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Essay: "Isolation and Solitude"by Paul Tovar I cannot tell you exactly how many years I have been isolated and placed in a secluded place. If I try to count all the years on and off I have been incarcerated and isolated, I’d have to say around sixteen years in all. I remember the last time I was inside a courtroom and in front of a judge. It is as if it happened yesterday. I remember the exact words given to me by the person who put me here. Those words were, “you need to go and do this sentence and come home because you are spending the majority of your adult life behind bars and inside of a prison.” It was the state’s district attorney who told me those words. I can still hear them clearly in my mind.
When I first came to prison, I was treated just as all the rest of the convicted felons doing time. I was placed in the general population (GP) and given a job. Today, I am now housed in administrative segregation, better known as ad-seg. The state classification department has categorized me as a threat to security and the GP. They have even been so bold as to claim that I am a member of a security threat group known as the Mexican Mafia. There is not one violent case or any type of physical case which shows a security threat towards either one. Yet, I am still classified as so. The evidence is superficial and was fabricated. I have exhausted my appeal process to no avail. I shall do the remainder of my sentence in ad-seg. Now, I am not only isolated from my family and loved ones, I am now isolated from the GP. Being isolated as I am has only given me more determination to travail. I have built a daily routine. In order to make my days pass by quicker, I must stay busy. The sound of a ticking clock will drive me insane. I have learned new things about myself mentally and physically. And I have chosen to strive and become a better man than before I arrived. I have dedicated this time to vanquish all the bad habits which led me here. I must fix what was broken in my life in order not to return. I expect no pity nor will I wait for any handouts. I am an honorable and prideful man. I shall advance and I shall succeed. Most of my family members have abandoned me. I rarely receive a letter of correspondence. The feeling of forlorn takes affect. Then I get a surge of relief and my faith kicks in and helps me not to relinquish my ambitions. What one makes of his confine shall set him free. It is all these invisible emanations which are a part of being isolated and in a state of solitude. |