It Sounds Stupid...

But the way women chat is quite different to the way that men do. You all know this, of course, but I have been stuck away from gaggles of women and didn't quite realise. It's all a bit like a soap opera. And I have always preferred the company of women to that of men, an appreciation which has grown in my current workplace.

I think that this comes firmly under the heading of being one of those things that everyone knew - except me. I wonder how many more of these blindingly obvious things there are lurking in the world for me to rediscover???

Embarrassing

Sometimes I travel to work on a prison minibus crowded with others, and sometimes by the local bus.

Either way, there are a gaggle of my peers around me all jabbering into their mobiles. The minibus is worst for this, with no hope of speaking so low as to be un-hearable. Which is something of a pity, because the other day the guy behind me was having phone sex at 8am...quiet as he was, my toes were curling in embarrassment.

There is fun to be had in observing these travels to and fro, most usually from some of the youngsters who will try to chat up just about any woman who sits next to them. Listening to their efforts is hysterical. That they invariably all strike-out only adds to the fun.

Back To Life...

Tomorrow I return to the nick after a five day home leave. Five days of living a normal life, to normal mores, has reinforced one simple lesson that goes to the heart of prison life.

It is weird and profoundly unnatural. Quite why we expect it to teach people how to be "normal" is beyond me.

Fanny Cradock

Cooking, prison style, is one of the many aspects of this life that lead, through necessity, to invention. We can cook with just about anything, the most basic set up being an old tin of Marvell and tapers of newspaper or loo roll.

The sporadic introduction of microwaves was a revelation. Not that anyone forked out for a microwave cookbook; we threw stuff in and nuked it, trial and error. We seem to get by, in the limited sense that no one has yet died.

It was with some hesitancy, then, that I told the Editor that I would have some supper ready when she came in from work. Cooking, especially with gas, was a proposition I had previously had little to do with. When there are two cats sitting and watching every move it only adds to the pressure.

Scrambled eggs, beans and toast. Not a mixture to shake the foundations of the House of Blumenthal, but I've lived on worse. The cats were the most disappointed. Such is the beginning of my training in domesticity.

The Mental Shift

Being out and about working four days a week, and a possible Town Visit on Sunday, means that I am spending longer outside than inside. The stress that accompanied parts of my early days out has largely dissipated and been replaced by a form of stress that I didn't foresee.

Coming back and being stuck in the prison for a couple of days in the week irks me, it chaffs and irritates. Those two days are riddled with things of a prisonish nature to deal with or, as I see it now, "prison shit". There are some who have to put up with this for a year or more, each day switching their head between inside and outside, fighting the natural urge to become slightly more complacent. God knows how they do it.

Thankfully, I should have only a matter of weeks left to go before "inside" becomes history. No date has yet been firmly fixed for my parole hearing but it is scheduled for May. Roll on.

Dai the Taxi

Part of my home leave journey was by taxi and the driver had no illusions as to my general identity: "To the prison, my man, with all speed!", slinging my kitbag on the seat beside me. And we began talking. Once we had established I'd been on home leave, done decades of bird and  "seem to be a bright man", it was interesting to be asked what I thought could be done to make prisons more workable (so to speak).

I had to pause and ask my own question - the answer to improving or altering prison depends, obviously, on what you want prison to deliver? Do you just want harsher punishment? Or do you want to reduce the future crime rate? And what if the two are incompatible, what if treating men like crap only increases the future chance of offending?

In our short journey there was only time to scratch the surface, to begin to bridge the chasm between prisoner and freeman. And yet I found it to be one of the most enjoyable chance encounters I've had for quite a while. I daresay Dai's views and mine would rarely overlap, but it was the fact that he was asking questions, that he was thinking and trying to engage with the issues which I found so enjoyable. I can only hope that he took up my suggestion of peeking at the blog now and then, and that he continues to think - so few people do, especially about criminal justice.

He also made me ponder a deeper point, one that strikes at the heart of much of my activity and the purpose of the blog. That is, how do prison campaigners such as myself engage with the broader mass of people, such as Dai?

