the swarms of cockroaches clustered about, especially around the combined toilet and sink on the back wall. When the light came on, the roaches scattered, dashing into tiny holes and cracks behind the sink and in the walls, leaving only the very fat and young ones still running scared. I was beyond shock to see so many of these nasty creatures. And although they didn’t come near me, I began to feel roaches climbing all over my body. I even imagined them mounting an attack on me when I was asleep.
This was home. For hours I couldn’t bear the thought. The roaches, the filth plastered on the walls, the dirt balls collecting on the floor, and the awful smell of urine left in the toilet for God knows how long sickened me nearly to the point of passing out.
To find home in San Quentin I had to summon an unbelievable will to survive. My first step was to flush the toilet. To my surprise I found all I needed to clean my cell in the fish-kit—a towel, face cloth, and a box of state detergent. There were also a bar of state soap, a toothbrush and a comb. A small can of powdered toothpaste, a small plastic cup, and two twenty-year-old National Geographic magazines, one of them from the month and year of my birth.
It seemed that time was now on my side. I started cleaning vigorously. I began with one wall, then went on to the next, scrubbing them from top to bottom as hard as I could to remove the marking and filth. I didn’t stop until I had washed them down to the floor and they were spotless. If I had to sleep in here, this was the least I could do. The cell bars, sink, and toilet and the floor got the same treatment. I was especially worried about the toilet. I had heard that prisoners were compelled to wash their faces in their toilets whenever tear gas was shot into the units to break up mass disruptions and the water was turned off. I imagined leaning into this toilet, and I cleaned it to the highest military standards.
I spent hours, sometimes on my hands and knees, washing down every inch of my cell—even the ceiling. When I had finished, I was convinced that I could eat a piece of candy that had dropped onto the floor. The roaches had all drowned or been killed. I blocked off all their hiding places by plugging up the holes and cracks in the walls with wet toilet paper.
After the first days had passed, I decided to decorate my walls with photographs from the National Geographic magazines. The landscapes of Malaysia and other parts of the world had enormous beauty, and I gladly pasted photos of them everywhere. These small representations of life helped me to imagine the world beyond prison walls.
Over the years, I collected books and even acquired a television and radio—windows to the outside world. And I pasted many thousands of photographs on the wall. The one that has made my prison home most like a sanctuary to me is a small photograph of a Buddhist saint that a very dear friend sent to me. It has been in the center of my wall for a number of years.
I now begin every day with the practice of meditation, seated on the cold morning floor, cushioned only by my neatly folded blanket. Welcoming the morning light, I realize, like seeing through clouds, that home is wherever the heart can be found."