Local Program for Helping Criminals Return to Life

From The Muncie Star-Press comes Reentry support program meant to change lives of jail inmates once they're freed:

State and local officials gathered Thursday at the Justice Center to discuss and provide an update on the Integrated Reentry and Correctional Support program that launched at the county jail late last month. The program provides peer coaching for inmates and, in conjunction with the Delaware County Manufacturers Alliance and Ivy Tech Community College, can provide job placement and continuing mental health and addiction treatment after release.

The article does not specify but most jail inmates should not be felons.

These programs are necessary for the inmates and the public unless the public wants to gas all of us criminals.

Which the public cannot do in Indiana unless the people want to change their Bill of Rights:

Section 15. No person arrested, or confined in jail, shall be treated with unnecessary rigor.

***

 Section 18. The penal code shall be founded on the principles of reformation, and not of vindictive justice.

Somewhat off topic is Abolish life sentences but I think this passage (at least) relevant:

...Moreover, ‘virtual life sentences’ – those greater than 50 years – effectively condemn almost all those serving them to a life in prison. In 2016, more than 44,000 people in the US were serving virtual life sentences.

Can anything justify these harsh sentences, in particular life or other very long sentences?

The answer is no. It’s easy to show that the public safety arguments for these sentences are fallacious, which leaves the conclusion that only retribution could possibly warrant them. But when understood in any reasonable way, retribution also fails to justify them.

I can say on the federal side no such rights exist, nor any emphasis on reformation. Neither my prison case manager nor my halfway house counselor nor my PO have had any plan on how I was to reintegrate into civil society. You can click on the little box on the right hand corner to find what I have written under the topics of Prison life and Halfway House Life and Supervised Life for details. Perhaps the reason my PO acts ss if I am about to go on a criminal rampage is knowing the federal government does nothing to prepare its prisoners for a life without crime. Well, this is how your tax dollars are spent.

I took upon myself avoiding what Public Safety Dance describes as supervision's problems:

Supervision nudges an individual into an “acceptable” lifestyle, generally at the bottom of the food chain, within a society where corporations exert ever more control over daily life. It’s supposed to make people better, but many describe the experience as so torturous that they would rather just be in prison. Many others die—from gaps in health care, from being uninsured and poor, from conditions that worsened in prison—and at rates over twelve times higher than the average person in the United States.

In the best case scenario, a person under supervision can have everything an unsupervised person has—except for their agency. We can expect that to have all the “public safety” money can buy will be similarly unpleasant.

 I came out of prison knowing of alternatives to crime and having had  goals restored to me. Plenty of my fellow prisoners had no alternative except a life of crime, never felt any purpose to their life except criminality. The people of Delaware County know its jail inmates are part of their community and programs offering those inmates a life different than what led them to jail benefits the whole of Delaware County.

sch 8/15/22

Final Comments on VOA Halfway House

 Another subject I have been putting off. I thought two months and my annoyance with the halfway house experience would mellow. It has not.

I have learned in the past few weeks that Social Security sent mail to the VOA. I have written here about how my VOA case manager dealt with my earlier mail issues. The alleged purpose of the halfway house experience is to help former prisoners transition to civilian life. The VOA's inability to forward my mail put roadblocks in the way of my obtaining food stamps and also Social Security benefits. Food and income sure seemed necessary to my being able to survive outside of incarceration.

I make note of that just do you can factor in my biases.

If the public expects the halfway house experience to lead criminals from criminality to some level of respectability through employment, then I have several questions about the VOA.

See, the VOA halfway house acts on behalf of the federal courts of the Southern District of Indiana. That District covers a lot of territory. The VOA halfway house, instead, centers itself on Marion County. None of us from outside of Marion County received any help in obtaining employment in our home counties. The emphasis was on getting work in Marion County - even if it meant the person's employment would end as soon as their stay ended with the VOA. How did this help those returning from prison who want a steady, functioning life?

I had experience with employment agencies. Those agencies prepared their clients for interviews. The VOA had companies who contacted them for bodies. Amongst some of us inmates there were questions about the intimacy between these employers and the VOA. We wondered if these jobs were to benefit the VOA or us.

There was no teaching inmates how to search for jobs, no instructions on how to prepare resumes. Yet, there had been such instruction back in 2010.

