Mindset (Part 3), 8-22-2010

 I was asked what life I expect after prison. Considering that I had been crafting suicide for months before my arrest, I had not thought of any future. I cannot imagine any life after prison. I sincerely believe dying in prison shall be a good thing. In any life where I survive prison, I see myself as a62 year old whose existence is at best unhelpful and, at worst, irrelevant.

I admit this view would differ a bit if I were sentenced to the statutory minimum of five years. I could see more possibilities of being useful at 55 than at 62. I do not ever see a return to my old life, for good or bad, and I cannot imagine living as anything but an outcast.

The outcast does not even require prison. I meant to cast myself in such a light when I was contemplating suicide. With one schizophrenic exception, everyone here shares with me the same middle-class lifestyle and agrees this pretrial detention has been enough to deter them from ever committing their crimes ever again. How will 7, 10, 12 years in prison make us any more repentant? I can see myself without a place in the world of 2022, I can see myself having acquired a prison mentality, but I cannot see myself any more penitent than I now am.

How did we get to this messy juncture? We bought the idea that criminal sentencing could be done wholesale. The politicians turned human beings into abstractions. What happens when any system removes the humanity from the people enmeshed in its system? I am about to find out the answer to that question.  I do not imagine good things.

You would do well to think what the products of such a system think of the system and its creators. Here I remove myself from the discussion entirely – I am too tired to care about myself. Whether as politician or government official or mere citizen, you helped create a system meant to dehumanize people. What obligations have you placed upon them towards civil society? If they are worthless in their humanity, what respect shall they give to anyone else's humanity? I say you are creating a world that has the possibility of being short, nasty, and brutish. In short, civil society becomes prison society and Thomas Hobbes swaps places with John Locke.

I expected complete abandonment by family and friends. I have been more shocked by friends offering help, followed by months of silence. That actually hurt when I thought I was beyond hurt. Now, I shrug my shoulders with the realization that I did wrong, as I always did wrong by asking too much. My former wife surprised me by her kindness even though I had thoroughly embarrassed her in public.

From the outside silence, I concluded I need to bring my thoughts to an end. I had, as I said, hoped to illuminate and educate and atone for my sins, as well as my crimes. (I do not see any room for atonement in the federal sentencing guidelines – either in theory or substance). Maybe I have done so, but I do not know and expect no likelihood of acquiring any such knowledge.

I have some more pieces I would like to see done. They are erratic, miscellaneous pieces, having almost nothing to do with my crimes, sentence, or even my life generally. I find myself looking forward to a hearing without preparation or much in the way of agreement, and can only say so be it. I would have preferred to have turned my self-destruction to better uses, but I cannot. I can only say, I did the best with what I had on hand.

I confess to retaining a bit of vanity. I think have written more and better material than I have in almost thirty years. I am happy about that fact. That almost makes me regret not completing my suicide plans. I had an eight-year-old tell me a month ago that he missed. That made me regret ever planning my self-destruction. Right now, I have the worst of all possible worlds; I destroyed everything about my life except my life, which left me prison bound. I always screw up my plans. I will miss Robert Burns.

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