I try to keep abreast of the many activities of what may broadly be called the "prison reform lobby". This is a wider spectrum than you may first think, encompassing radical anarchists through to mainstream politicians. And yet I am all too aware that this can sometimes be a closed loop, a circuit of endless conferences where the guest list is a repeat of the last, a collective of likeminded souls all preaching to each other - the converted. On the basis that a con can be lured anywhere with the offer of a cup of coffee and a biscuit then I fully expect to take my place in this collective.

And yet... it is not others within this movement that need to be engaged in debate. The most important activity must be to somehow engage with the concerns of the wider community, to talk with the masses. Bless 'em, they deserve a more nuanced analysis than that provided by the Daily Mail.

This is why I made a deliberate decision to, in some small way, make this blog "personal" and not shy away from the issues that appear to fire up people the most. Issues about the nature of murder and murderers, about the purpose and limits of punishment, about... you get the idea. Talking about these in the abstract is all very well but there is an added sharpness, a new avenue of engagement, when the guy doing the talking is himself an (ex) murderer. If nothing else, my existence shows that stereotyping criminals is just plain lazy and deceitful.

The Devil Boy

The power of the media to leave an imprint, an aftertaste, of an event in our group consciousness is immense. Popular heroes and popular devils can be created in an instant and that forever sets the tone of our public debate and understanding.

Killing one's mother and faking an attack in an attempt to cover it up comes pretty high on the shock stakes, particularly when the guilty party is a mere 14 years old. This crime is thankfully rare. As expected, the less evolved media have begun to whip up the mob, inescapably assisted by the judge who was stupid enough to allow them to publish the boy’s name.

As ever in these cases a decision must be made. Should we - as a society - write off this boy as being irretrievably wicked? Or do we believe that people are rarely irretrievable and take the advantage of these formative teenage years to help to reclaim him to be a good member of society when he is eventually released in his 30's?

The boy seems to be very bright, which is in some ways helpful. For no matter what "the system" does to him (and I mean to, not with) in the name of rehabilitation or development, it will be through his own private reflections that determines whether he changes or not. I hope that, even if it is inadvertently, he is given the supportive environment that he will need to examine and change himself; not because it will be demanded of him, but because he (belatedly) has a moral re-awakening.

Given this guy's age I cannot help wondering about the course his life will take, whether much has altered since I trod that particular path. And whether he will have the psychological strength to form his own personality in the face of an overwhelming pressure from his keepers to become only what it is they want him to be - passive, compliant, obedient.Given the rotten nature of the Administration I would be a fool to think that lessons will have been learned from experience such as my own. Perhaps he could use a mentor who has trod the road that he is now learning to walk..?

Work, Work, Work

Obviously, I had to begin my charity work on the very day that the place was in upheaval - delivery day. Endless sacks of clothing and knick-knacks to be unloaded, piled, opened, sorted, re-bagged and re-piled. Organised chaos at its best, with a mountain of donated stuff being sorted through by the end of the day.

I was interested to learn how things were sorted, for although people can clearly be generous in their giving, the items they donate need not be saleable. Clothing, the staple of charity shops, is essentially reduced to two piles - those that are saleable and those which are not. The damaged or otherwise unsalable are sold to textile recycling merchants, so the charity receives some income from even the most threadbare of goods.

I just had to ask the Boss, "What's the weirdest thing you have ever found?" as we tore open more sacks. "A vibrator from the 1970's". I didn't dare ask how she was able to date it so precisely. Fashions change... Perhaps oddly, it is men's clothing which is in the shortest supply. Men's shoes in particular. Please bear this in mind when you are next moved to donate some clothing to charity - shirts and shoes people, shirts and shoes!

Repulsive

When the same Government who support a move away from "European" human rights towards "British" rights suddenly appear on my TV insisting that they should have the ability to trawl and record all electronic communications made by 65 million citizens, it must make some of us pause.

For a smaller - but far more significant - number of people such an monstrous outrage must prompt the question -  just what does a government have to do to its citizens before the people have a justifiable urge to wage war upon that government?

I cannot imagine this disgusting proposal for total State surveillance being made in any other Western democracy without the proposer either being fired or laughed away. In Britain, though, we give this proposal headspace and media coverage. Nobody takes to the streets.

Having got nowhere in the Orwell Prize this year I must quash my misery and point out what George told us so many years ago. "If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face -forever".

We get the government we deserve. And given the British people's incredible ability to become mere suspects for State surveillance whilst simultaneously believing in "British freedoms" then the government they deserve is just the one that abuses them in such a way.

