They say the bologna is not for human consumption. They said there’s a sticker on boxes they come in that even says so. I believed them, probably not because I’m entirely gullible but because the conspiracy theories are fun to talk about. The stories you hear in here, Jesus Christ, it’s amazing. It’s as if your surrounded by a bunch of compulsive liars playing telephone… probably ‘cause you are. IT’s especially annoying because all people do here is talk. Talk, talk, talk, talk… talk.

OK, I’m being a little unfair, I’m referring mainly to the kids in their early twenties… for the most part.

Since I can’t shut them up, I’ve made ear plugs, or I talk to them and pretend to believe every word. I enthusiastically nod and say things like, “No way”, “Get outta here”, “you’re shittin’ me,” and ask them questions. Lots of questions, kind of like a choose-your-own-adventure of sorts. Note: If you try this at home, control your laughter. Compulsive liars tend to have other emotional issues and are quick to violence.

LoL. Jail! Am I right? Addendum: I use the term “jail” in the loosest possible manner. I’m not saying it’s not technically a jail but I guess due to lack of maturity it feels like a juvenile hall or like I’m in that Disney movie “Holes.”

It’s getting harder to write these things. It’s hard not to have these letters feel a little melancholy. Jail is repetitive as fuck. Day in day out same thing. The phone calls and the visits break the monotony but there’s a balance between thinking of things I have to look forward to when I get out and remaining present while I’m here. It gets hard when you think about the outside too much.

I had a great phone call with my mom today. She didn’t know I was in jail until just now (I tried to keep it from her because I didn’t want to upset her) but she’s happy I’m doing well. Which I am. I’m more disciplined in mind, body, and spirit. I’m getting a crash course in responsibility. Despite the general tone of these letters I’m in a good mood, maybe that changed when I’m forced to sit and reflect…

My first time in jail even I have the foresight to know that this is not the best time to make pruno. Everyone insisted it was a good idea and a good way to celebrate the independence day. I’m sure there’s something to be said about the irony of losing privileges after getting in trouble while in jail in an attempt to exercise my freedom but, whatever…

Side note, my bunkie just brought me a fruit cocktail for a desert after our jail made breakfast burrito. LoL, it’s not that bad when you have commissary and can cook. I had orange chicken last night and an amazing coconut curry last week.

Anyway, back to the 4th. It was eventful to say the least. A few people said they were bummed to be here for the 4th which seemed strange to me considering it’s just another day. I have trouble relating to people here, if they’re not talking about drugs or other jail time they’ve done they are giggling about dick jokes. Somebody even made fun of someone today for trying to get their GED in here… LoL, yeah fuck him for trying to better himself I guess.

I’ve come up with a good way to avoid getting caught up in the bullshit. I go to work, work hard and keep my head down, I read positive literature and meditate, and probably most important of all, I made a blindfold and earplugs and I can block everything out after final count…

Goodnight

It’s getting harder to write these for some reason. It could be the 10 hour days in the kitchen or the routine when I’m back in the dorm. I’m getting frustrated with the stories people tell in here. One guy always talks about his time in prison, we’re friends so I give him shit for it but the lies people tell irritate me most.

See, the best way to get through time here is to be involved. Partially. I’m involved enough that when something happens with the woods (whites) I’m asked for input but for the most part I keep to myself. My lack of “participation” with most people is because I can’t stand the lies. A guy who’s in my cube is probably the worst of them. He talks about all the things he has on the outside all day. If it’s not that he’s kissing ass and and trying to be popular. The way he walks is even exaggerated that I’ve noticed since I’ve been here and my friend who knows him from outside jail said he’s a completely different person.

As I’m writing this he just asked me if I’m still writing my journal entries. He said “That’s cool, I was gonna do that too but I can’t find time.”

It must be very difficult to find time to write between playing cards, doing drugs, getting tattoos, and “beating people up” (his words not mine).

“If you keep your mind from judging you will find peace.” - Tao

Guess I’m fucked…

The fact is, he’s 25 but when I can’t find anytime to read, write, or meditate without hearing his voice I fail to be understanding. I hate that this whole entry is about him but I can’t lie in my bed without hearing his fucking voice. Fuck I’m tired and this entry seems pointless. Maybe I’ll go find some seroquel for him so I can sleep. Lol.