There was no Narcotics Anonymous or even AA. Instead, there were addicts on  the edge of passing out around the third floor television.

I thought of Fort Dix FCI as a Potemkin village, but I wonder now if all the United States Bureau of Prisons touches does not suffer the fate. If the VOA was to give me guidance on obtaining work so I could support myself away from prison, if the halfway experience was to help me come to grips with the societal changes occuring during my imprisonment, then the experience was an absolute failure.

On the other hand, I have to thank the VOA for providing free wi-fi. I did not get access to it until I was moved to the second floor. I managed listened music on YouTube and get research done (some of which has been appearing here). Oddly, pornography never crossed my mind.

That I think most people do not care about criminals returning home - I think they would prefer us all to disappear in preferably into a hole in the ground. But we do return home as living beings. That services are needed for prisoners  not be a disputed point. Too bad the VOA does not provide services sufficient for the need.

sch

Update 9-15-2020

Two weeks have gone by since my last entry. It seemed longer.

I remain dissatisfied with the VOA halfway house. I write that even though I am out on a 3 hour pass having been promoted to Level 4. Whoopie! I went to CVS to get my refill of Zoloft. I do like the Zoloft as it seems to keep me from getting too agitated. I have been smoking a few cigarettes, all the same. Puffing, not inhaling. They taste bad which is a strange counter-balance to my roiling stomach. I cannot go to the IUPUI library (due to a lack of computer supervision for a villain like me) but I can go to the Center City Mall. If I were the maniac the federal government thinks me, should I be let loose in a mall? I guess since there is nothing to do in the mall [and subsequently, fewer people] the VOA feels safe in letting me go there. Having been there and finding not even an open restaurant, I can understand their feeling of safety. I had to go across the street to the PNC Center to find an open Subway (my first in around 11 years).

I do not mind not going to the library as I purchased through Thrift Books John Dos Passos' USA Trilogy.  I am half way through the first novel, The 42nd Parallel. More about that later.

I have not yet decided if I trust my case manager. Allegedly she has a bias against sex offenders. Such malice I have not seen. Instead, I get this when we meet:

1. when I asked about speaking with my federal probation officer who will need to approve my apartment, she says I need to give her a note 2 weeks before my departure (10/7/21 is when I leave, so my deadline is 9/22); and
2. I need to remind her over and over of my intentions to settle in Muncie [we had been meeting every two weeks since my arrival]. 

If I had not asked about the probation officer, I do not think she would have offered the information. Our next meeting is 9/27/2021. If I had waited till then would it have been too for me to get my apartment approved? [Turned she found out there was no need for the PO to approve the apartment.] If so, What would I have done for a place to live? Rather than bias, I prefer thinking her talents do not rise to the occasion.

If not for myself, I would not have a job. If not for my people [and the internet], I would be without any leads on where to live.  Where is the aid in translating me from prison life to civilian life?

I offer this observation as my answer: the halfway house concerns itself first with meeting bureaucratic dictates, then with incarceration of its inmates and then with managing its drug addicts and its mental health inmates., and transition into civilian comes up when they have a few spare moments. Ms. Greenup dutifully asks me questions from the checklist on her computer. She has never engaged me in conversation. Sbhe presented goals for me back in May without any input from me - without asking me why or why not I had any goals of my own. Instead, she inserted my obtaining employment by May 28 as an aspirational goal and then did nothing to promote that goal. Frankly, I have not cared overmuch about her role. 

Four things being in the VOA has allowed me to do: 1) get a knock off of a London Fog coat; 2) raise money for an apartment (they do feed and shelter me);  2) use of the computer lab to get this blog started; and 4) using their computers to get my play "Masque of the Red Death" in an electronic format. I could have gotten only #2 done in a homeless shelter.

I should probably thank them for the free wi-fi also.  I would have gone completely bonkers without anything to read. Instead I have been using my flip phone to fulfill my urges to read. And for music, too - YouTube has been a joy. I have been using my 2 hours of charging my electronic monitoring device for listening to Jonathan Franzen and Jhumpa Lahiri and other writers. Last night I listened to a lecture on D.H. Lawrence and this morning it was John Dos Passos. Don't tell the VOA about all this unsupervised computer use.  I would hate to undermine their confidence in what I would do with unfettered computer use.  (Right now I am listening to Howling Wolf's Moaning in the Moonlight album.) You, dear reader, may be surprised at the lack of my temptation to indulge in criminal activity. It was never a compulsion and now I feel I am living on borrowed time and have no time to waste on useless ugliness. I have debts to pay I do not have the time for anything distracting me from my obligations. But let's not upset the government and its agents with any contradictions to their party line. They do think they mold reality.