This is one of those political moments which will shape the course of my future life and attitudes. I am deeply angry; not just at the government but at the apathetic voters who will allow this contemptible policy to become real. I'm not quite sure which party I find more deserving of challenge - the policy makers or the saps who sit back and allow them to weave their web.

Shame on us. Shame.

The Introductions

I have now began working outside of the nick four days a week and as previously promised I won't be telling you precisely where or for whom. Let's just say that for four days a week I am working in the charity retail sector somewhere in England.

The initial introductions were mercifully brief- "this is John..." - ah, dammit, I failed to firmly squash that in favour of Ben, so now the number of people who know me as John has tripled at a stroke. It will take some getting used to, having only three people previously calling me John in decades.

I have nothing against "John", there is nothing inherent in the name that offends me. And yet it feels like a name that belongs to someone else, a label from a previous existence that I left behind many, many years ago. "Ben" arose out of the ashes of my teenage years where I sported a fearsome beard and attitude. It is quite probable that this was a staff invention, "Treasure Island" not being a popular perennial on the landings.

And it seemed to fit, and seemed to stick. My attitude to it had no impact. The only advantage I saw at the time was that it stalled any staff who wished to imply that we were on a first name basis; my pseudonym allowed for the impression of a pseudo relationship. I seemed to grow into it, and Ben is who I forever became.

Now, as The End is Nigh, I really should give some consideration to my future identity. The part of the world who gives a hoot knows me as Ben Gunn. My official paperwork knows me as John Gunn. Actually, I have to add the caveat that I discovered Legal Aid for changing names by Deed Poll as a teen and had a brief existence as, would you believe, Mokurai Yoritomo... mostly because it used to piss off the Censor as he tried to work out who the hell that was.

Outside of the prison system, though, I am the Man With No Name. Not only do I not possess my National Insurance Number but one doesn't exist to give me. I am a tabula rasa for the whole raft of Government agencies who, soon, I will have to persuade of my existence.

And at this point I could formally change my name. I could quietly cease writing and drift out into the world in a completely new and unknown guise. I've always fancied trying Arbuthnot Aloysius Fotherington-Smythe.

My Life

Is it all about challenging power for me? Is that the infinite drive which powers my activity? Or could it be that my drive is actually to try and change whatever small corner of the world in which I live; which, being prison, inevitably then involves challenging power?

What does this mean for me after release?

A Revelation

Working in the charity shop means that I am handling clothes like never before. I joke that I've never had my hands up so many skirts. And the vast differences between men's and women's clothing have led to the following theory.

That is, clothing reflects the nature of genitalia. Women's clothing is ornate, even the simplest of garments made more complicated by folds, frills and pleats. Men's clothing is straightforward and rather simple.

Just a thought. And I don't know where transsexuals fit into this theory yet...

Blending In

Aeons ago, just after my Zen Tukai Jokudo ordination, I was having a fierce argument in a corridor with a

governor about whether I could wear my token kesa. This is a token robe, essentially a two inch strip of

black cloth worn hanging from the neck. The Gov wasn't having any of it, even if I wore it beneath my

clothes.

"It will make you stand out!", and he wasn't having such flamboyance perturb his uniformity. As he spoke, a Sikh walked past, sporting the most fluorescent yellow turban in the land. The governor and I stared at each other in the unspoken common knowledge that we had both seen this apparition and it made utter nonsense of the Gov's declaration.

I'll give him his due. He didn't bat an eyelid. Or retreat a single inch. It is this level of shamelessness in the face of reality that is the hallmark of the modern prison manager.

Shadows and Echoes

How long after release will seemingly normal activities be overshadowed by the meanings given to them by my prison life?

On home leave I could have gone to the cinema but the instant the Editor raised the suggestion I felt a great resistance. It swiftly dawned on me why. It is because communal screen-watching in prison, exemplified by the old TV rooms, were not only places for shared activity. Oh no; the darkness gave rise to sudden attacks by blade or boiling water as well as a chance to watch EastEnders.

It was this distant memory of darkened rooms being a source of potential danger that rose from my guts at the thought of going to the cinema.

And that makes me ponder the insidious effects of imprisonment, and wonder what other unexpected shadows may rise from within in the future?