Jail politics. I’m learning about all the intricacies of jail and how people get along. At first the idea of “politics” seemed silly to me, and it still kind of does at least in county jail where we are all working off time on our sentence. If you refuse to work your time will be served at 75% rather than 50%. So no one wants to get rolled out (kicked out).

It works like this: you have 4 cars. Cars are the races/groups to which each person belongs. Woods (whites), homies (mexican american), Paisanos (mexicans), and asians, brothers, and others roll together. The politics maintain order, for instance, if somebody in the wood car fucks up in the kitchen and gets out double taken away he is disciplined among the whites. That is for the peace as much as discipline really.

Every race lost their privilege as well and if we let it slide it’s a disrespect to them. The problems happen when because of the fuck-up in the kitchen the cubes get tossed at the house… fuck I’m using the jail slang, lol, it’s a different culture and you have to adapt. Anyway, this happened the other day and there was a disagreement between the homies and woods as to what should happen. The wood had already been disciplined in the kitchen but the homies wanted that to happen again after the cube was tossed, eventually punishing him twice for the same crime. This is where I got interested. There was a tense two hour period where we were about to fight (and woods are greatly outnumbered) but no one wants to change their release date so that’s not really going to happen. That’s why it’s strange in workers. And this is why politics are strange to me. There are clear ways to fix it such as having the reps meet and discuss what their expectations are; and something should be done about disciplining prisoners after the cops harass them but these folks aren’t so open minded. Lol, go figure. Anyway, I just saw someone put a chair down in the pathway where the cops walk and I gotta tell them to move before our day room gets shut down.

They have this thing called a "3-day kick" or very rarely a “10 day kick.” It’s where they let you go early and it can end up being a popular topic of conversation as you  can imagine. The funniest thing is when prisoners ask each other if they’re gonna get a kick or not.

“Yeah, as a matter of fact I just talked to the guards, they said you are getting released tonight, but don’t say anything, they want it to be a secret.”

So last night at 12:00am I got called to “roll-it-up” or get ready to go home. I was asleep, so I got genuinely irritated; they said it three times from the guard bubble. I had to eventually tell everyone to shut up and there is no such thing as a “45-day kick.” When the guard checked for the fourth time they realized that made a mistake and on my way back to my bunk someone remarked that I should’ve just gone with it, too tired to address the stupidity inherent in that statement, I went to bed.

In the morning I was woken up to the wood rep asking if I threw a cup full of piss in the trash, I haven’t laughed that hard in a while. Seeing the humor in that he laughed too and said someone had told him I had and he was obligated to ask. Jail… am I right?

Last night I laid in my bunk reading. A young kid came up to me and asked if I was reading the bible. He thought I was underlining scripture mostly because that’s what he thought someone would read. I showed him the passage I was underlining:

“Sobriety is okay enough,” Denny says, “but someday, I’d like to live a life based on doing good stuff instead of just not doing bad stuff.”

-Choke by Chuck Palahniuk

He asked me about the book. I told him that the protagonist is a sex addict who scams people into “saving his life” when he forces himself to choke on food. They in turn feel like heroes, and responsible for his life and they start sending him money.

That part’s cool but I felt I should tell him the bottom line, that this guy does all sorts of fucked up shit to get people to love him. Even when he’s with a strange girl he whispers “I love you” to them. So I felt a little strange explaining to an inmate from another race that love was at the core of what this man was looking for, not money, power, or women. Love. I was surprised when he didn’t blow it off but seemed to understand. There was an odd moment where we understood each other. Understand, that this especially took me off guard, considering he and the majority of inmates talk about respect, prison politics, and meth. That’s partially why I read so much. Nobody wants to talk about anything other than the shit that put them here.

Enough with the sensitive chick bullshit. I sound like such a twat. LoL. Let’s get back to violence…

This is the best opportunity I’m gonna get to quit smoking. Gotta have a positive attitude, right? I’m kind of over this. Only 13 days in and I’ve had enough. People tell me I’m hard-timing it by reading books and keeping to myself in my free time. They said I gotta walk around and talk to people… I don’t see the point. The topics of conversation that are bearable are mostly recapping the movies and songs we all miss.

“Remember that movie?"

“Haha. Yeah, me too.”

I’m paraphrasing, but you get the gist. It only makes me miss the outside. People talk about their lives on the outs as its called and I’d bet a soup that 90% of it is bullshit. A lot of people trying to impress each other. Why? We’re in jail.

