The View From Scranton

A Reprieve

I don't know what it is. I don't know where it came from. I don't know who sent it. And I don't know how it got here. But whatever it is, wherever it came from, whoever sent it, and however it got here, I'm glad I landed on me. Now I wanna bottle it, wear it around my neck. Forever. Keep all the ugly away.

Yesterday, when I returned to the House for what I believed to be the last time, a gaggle of Parole Agents swooped in and snatched-up another Resident. Apparently the man had told someone he'd rather go back to prison than go to MinSec (I told you it was that bad), and just as apparently said someone told someone who told someone else and that someone told the staff. The staff was all too happy to oblige. A crack like that makes a cat high risk. And the CCC doesn't dig high risk. I don't blame 'em. Regular risk is risk enough. To make bad matters that much worse, the man had a hot urine. Two strikes when even one means you're out. So he left, shackled, handcuffed and led away by a belly-belt.

That left me. All the drama had created a bit of a logjam at the desk and I was told to sit down and wait. I do what I'm told. Or else. The wait stretched, yawned, stretched some more, then was stilled by my counselor. Come in the office, John.

I was prepared to petition for Philly. To ask for what little money was on my books and a trip to the bus station. I'd be outta here and outta their hair. For good. Most importantly, I'd be in a whole new elsewhere.

Yes?

We did some figuring, and the director made a phone call. If parole comes through for someone tomorrow, you can stay.

So I won’t have to go to MinSec?

You won't have to go to MinSec.

Could you repeat that please?

You won't have to go to MinSec.

If I was shook before -- and I was -- this took the shake right outta me. My little so-called life was for the moment still half mine. My tomorrows would still be half-lived. The light, however dim, was still lighted. Might not sound like much to you, but to me it was the closest thing I have to being free.

I pinched myself; bombarded her with Thank Yous; took a half-deep breath and went upstairs to lie down.

It had been a crazy day. I woke at 6, as I always woke. Though this time I didn't slurp down the thawed coffee on my bedside table and cram my face with a cereal bar. Nor did I follow up the ritual with a pilfered hot second and a cigarette. I couldn't. I was scheduled for a battery of blood tests at Moses Taylor Hospital, tests that required me to fast.

So, no caffeine and no nicotine. Not an easy wake for one so brutally accustomed. But today was the day of my Electric City debut, and I'll take a byline high any day. Thus charged, I made my way up and over a few of Scranton's infamous hills to my appointment.

I hate to be poked, and I hate to be bled, and I hate hospitals even more. Add what's subtracted by the fasting, and I'm down to below zilch. I mean, even a byline high only lasts so long.

Thank Zeus for the good folk at Moses. A receptionist directed me to a series of rather welcoming sofas where incoming are told to hold for processing. Ever the Boy Scout, I'd come prepared, with a freshly-inked copy of the day's Times. But before I could even crack the Metro a woman poked her head out of a windowed cube and summoned me in.

Is this your first time here, John?

Yes, ma'am.

Do you have insurance?

No, ma'am.

Don’t you worry. We'll get this paid.

Thank you, ma'am.

A few perfunctory questions and answers later I was off and up to the third floor lab. Even there the wait wasn't much of a wait. I'd just started checking the ho-hum latest on the boresome Democratic candidates for NYC mayor when I was called.

Then it hit me. Or rather, she did. Hit me for six diabolically-sized test-tubes of my once precious blood. My head evaporated. My heart reared into reverse. And all that tough guy stuff I'd been pretending with went the way of the Hula Hoop. A bygone spin. I thought I was gonna lose it. And if it wasn't for the plump young woman loudly complaining in the next desk chair, I might've.

But my falling-on-the-floor-in-public days are over. So I steeled myself. Then I steeled myself some more. Turned blue and tried to hide the wane in my face, the gulp in my gut. All done. The sing-song voice came from another dimension. Done? Yes, except for this. She held up an all too familiar plastic jar. Right. You got my blood, now you want my bladder. Heap it on, baby.

It was all downhill from there. Literally. I choked down a few smokes, grabbed an over-priced cup o' iced latte and made my way to the blind for some glasses. Really. Scranton's SafetyNet, once proud providers of replacement specs for the broke and needy had told me they no longer provided. Now that particular task was in the hands of the blind, the Pennsylvania Association for the Blind. Go figure.

If I had my hat in hand at Moses Taylor, I now needed my eyes on a platter. Seems getting reading glasses from the Blind is like listening to Mozart with the deaf. It takes some doing. Like 3 pages of application worth of doing. And a prescription. And a two-week wait. And $30. If I had all that I wouldn't be here. Yep, no matter what you've heard, the Blind do not help you to see.

I was too a twirl to care about the cruel logic of the irony. The fasting and walking and the poking and the letting and the bylining and the caffiening and the nicotining had left me giddy. I was just glad I could see my way out.

An hour later I was at the library boasting about my completely unboastable feat of Meating; two hours after that I was back in the same place sobbing through my fingertips. Shook. Shaken. Stirred. To such an extent I let the wallow wail along to Coldplay's "Fix You."

Coldplay, as everyone knows, are master of the grand, sweeping gesture. Since I'm occasionally a fan of grand and sweeping, I'm occasionally a fan of Coldplay. This was one of those occasions. At first I thought "Fix You" was an unpardonable conceit. Who the hell was this cat to fix someone else? Then I listened a little closer, and between the grand and sweeping gestures lies a nice little hurt. This cat had made a girl cry and now he'd do anything to make her stop. That was the fix.

What really struck me was what was left unsung. "Tears stream, down your face, I promise to learn from my mistakes" is a gentle act of contrition, especially in Coldplay's patented sonic context. But when the "And I" trails off into the ether the hit is all heart. This is the netherworld of our imaginings. The all that's unsaid, unspoken, unspeakable.

It made a nice set-piece to my pain. I looked out the library window at the crests surrounding Scranton, the sun slipping on, the sky slating into slumber, and I thought about the women I've made cry. Not because I was so special, but because I wasn't. I thought about what I could've done to fix them then, to fix them now, to fix me. And I came to a very simple conclusion: Get the fuck up off my moan and face it.

posted by John Hood. @ 12:27 PM