But why should you trust felonious me?

I have seen an eye doctor - I got new glasses that look good on me and reassurances of relative good health for my eyes. 

There was a second meeting with my primary care doctor. All is good there - except for my lungs and her wanting a colonoscopy for me.

I am getting along at Jimmy Johns. I will miss those people as much as I will not miss the VOA.

I need to get back to my writing. I hope to raise funds and I will need to pay the rent.

sch

Update - 4 Hour Passes 9-1-2021

Ms. Greenup told me this past Monday she had told me 2 weeks before I was now eligible for weekly 4 hour passes. She had not said a word, but I felt no need to be contradictory. I put in for the IUPUI undergrad library. 

That pass she denied me on the grounds of my needing supervision around computers. She didn't ask why I wanted to go to the library. That I have new glasses that do not gouge my nose and make seeing a pleasure has me wanting to read. As I read the IUPUI rules, computer access is limited. Which left me without my Louis Ferdinand Celine novel and books on John Dos Passos.

I put in another pass for religious services. I have yet to see if it has been granted. They can censor my reading material, will they also interfere with my free exercise of religion. [I did get that pass without a problem.]

sch

First Day of Work 7-30-2021

 I finished my first day of working at Jimmy Johns. I was all too keyed up for it. I thought of buying a pack of Camels. My bowels were unsteady. Yet I survived. The timeclock is now a computer (a tablet mounted on the wall), but restaurant work has not really changed in 40 years.  A certain personality works at a restaurant - the sort who could not work an assembly line at a restaurant. I didn't screw up too badly, so I may last. 

Meanwhile, I need a second job. Old Sam needs the money.

Going to work had me away from the imprisoned for the longest amount of time since March 2, 2021.

sch

What Happened in the Conference Room 7-26-2021

I got called down to the conference room this morning. Expecting close questioning about my blogging exploits what I got was a room holding with six or seven other inmates of this work release center, the employment specialist Mr. Smith and the head honcho Mr. Boles. Work release center is the term used by management. I think it more accurate than halfway house. This meeting was to let us know of job opportunities. Being the only one from the second floor I felt out of place until I grasped the meeting's theme: we were the ones they wanted outside working with companies management had lined up to employ inmates. My name came out of Mr.. Boles' mouth regarding ALSCO what all was wrong about that job for someone with COPD like me and after announcing I had an upcoming interview with Goodwill Industries he kept quiet about me and jobs. Mr. Smith offered to talk to someone at Goodwill to help me get the job. [There was no indication of any such call when I interviewed with Goodwill and I did not get the job.]

Call me surprised. Where was all this helpfulness before today?

However, I may have found an alternative in Tipton.

sch

Job Hunting 7-21-2021

Mr. Smith [VOA personage in charge of employment issues] says no passes for job interview. I said I emailed you on Monday and he had not replied to my email and should've let me know he had no passes from me. Mr. Smith said he didn't need to tell me anything Then he hung up.

sch

Watching Movies By Myself at the Halfway House 7-12-2021

The Prizefighter and the Lady: So that Jethro's dad - Max Baer, himself - the antagonist of The Cinderella Man, where he was made out to be a jerk but here he carries himself well. Myrna Loy looks too lovely to contemplate her in Cheaper By the Dozen. Thank you, Turner Classic Movies.

The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox: Goldie Hawn on the verge of her run as a big star. I had never seen this movie after hearing about it for years I was not impressed. I recall an interview where Burt Reynolds said he would have liked to have the George Segal role and I think he would have done a better job. That is if Burt didn't smile too much.

I kept flipping between the two of them; not being in the mood to watch either. 

We set up Tubi last night. We watched Keanu Reeves in Henry's Crime.  Maybe I'm getting slap happy in the halfway house but I liked the movie and Reeves' performance as a man finding himself was convincing.  Not a blockbuster, not in the least splashy, but plays to Reeves' talents as much as the John Wick movies.