I hate the bracelet I’m forced to wear. I hate the over-sized clothes, the boxers I hand wash every night, and the colored socks that smell like they look.

Black socks always stink.

I hate reciting my booking number on command: “3058695.” I hate the nasty guards who demoralize me and I can’t say anything back. I guess it’s about compliance. Fuck compliance. Ahhhh, there it is; defiance, my favorite form of sabotage. The one that only really hurts the self.

Writing this out is cathartic as fuck, but I’m not done.

Fucking the people in here and how they behave with their commissary. The nickel and diming, or the favors they want. Fuck the pretend touch guys. Fuck the institutional racism that I’m forced to fall in-line with. Honestly, fuck the judge that sentenced me here. I know I committed a crime and deserved to be punished but what kind of fucking moron would think it was a good idea to send a recovering alcoholic to a place that’s teeming with drugs. So yeah, I stick to myself as much as possible. And yeah, I’m a little angry with my situation....

Of course…

This is all justified…

But I still have things to be grateful for. And I think that separates me from a lot of other prisoners. So thank God for the things that matter: friends, family, health, and of course, this opportunity to quit smoking.

June 8th

“God has chosen to smile upon us today, children. Your King has seen fit to bestow upon you the blessed juice of the cow. Your bones will be fortified with calcium as you prepare for battle tonight and your gut will be strong with nutrients so you will not shy from your fellows. So go forth, men. Go forth and know, no man shall bleed tonight for you are invincible. Protected by the sustenance your King provided. Go forth men and be strong for victory shall be yours.

Last night I was pulled aside and asked if I could be a Linebacker. “Can I? You bet your ass I can! I’ve been waiting for this for a long time.” I walked back to my bunk with a newfound confidence. The Longest Yard was in fact a documentary. In the morning I would be on the gridiron at last, where I belonged.

“You’re killing it, Greene. They’ve finally seen your potential you beautiful son-of-a-bitch.” I said to myself as I rested in anticipation of the day ahead.

In the morning I rose with a smile on my face. I downed a cup of coffee, ate a tuna packet (for protein), and started stretching.

Imagine my surprise when I found out I was working in the kitchen as a line-backer. Backing the line servers. I was crushed. My head hung low as I shuffled my feet in a line with the rest of the workers. A mixture of emotion hung on my face; so happy I was so close to greatness, so sad I’m a line-cook in county jail.

And just as my spirit was about to break for good I was told I would be handing out milk for the entire jail. Guards and prisoners alike. I was responsible for their daily intake of milk. I, Benjamin F. Greene would have the honor of providing these young boys, ney, men with the sustenance they needed to grow and become productive members of society. Heavy is the head that wears the crown.

Ok, you can probably tell by now that these letter are just as much for me as they are you.

And I shit you not, throughout my 10 hour day I must have spoken like that at least two hours whilst holding two little milk cartons in each hand and raising them above my shoulders letting them fall like precious jewels.

Sometimes a situation is only as bleak as you make it.

June 7th

It’s a lot harder to write this when I’m in here. There’s this little shit named Chaves standing by my rack trying to get me to try his “hair grease.” I fuck with him because I like him; he’s a good kid. Actually, there’s a few people I like. I’ll be honest, I thought I was better than jail. Too good for it. I even would joke around about making friends in jail because I thought the idea was absurd. Lo and behold I like a lot of these people. I had a long conversation with a UCLA neuroscience major about differing ideas on recovery earlier today. These are people!!

Let me say this: there are strict rules and punitive violence among the inmates. It’s not an easy place to be, and there are plenty of drugs and homemade wines to help pass the time but there can be hope. There are human beings with compassion and familiar, despite some circumstances, completely reform-able and redeemable. It truly makes me ashamed of the times I chose to continue fucking up my life despite all of the support and resources in the world.

Basically, everything you see on TV is exaggerated BS. I guess it’s a lot easier to condemn outcasts than to help them and take them back into society. People have to own their lives and take responsibility AND they’ve failed. And for the most part nobody cares. I’m just spit balling but maybe a criminal’s right to vote should not be taken away. Lol, I also think that some people’s votes are criminal in their own right.

I hate to do this but It reminds me of a quote by a Rabbi I like: “In a free society, some are guilty, all are responsible.”

OK, back to what’s really going on.

I keep pontificating for some reason. This whole thing is new territory for me. Very difficult to write.

