From Prisoner to Purpose: A Prison Rehabilitation Journey of Writing, Art, and Service Dogs

Dear readers,

On September 16, 1995, I shot and killed a man. For that crime I’m deeply and profoundly sorry. No matter how much I’d like to change the past, I cannot. But what I can do each and every day is strive to be better.

During my first 10 years of incarceration I refused to accept responsibility for my actions. I blamed others, and often lied, telling people I was innocent, or that my victim deserved to die. I spent most of those years drunk and acting like an idiot, not caring whether I lived or died.

“Man, you know I didn’t do that shit. I was framed. The system was rigged against me. My judge had it out for me. Pass that wine, motherfucker.”

Then, during the middle 5 years of my incarceration, I began to realize that I needed to turn my life around. It was during this time that I began to attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings here at Thumb Correctional Facility. There I met Ernest Fisher, an outside volunteer and Flint City native who’d been chairing our facility’s Saturday A.A. meeting for over twenty years.

“Do you feel you have a drinking problem, young man?” Ernie asked as I stepped through the steel reinforced doorway leading into our prison’s group visiting room. Ernie was an older black gentleman sporting gold-rimmed glasses, a flashy gold wristwatch, and several shades of green. His eyes bored into mine almost as if he really cared to hear my answer.

“I guess,” I replied with a shrug.

“What you mean, you guess?”

I shrugged again.

“Okay then.” He waved me past with a soft smile. “Have a seat. We’ll do our best to figure it out.”

Ernie taught me many things over the years, but most importantly he taught me how to forgive and love myself. This, he said, needed to be accomplished in order for me to learn how to forgive and love others. And although Ernie has since passed away, I still attend those AA meetings every week. I’m currently in my 14th year. Thank you, Ernie.

During these last eleven years of my incarceration I’ve made leaps and bounds in my rehabilitation.

I taught myself to write. I’m most proud of that. I’ve written and published dozens of articles, essays, short stories, and poems for various journals, magazines, and online news outlets. I’ve written a fantasy fiction novel, Blood & Steel (Wattpad.com/JAMetcalfjr); a poetry book series, Prison Poetry Volumes 1-3; an essay book series, Prison Essays, Volume 1-6; a dictionary, The Pimphammer & Dank Dictionary of Prison Slang; a cookbook series, Prison Cookbook, Volume 1; and a women’s erotica series, Exploring the Wilderness of You, parts I and II (all available @ Amazon.com).

“Move it Along Shitheads”

Iron doors clang
like ancient gongs
calling the devout to prayer.
Belly chains constrict
and leg irons jingle
with each trudging step…
And grown men weep.

Move it along Shitheads!

Like God
from the ether
loudspeakers blare.
Shotguns are racked.
The peppery stench of tear gas
permeates the air…
And grown men weep.

Move it along Shitheads!

Days morph
into weeks, and weeks
morph into years.
The winding path never varies,
uphill both ways.
Feet scab and blister,
eyes lose their luster,
and fleas lay eggs and multiply…
And grown men weep.

Move it along Shitheads!

Old wolves die young.
Young wolves grow old.
Loved ones fade away
or pass away.
Years morph
into decades…
And grown men weep.

Move it along Shitheads!

Some crawl out,
others burrow deep
into Mother Earth
for the Long Embrace…
Either way,
grown men weep.

Move it along Shitheads!

I’ve earned many different certificates, and even a two-year degree in religious studies. I’ve also learned how to paint abstract art, and my paintings hang in households across Michigan and the rest of the United States.

The U of M volunteers arrive, and after a quick speech thanking us for contributing, we are asked to stand by our artwork, and they go to work. There are six or so college students and one professor. They move amongst us as if we are normal people, asking questions about our artwork and making suggestions for future projects.

Stuck off by myself, nobody seems to realize I have a painting, so I’m forced to nervously gain a pretty Asian American girl’s attention by waving to her.

“Hi. Would you like to see my painting?” I ask, hoping I don’t come off like some weirdo lurking in the park wearing nothing but a trench coat.

She smiles and approaches. “Sure. Let’s have a look.”

I spin and lead her to my podium near our prison’s wooden shoeshine chair.

“What’s it titled?” she asks after eyeing the monstrosity of a chair with distaste. She runs her fingers over my chaotic drips, smears, and slashes of patriotic color. My masterpiece of pent up emotions.

“First, I have to ask, are you a Trump supporter?”

Her eyes narrow. They take in my white skin, bald head, and beard. She’s clearly afraid to tell me the truth. “I prefer to leave politics out of this.”