TCM showed Clark Gable and Marion Davies in Cain and Mabel. I kept switching off to the news - it  was 7 AM, after all. Gable was a boxer and Davies a showgirl. They hate one another and then they fall in love. This was the first time I had seen Marion Davies. She was cute enough, talented enough but not enough to spark any interest in me. Three thoughts came to me from watching her: 

1. This was William Randolph Hearst's mistress;
2. I can understand why they cast Amanda Seyfried in Mank; and 
3. I finally appreciate Jean Harlow

On Fubi I watched Oklahoma Crude. This one I need to look up - I kind of recall it back when I was a kid (the stars were George C. Scott and Faye Dunaway, after all). I don't think it was a success. Like Bite the Bullet, this was a Western set after the closing of the frontier. No sex, not even romance, but there is death in the pursuit of oil that turns out not to be there. An ambiguous ending that could have be seen as pointless or absurd. The ending reminds me of Harper (also lately seen on TCM). Could be this is a movie that would play better now unless it drew the ire of our cancel culture.

I tried watching a Parker Posey/Jeff Goldblum, Fay Grim. The writer/director kept the camera aslant and that was not enough for me find any humor in the comedy. Goldblum and Parker were so arch they could have gotten jobs with McDonald's.

I tried What Happened to Jack Kerouac. No idea how old it was but the sound kept going from documentary low volume mumble to advertising jingle loud, I'm not sure this added to my knowledge of Kerouac since I am not sure what I heard other than spontaneous writing and drunkenness and San Francisco.

Then I tried What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael. This I could hear clearly. This was filled with images and talk and talk that was vigorous, balanced, and fun. This has been the best thing, so far.

I gave Parker Posey another go with Broken English. Parker is intelligent and good-looking and talented actress. The movie is a quiet thing about a woman in her 30s , still single, trying to find her place in the world after college and a degree in art who is now working customer service in a hotel. I find I do not like her a doormat character. She was the best thing in Netflix's Lost in Space. There she cut loose as a psychopathic Dr. Smith; there she was subversive. In Henry Grim, she was passive and not at all subversive - at least she was not before I pulled the plug. This was pleasant in a wistful way. Besides, the director, Zoe R. Cassavetes gave her mom, Gena Rowlands, a part and anything with Gena Rowlands I think worth watching.

I'd rather be working but what I get is movies.

sch

No Computer Saturdays 6-19-2021

I probably need a break from the computer. The carpal tunnel has flared up.

Thing is access during the night and weekends depends on who is working. Some have no problem with where others say since no one is back there I cannot use the computer lab.

I still need to get the advertising set up. I need to make money with this blog - the necessity of poverty. I am also balancing the blog and typing up my play "The Masque of the Red Death."

And pushing me onwards is the knowledge that at some point I will be working and will not have even the access now given me, and thus causing this project falter and die. IJ can put up enough posts to get me into September, if I can get 2  weeks in front of a computer.  That would be even quicker if I did not need to adhere to the VOA's schedule.

Finally, I'm not sure what the halfway house would think of this blog and so I work very much on the sly.

sch

Bands Who Never Got Any Respect In Indianapolis 7-25-21

 I might as well continue complaining about Indianapolis radio - even though I cannot currently post to my blog. What I can do is type up my notes into Google Docs. And I have access to YouTube

Let’s get to the list:

• Dave Edmunds

• The Replacements

• Joe Ely

• The Ramones

• Ian Hunter

• X

• Television

• New York Dolls

• T. Rex

• Sex Pistols

• Mott the Hoople

• Patti Smith

• Buzzcocks

• The Kinks

• Iggy and the Stooges

• Iggy

• Frank Zappa

• and The Mothers of Invention

• Little Feat

• David Bowie

• The Clash

And a bonus from The Clash for those with a certain sense of humor,

7/25/2021

Halfway House Update 8-30-21

 Well, I still cannot  add to my blog through Blogger.  Doesn’t mean I cannot add notes to Google Docs for later usage on blogger.