Anyway, despite all the nasty parts of jail I laugh a lot here. A lot. In fact, I even got in trouble today for laughing while working.

Oh yea, I work. Which helps a lot. 50 hours a week and at the end of the day I actually am grateful to head back to my rack.

It’s funny, people tell me this is a particularly bad place as far as jail goes but I don’t see it. Maybe it’s because I watched all those prison shows, or maybe it’s because of my spirit, or maybe I’m handling it well or maybe my opinion will change drastically in a week. I guess we’ll see it out together.

I don’t want to die without scars.

My first entry: fuck that sounds trite. Anyway I hope to convey a sense of what I’m going through (which in the grand scheme of things isn’t much) and I’d like for those who read this to understand my sense of humor which is often self-deprecating and sarcastic. Ok, fuck the dramatic shit

Thoughts: by Ben Greene lol.

Fuck me that’s cringe-worthy. I don’t know what to say here. Let’s be honest, 4 months (at half time, so 60 days) isn’t much. I’m trying to convey a new perspective I have on this sort of thing. From an anthropological view I can go to jail and learn about a completely different culture. I used to think I was tough - I've always rocked a kind of devil-may-care attitude towards life.

Laughable really. My how people change when they're forced to walk their talk. Where does that tough guy attitude come from? It's not who I am. It was most likely a defense mechanism that probably served at the time; maybe as a reaction to my environment. It was a survival skill that one day stopped making sense. Now, even after I drop the facade at  certain points, I still carry the beliefs.

I thought it was funny to drive intoxicated.  Honestly, I felt justified in this particular mode of transportation by the fact that I was planning on being drunk as a way of life and I would, of course, have to drive at times- so naturally society would just have to give my vehicle a wide berth as it cruised down the 405 occasionally careening in between lanes. My intoxication is really just me exercising my free-will, after all, and when did Southern California’s total acceptance of outlier beliefs develop an exception for my high BAC fueled endeavors? Scientologists get a break and I get jail time.

What a fucking juvenile concept of free-will. Jesus, the more I write the more I can see my faults.

It’s surprisingly cathartic, this “honesty" thing. While, of course, I want people to think this is a good blog and in turn approve of me- that’s  seems a lot more inconsequential now.

That’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to write what I think and know it’s authentic... if you don’t like it that’s fine.

So nuts and bolts: I am turning myself in to Theo Lacy Jail this afternoon. It’s the first time I’ve had to spend any real amount of time in jail and I feel good.

I'll let that sink in.

I can’t explain it. I can guess that it comes with me trying to truly understand free-will. Can I be free in jail? Yes.

I’m in recovery for substance abuse but I don’t like it when people suggest that freedom from active addiction is the most important thing. That’s not good enough for me and it doesn’t offer much insight.

When I trust my gut, am I exercising free-will?

Am I being guided by my experiences in the past that still hold me hostage to their behaviors? Is my past standing there with a gun to my head ordering me to speak calmly and tell all the nice people I'm doing fine?

If it made sense to react one way to a given situation during my teens that doesn’t mean it makes sense now. I was quick to lash out at people that threatened me and that worked.

For a time.

A surprisingly long time.

That behavior seemed valuable and my brain got the message that these behaviors were good. Positive reinforcement. Little medals pinned to their outfits. Little gold stars by their names.

However misguided, it served a purpose. But now that no longer works.

But it’s still in me. So now, if I behave like that am I acting on free-will? Or am I just letting my past dictate my behaviors? Can that be seen as free-will? These questions are important to me and I sometimes believe that people use certain phrases, slogans, or platitudes to avoid thinking. Especially in recovery.

Fuck, that was a strange turn. Look at me on my soapbox. Lol. Why am I philosophizing? I guess It could be an internal search to create meaning out of this experience. I’m not focused right now, I’m all over the place and I’m trying to write this blog and make it good.

My friend David, who owns this company and is seeing me through this process asked me to do this.

Fuck David.

This is just giving me a platform to puff up an already over-inflated sense of self-importance. And I sure as shit don’t want to be seen waxing philosophically about an experience that for all I know might end up being trivial.

Right?

Truth is, this is a real struggle and an opportunity to grow. I’m not a career criminal and as somebody who just wants to do his time, make it productive, and change my path this is something that I’d like for anyone still reading this to identify with. So thank you David Gable, I am grateful for this opportunity to embarrass myself in a public forum. Lord knows I'm well versed in it.