DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.

How I Mastered Visiting Facilities

 

First and foremost, I have the utmost respect for people who work for correctional facilities as well as the facilities themselves. I would never want to jeopardize the incredibly positive relationships I have with the facilities I visit. That being said -

 

One of my favorite hip hop artists wrote something that resonated with me when learning how to visit correctional facilities. "Talk less," he'd said. "Smile more."

 

This, I think, is the best way to get into facilities and stay in facilities. I couldn't walk into a facility and start hurling insults at corrections officers. I couldn't do that to anyone, no matter how I was feeling. The people in charge (officers, coordinators, wardens, higher-ups) would say things that would make my eyes itch. I'd leave irritated, or angry, or frustrated or anxious.

 

I couldn't let that show. You let that show and you're done. They don't need you and they never will need you. Outsiders aren't welcome to begin with; now you're going to go and wreck an already tenuous relationship with the people who literally hold the keys to the place you're trying to go?

 

It is their house. You are a guest. And you are polite. (And if you can't be polite, you are at the very least quiet.)

 

There are, of course, people I admire and aspire to be like with very public agendas who visit often. I can guarantee they didn't enter spewing venom at everyone they met. If nothing else, focus on the task at hand that you are working on that day. When I go to Rikers I take the role of a tutor. Do I want people under 18 at Rikers? Absolutely not. (I don't want anyone people under 21 at Rikers.) But they're there.

 

I have a job to do. That means cooperating. That means smiling when walking through the facility. That means thanking everyone for having you and that means listening to their rules.

 

If I acted poorly I wouldn't be asked back. The students would lose a tutor. The organization I worked with would take a hit; not in losing me, but by getting a tarnished reputation by association. They don't train their tutors properly. That one gave me a lot of trouble. I don't want any of them back until they sort that out.

 

"Talk less. Smile more. Don't let them know what you're against or what you're for." I enter the facilities. I am polite and neutral and good. I am Clean. The facility turns me red but my skin holds it in until I resurface.

 

It's hard. You'll want to get angry. You have to fight that urge. There are other spaces for you to work through that anger. (And therein lies why my memories are not what they could be.)

DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.