No,I  have not mentioned this to the staff here. I need access to the computer lab for finding jobs and a place to live. The VOA has not been much of any help in these areas but they sure could be an obstruction I do not need. Besides, 

You want to ask them why they blocked access to Blogger,feel free to call 

Oddly, the ban does not apply to blogs themselves. I can view my blog; I cannot update it from in here.

Notice from here on out the posts that I am putting up first on Google Docs will have the date of creation in their title.

Two weeks ago I asked Ms. Greenup about finding a place to live after I leave here. She blurted out that the VOA could not give me any financial assistance in finding an apartment. Since I have been working at Jimmy Johns, that was not on my mind. She then quickly said federal probation could pay for my continued stay at the VOA. If I stay any longer at the VOA, I will need a rubber room. We have now one mental patient on our floor, still no windows. All I wanted was time to go look and pretty much told her that. She said I needed to work through the levels for passes. Well, today I am giving her my two pay stubs, so the levels should go up and I get more passes. T2 suggested the Muncie Mission and that is what I suggested yesterday to my sister and K and KH.

Yes, I had visitation of sorts. I had my sister and K come down to drive me on my hygiene pass. Also a first for me. I shorted myself an hour. I felt very agitated.I bought me a pack of Camels - I felt that agitated. No, the Zoloft the doctor has had me on for the past 2 weeks was not enough. It felt like what I wanted to say either did not get said or not said in a sensible manner. Oh, well,it was it was  start. I almost gave the control desk my receipt for the cigarettes instead of the receipt for bandaids.

I do now have a book to read, a Walter Mosely novel.

I like working for Jimmy Johns. I am getting really tired but at least I am doing something to prove I can be more than just institutionalized.

Regarding Nelson Algren 7/25/21

The halfway house has wifi which I can access with my flip phone. I need to read and so I will probably burn out what is left of my eyes. Meanwhile…

Reading about Nelson Algren on Lithub makes me wonder if I have engaged enough with the marginalized, with criticizing those in power. 

I read A Heroic Line of Losers by Brook Horvath which is just one of the pieces to be found about how great a writer Algren was and why he is now such an obscure one. Long-Awaited ‘Algren’ Documentary to Open in Chicago is another but has the advantage of a video excerpt. (Now I have to spend time on YouTube not looking up Pretenders videos.) There is an interview with his latests biographer here: Nelson Algren’s Strange Midnight Dignity. This one may explain why Algren does not go away:

J.H.: Yours will be the third biography of Algren. Most writers are lucky (or unlucky) to get one. Why do you think there has been so much interest in his life?

C.A.: The simplest answer is also the truest: Algren’s life remains interesting because of his work.

Algren’s writing has several things going against it. He uses vernacular extensively, which can be difficult to parse now that it is decades old. His books are lightly plotted, and his protagonists are deeply flawed. The environments he conjures are brutal. And yet, Algren’s books have aged well. One reason for that is the singularity of his prose. It’s possible to orient Algren’s work within the American tradition—his stuff contains some of the naturalism in Farrell and early Steinbeck; he writes with a rhythm that’s reminiscent of Hemingway, occasionally; and he uses imagery that has echoes of Carl Sandburg’s poems—but he was not derivative; as a stylist, he stood alone. He consciously tried to appeal to the eye and the ear simultaneously, and as a result his work is complex, closely observed and precise, but also propulsive and pleasurable to read. 

‘Because of the singularity of Algren’s style, people still feel they’ve discovered something new when they first encounter his work.’

A brief anecdote: I recently introduced an acquaintance to Algren. Trying not to say too much or sell too hard, I suggested she read The Man with the Golden Arm. When I saw her the following week, she enthused: “The book reads like poetry. The sentences have a rhythm. I can hear the rhythm of the El tracks in everything.”

Because of the singularity of Algren’s style, people still feel they’ve discovered something new when they first encounter his work. I had that experience with his writing, and I have heard the same from many people since. Given that Algren wrote his best work more than sixty years ago, and millions of copies of his books have been purchased, this is a remarkable phenomenon, and goes a long way toward explaining why people remain interested in his life.

But Algren’s subject matter is also a factor in his enduring relevance. It’s a cliché to say that a writer whose career peaked and then faded suffered because he was ahead of his time, but in Algren’s case it’s true.

