From Dragonfly: ...To Accept the Things I Cannot Change

I stopped by my case worker's office this afternoon. I asked her if there has been any update on getting my exit summary completed, so that I can get a date to go home. She had "promised" I'd be out of here before my home confinement date in May, but now, she says that since medical has not completed the paperwork, I'll be lucky to get home by June... and possibly will be here until my actual "out" date of July 2nd. Really!??!??! Any other facility, and I'd be at halfway house or home already. Something is just plain old wrong that they can't seem to complete the paperwork in order for me to get my time at halfway house or home confinement. It is just so frustrating. I heard from everyone - including once I was already here - that people get their time in halfway house and home confinement, but I've seen person after person have to max out their time, here, because of paperwork and bureaucratic b.s. Okay, I'm officially agitated. Even my supervisor asked me today when I am going home. I said, "within the next 120 days," because that's as close to a date as I have. Four more months of this... four more months away from my family, away from my friends, away from trying to get back in school, away from everyone who loves and needs me, just away. Four more months of depending on Traveler, Sporty, and especially Survivor who do so much for me from a distance. I'm away from Super Dog, away from T.S., who will finish her first year of college without me seeing her dorm room, away from my aging grandparents who are not doing too great, away from my father who can barely speak to me by phone and can no longer write me because he simply can't get the words out, away from my scooter "Hope," away from colorful clothing, pedicures, fresh vegetables, wonderful foods, my computer and the Internet, my cell phone and fun games, facebook, and especially my future. Four more months of being locked up with inmates, whose stories scare me more than I can share. I am constantly learning someone's back story and saying, "she did WHAT?!?!?" Life at a camp would be different, but I'm in a high security place with all levels of security inmates, and we are all together, eating at the same tables, studying in the same classrooms, working at the same jobs, and, especially, living in the same rooms.

I can change none of the above things I am ranting about. I really hate that I ranted, but one thing I learned in recovery is to "name it, claim it, and dump it," and that was my dump. It's out there and I can now walk away from this computer and writing this note knowing that at least I am not keeping it all inside. At least I no longer have no real emotions.

Four more months sucks, but it sucks much less than those who have 4 more years, or 40 more. Of course, I did not do anything that would have earned me that much time, but some people's sentences are far too long for their crime, and others are far too soft for theirs. It is all a matter of perspective. Over 4 months I can finish the throw blanket I hastily decided to start crocheting. It's definitely an original (I can see my errors), but it will be cute and warm. It is about 1/20th complete. A bit to go still. I can spend time with the people here that are friends, and perhaps help a newbie that may come along in the near future. We received 60 new inmates yesterday, I heard, and about 300 more are on their way according to inmate.com. I can see some of my students take the official GED, and, hopefully, a few will run up to me and say, "I did it!" I'll have such pride for those students. "Yes, yes, you did! I never doubted that you could," I would say with the biggest smile on my face.

Perhaps the next four months will send me to the camp, although it's been four months since I was told I was going. I tell my case worker, "I don't want to go to camp, I want to go home." She gives a knowing nod, but she, too, appears powerless to get the people who need to do the paperwork to do the paperwork. I'm not the only one in this situation, she tells me, but I know that... it really doesn't make it any easier knowing that others are also caught here because their paperwork is not completed. We should all be leaving - make room for the 300 newbies on their way. Where will they fit in this already beyond capacity place if no one gets released?!?! Ok, that was another vent. I'm going to walk away now. I'm going to make a peanut butter and jelly on a caramel rice cake dinner and drink a sprite. I will read the novel I'm finally finishing, "Gone Girl," that I started before I was incarcerated, but had not had access to until I found it waiting for someone to want it on a trash can lid (where we put things up for grabs) in my unit the other day. I also got a reader's digest today, that, I will enjoy. Interestingly, it is about "dumb criminals" - I think I now know some of those people! The picture has a criminal being held up by a banana - okay, that's funny, given how important bananas are at this place. It will make me laugh. Laughter is good.