Other essays on this theme

Essay: "Childhood"

by Matt G. Green
In the middle of the night is where I live both mentally and physically. I have found over the years of my incarceration that I am the most at peace behind these walls in the middle of the night. The noise level drops after lock down and by midnight you usually don't hear anyone until count clears again in the morning. And when the noise level drops I find my stress level does too, also in the middle of the night you don't have people walking by your room looking in, other than the pig on his rounds. And that allows me to take my curtain off the cell door and the room air out. I can look at the time of the night and don't have to be bother with the mooches coming by trying to see what they can get for free. These things of yours that you don't want to advertise to the prison world can sit out in the open proudly. And when you stay up all night like I do it has an added advantage. You sleep through first shift where most nonsense takes place, which is a major advantage here, for the less you deal with the other convicts around you and the pigs the better off you are, and the less likely you are to get caught up in other people's problems. In the middle of the night I can get in touch with my feelings and write my family and children and the stress and craziness in my head usually won't show through on to the pages of their letters. I can lay back with a pencil and try to let my creative side shine and draw out a card or two. For all these things I have mentioned I find next to impossible to accomplish during the light of day, when people are out and about, and the chaos of this place is knocking at my door. That is why I enjoy the middle of the night.

Matt G. Green