Algren focused almost exclusively on the lives of people who, he felt, had been marginalized or discarded by America—prisoners, itinerant laborers, alcoholics, morphine addicts, petty criminals, prostitutes, and boxers. Other writers, of course, have done the same. But Algren’s work is distinct because of the convictions that motivated it. He chose his characters advisedly, and saw their stories as an integral part of the American story. He focused on the portions of society that benefit least from America’s wealth because he believed the quality of their lives was an accurate gauge of the country’s moral health, that the struggles they faced foretold the challenges the remainder of society would soon face. This insight allowed him to produce insights that were decades ahead of their time.

LitHub has a podcast link of an interview with the the same biographer under the title of On the Excoriating Speech Nelson Algren Delivered to College English Students.  Oh, it kept me listening.

The Nation reviews this biography under Rediscovering Nelson Algren, which includes this paragraph:

Does Algren matter? His legacy across the decades has been kept alive by other writers (Don DeLillo, Barry Gifford, Kay Boyle, Ernest Hemingway, Simone de Beauvoir, Russell Banks, his good friend Studs Terkel, among many others); a handful of academics (Malcolm Cowley, Brooke Horvath, William Savage, Carlo Rotella, Hazel Rowley); and a belief in him that’s a powerful mixture of loving the work and loving the man. He was lovable and beloved, not simply because the things he stood for still hold true and remain important, even if we believe they do, but because he embodied them and couldn’t help himself. Algren wasn’t against selling out; he just couldn’t do it, even when he tried. How can you not love someone who is incapable of profiting, whose anti-capitalism runs that deep?

I wonder if I understood A Walk on the Wild Side - if having come to it late I am confusing what Algren did first with his successors. Something I called long ago the Chuck Berry effect - people had heard Chuck’s songs by others and failed to give him credit for starting the whole mess.

Nonconformity comes under discussion which left me thinking I understood that book.

In fact, "Nonconformity" could hardly be more relevant to our own time -- when lawmakers can speak without blinking of "cutting the budget" as they actually cut the throats of various powerless classes of people. American writers, says Algren, must report "the defeats in which everything is lost . . . [that] cost everything of real value." They must write from "ruthlessness and alienation" of "the unswept streets where most of humanity has always lived." Their attitude to both politicians and society must be: "This ain't what you rung for, Jack -- but it's what you're damned well getting." Smugness and tidiness must be tossed in the garbage can, along with the other accoutrements of a literary career. "American literature isn't anybody phoning to anybody or anybody writing about anybody," he holds. "American literature is the woman in the courtroom who, finding herself undefended on a charge, asked, `Isn't anybody on my side?' "

Sch

World Novels 7-25-21

Try The Modern Literary Novel site here with its emphasis on the translated novel.  The site describes itself as follows:

The purpose of this site is to give an idiosyncratic view of modern (i.e. more or less 20th/21st century) literature, as represented by the novel. It is biased towards my taste and towards the English-speaking world and Europe. You will find very little reference to short stories, drama, poetry and other literary forms, not because I do not consider them worthwhile but because I have less interest in and knowledge of them.

Most, though certainly not all, the books mentioned here have been published in English, though many are now sadly out-of-print. This site is strictly non-academic. I am not and have never been an academic and have aimed it at the intelligent reader who reads modern literature for pleasure.

And there is a blog included in the site:

Among the Japanese writers are Kenzaburo Oe, and Haruki Murakami, whom I have read. There is a very enlightening review of Murakami's Kafka on the Shore - a novel I have read and impressed by and for which my notes will probably appear in the future - and Killing Commendatore - and his view is similar to hmine (mine was negative and will also to appear here in the future). With Kenzaburo Oe's A Personal Matter there is pretty much a plot summary compared to what he does with the Murakami books.

With the Europeans here has: 

• Milan Kundera -  The Joke  gets a short summary while The Unbearable Lightness of Being   gets some serious criticism.

• László Krasznahorkai has and external links

• Magda Szabó's article has a comment on Abigail - including a plot description better than you will get from me and a positive conclusion.

• David Albahari has a bio paragraph, some links but no commentary on Gotz and Meyer, the only novel I have read by Albahari

• Mikhail Bulgakov appears with a comment on The Master and Margarita - which of course he likes (and who doesn’t?)

• Victor Pelevin gets a bio paragraph and comments on several of Pelevin’s books but not A Werewolf Problem in Central Russia

• Georgi Gospodinov  -  a paragraph for a bio, links and gets a discussion of his Natural Novel which concludes with:

...In the end… What? He sits in his battered and much repaired rocking chair. He becomes a tramp and his old friends don’t recognise him any more. In the end, nothing. This is not a realist novel so, while it can have multiple beginnings, it really does not need a conventional end. It is very well done and very well written. If this does not kill the realist novel, nothing will.

No More Blogging 7/25/2021

Well, the system administrator here at the halfway house has set it up so

I don't have access to Blogger. Guess it was a good thing I got the posts

done that I did. I am left wondering what threat was felt by the staff here.

Maybe they actually tracked down the blog? They probably got an eyeful! Let’s

see what is said.

This the message announcing the blockage:

Bitdefender Endpoint Security Tools blocked this page

This page is blocked by your system administrator. (Content Control, Web Category Filter: Social Networks, Blogs, Computers and Software).

Access from your browser has been blocked.

Yet, I could access the blog to read. Figure that out.

Sch

Interpretations 7/21/2021

 Yesterday, my case worker found me sneaking in Youtube videos while I was in the computer lab. I get the feeling she did not approve. I didn’t approve of the female group’s interpretation of Led Zeppelin's “Whole Lot of Love.” (Here is the video of The Devil's Daughters' version.)

Then I got thinking she thinks I’m hunting down pornography. (Okay, I do think the singers depend too much on their cleavage but pornographic?) And should she think this? Because the federal government has interpreted me as one for whom pornography would be his sole interest in life. If not sole, then certainly chief.

I do not see myself this way, but I permitted this interpretation when I remained alive to admit my felonies. I have also left myself open to an interpretation of pedophilia. No one wants to interpet me as a damned fool.

I do interpret myself as a damned fool. You may think this as a plea of mitigation. If so, why do I not feel any lessening of the damage I have done to myself?

But more broadly, surely more interestingly than focussing on myself, is using this as an example of the divergence between interpretations and the creator’s intentions. Moreover, how an official opinion - whether the official nature arises from the power of an office or the power of custom does not seem to matter here -  affects those making an interpretation of philosophy, work of art or  literature, or any other human action or work needs reckoned with. The distance between a creator’s intention and the received dogma built up interpretation needs considering.

Seems to me we need to understand the text as reality. Our interpretation - even those of the creator - need be judged by how they track the  actual text.

Explaining the text must not be confused with explaining one’s reaction to the text. With the latter, reality is not the text but the intersection of text and observer. (Which prompts me to think the French would say the first was not possible, only the intersection of text and observer). 

Just a few thoughts on the spur of the moment. YMMV.

Sch

Updating the Job Search

 Well, I thought I would have a job this week. I put i9n passes for Firehouse Subs and Goodwill Industries. The employment specialist said I did not put in the pases. So I sat on my behind Thursday instead of being about and getting a job. 

That is I mostly sat on my behind. I sent an email to Goodwill about the problem and setting up a new interview for July 29. I also set up a meeting for Jimmy Johns on Monday - a possibility unknown to the staff here at the halfway house -  and spoke again with Giordano's Pizza. Jimmy Johns is 99.9% certainly, so I may have a job this Monday. Giordano's told me on Friday they will have an opening for me in 2 weeks.

All this raises issues of trust. The employment specialist here seems to have wanted me to go into a factory which would not have  be conducive to my COPD. I had sent him an email checking on my passes (for there have been stories circulating here on how he has sabotaged jobs) this past Monday. He did not answer my email. When I calle dhim and he told me the pass requests had never been received and mentioned the unanswered email, he said it was not his responsibility to tell me anything.

I also almost got caught posting to this blog. I did get caught searching YouTube for music by ms. Greenup who I think did not appreciate this The Devil's Daughters video. I got to say I wasn't impressed with their performance. maybe they should spend more time thinking about the music than on their cleavage.

I cannot kick the idea I would be happier out of this place.

Not a Complete Loss of a Day

 I have been trying to get into the computer lab since noon. When I got in here a little after 3 pm I was told by the person running the front desk that I needed to be done by 4p,  So I got 50 minutes. He doesn't want anyone back here when the staff is gone. He is one of two of our jailers who does this. Which is why I am expecting nothin  to be done over the weekend. We will see who comes in at 6 pm.

I got got to see documentary on William F. \Buckley and Gore Vidal and I applied to 2 jobs, so I guess it has not been a total loss. 

Second Interview to Awry

I get to  Giordano's Pizza ahead of time which turns out to be a benfit since the person running the store is tnot who I talked to on the telephone, has no idea of who I am, and nothing from my online application. I did a paper application, was told to call back tomorrow at 10 am, and sent back to the halfway house.

Wednesday's Bus Trip

 Wednesday's Bus Trip went much better than yesterday's. I had no feeling of being trapped in hell. Maybe the crazy man outside the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra's office was a good omen. The bus went north and then back to East Street. I was the only rider at this time and continued to be so until I got to 10th Street and Shadeland Avenue. 

The first part of the trip - downtown and then onto around Fountain Square- was about seeing so much fine new housing - although downtown there was next to one a part of the Wheeler Mission with its denizens contrasting with the fine place to its south.  Makes me wonder with all this fine looking apartments and houses if there is all that much affordable housing in Indianapolis. After all, Indiana does like to recruit low-paying jobs. 

The bus went down English to Southeastern Avenue. Twin Aire looks to be in operation still. Went by Christian Park - saw a Mexican Restaurant where the old Linder's was. The little DQ is still there on English. 

Then went through the south side of Irvington and then back on English from Arlington to Shortridge. The Ford plant is gone. There is a trucking company next to the old Colonial Bakery. Shortridge has a different trailer park and Trimble's is gone. They tore down Al Green's but maybe that was when I was living down here twenty years ago . IMPD has taken over Eastgate. 

I saw no movie theaters - not at Twin Aire and not at Eastgate - so where will people go to see movies?  Or is it all at home with Netflix nowadays?

 The Great Clips was at 10th & Shadeland. That intersection looks a little different but the only things I really noticed were no Bonanza restaurant and there's now a sushi restaurant off of 10th.

I got a great haircut, by the way.

Going back, I caught a bus taking me along 10 Street back downtown. My main impression was that much of East 10th Street seems now quite stylish. Then, too, some parts seem unchanged from the Eighties.

I am still unsettled by yesterday's misadventures. One thing I decided today was to print off the bus schedules., to stop thinking I have a clue how anything functions today.

The Worst Day in My Life

Okay, not the worst days of my life. There is one day back in 1984 that was incredibly awful and January 1, 1985 was far from a picnic.

Call this the worst day since I got out of prison. Call it the first time I had thoughts of doing myself in to get out of what was either "IndyGo Hell" or "Bad Karma for Me."

The front desk and me started feuding just after lunch about me using the computer room, again. I wanted to work on the "The Masque of the Red Death" and get my phone reupped. I got a few more pages done on the play but got nowhere on re-upping the phone. I came backdown to the front door at 1:50 pm and was told to go back up for another 5 minutes. I had my resume with me then. I came back without the resume but did not notice this till I was out the door and hundred feet from the halfway house. I go back in, got a lecture about returning before the pass's return date, and had to be patted down. I missed the bus by about the same amount of time.

The bus I got didn't get me close to where I was supposed to go. I got stuck in a downpour as I walked towards my appointment. I was now late for the interview. I kept walking a few miles. Soaked to the bone. .I never found the Staples. I missed three buses. I ran after one bus - all 240 pounds of me was running down 86th Street chasing a bus. I was beginning to think about throwing myself  under a bus. Or hanging myself - it seemed I was trapped in a self-contained hell and I wanted out. I decided against suicide. If one bus driver had not gotten me to the right bus line, I do not know if I would ever made it back to the halfway house. As it was I came back 42 minutes late, still date from the downpour and very, very  tired,

To make matters even worse, I found out - after my return to the halfway house- I been going north when I should have been going south. I feel like I should be the dictionary's illustration of mortification.

I hate my life. I think I am too institutionalized to be let outside alone. I definitely need medications of a psychiatric sort. Back to Dancing School.

But I did finish typing my adaptation of Poe's "Masque of the Red Death."

And I got to hear Warren Zevon.

There are some small compensations to existence.