I chuckle. “Well, I don’t. I wanna go on record as stating I’m definitely not a Trump supporter. I titled this piece Trump’s America because I feel he’s messing up our country.”

She exhales as if she’s been holding her breath, then smiles. “Thank god. I can’t stand him either.”

We both laugh. We spend the next ten minutes or so talking about Trump, art, and the effect of both on prisons. For those ten minutes I feel free, feel normal.

I’ve learned to read and write Spanish, though I grow rusty when not using it, but it helps that each winter (pre pandemic) I hold a class teaching Hispanic prisoners how to speak English, and American prisoners how to read and write Spanish.

I’ve learned how to weld, woodwork, lay tile, pour concrete, repair and install plumbing, and countless other hands-on skills while working maintenance here at the prison for eight years. I’ve also taken and passed the Building Trades class here. I’ll never have a problem finding or keeping a job.

“Shout out to my old boss. He no longer works for the state, but he was a great teacher.”

I currently (and for the past 6 years) train service dogs for Paws With a Cause. This not only blesses me with an employable skill, but also offers me an avenue for giving back to our community. Because of this I’m proudly able to contribute to the free society I so deeply long to return to.

Today as Connie, our Paws With a Cause instructor, delivered ten new dogs to our facility for training, it hit me how much these service dogs’ lives parallel our own.

“This batch of dogs is super unruly, Guys,” Connie said, “so take special care with them. Keep them separated. Don’t let them be overly possessive of toys. And don’t allow them too much contact with people for the first few weeks.”

Every four months we exchange dogs here at our facility’s Paws With a Cause service-dog training program. (pawswithacause.com) And just like every other exchange for the past three years, I handed my leash to a prison official who then led my old service-dog-in-training (a Black Lab named Nudge) out of the facility, and returned leading my new dog (another Black Lab named Digit) over to me. The only difference between these dogs we exchange other than breed and personality is the fact that the outgoing dog is always well-trained and mature, and the incoming dog is always young and wild.

Hence the beginning of my revelation on how these dogs’ lives so parallel our own. As I sat there in our antiseptic-scented visiting room surrounded by modern vending machines covered in touch screens, buttons, and odd flashing lights, petting Digit in an attempt to calm him before leading him deeper inside the prison to his new home, I considered all the other many ways our lives paralleled each other.

Like Digit, I spent my younger years at home with my family, and also like Digit at a young age I was bounced from family member to family member. In Digit’s case, he spent a few months with his mother, siblings, and the people who birthed him, then he was shipped off to live with a family of volunteer puppy raisers who loved him and raised him and taught him all about family life.

Also like Digit, as soon as my youth was over (for me, age twenty; for Digit, around fourteen or fifteen months) I was introduced to a life of bondage, to life in a cage.

Like Digit and his brethren, convicts are often loaded onto transfer buses with zero prior notice, yanked away from friends and loved ones, and shipped far away to new and strange places where they must start over knowing no one.

Both groups are rewarded for good behavior:

“Yes. Good boy, Digit. You’re doing a great job!”

“Yes. Good job, inmate Metcalf. Your cell looks so clean!”

And both groups are punished for bad behavior:

“No. Bad dog, Digit. Down, no jumping on things. Go to bed!”

“Damn it, inmate Metcalf. I said no. Now get out of my fucking face and go to your cell!”

A loudspeaker announces when I’m to eat: “Unit to chow, unit to chow. You have ten minutes to get your asses moving.” When I’m to sleep: “Unit locked down for the night. Take it into your cells.” And when I may use the toilet: “Count is clear, day rooms, bathrooms, and telephones are now open. You can exit your cells.”

And I announce when Digit is to eat: “Come on, boy. You hungry?” When he is to sleep: “Digit, go to bed.” And when he can use the toilet: “Digit, let’s go outside for a potty break.”

Also like these dogs, men in prison are stripped of their individuality and trained to think like a herd. Each day at 4:00 pm sharp, every dog I’ve trained so far perks up and sits by my cell door awaiting the delivery of its food. And every day at 5:30 pm sharp convicts bunch up onto our unit base (large common area near the exit) where they await the phone call that will send them to chow.

Like these dogs, we learn to follow commands without question no matter how silly or ridiculous those commands might be.

Like these dogs, we come to rely on our masters for our health, wellbeing, and happiness.

Like these dogs we are here to serve at the bequest of others. In prisons across America men slave away for pennies per hour cooking, scrubbing toilets and floors, cutting grass, farming, working in factories, building roads, digging ditches, doing facility maintenance, the list is endless… (I myself make a paltry $1.54 cents a day to train and take care of Digit.)

Unlike these dogs, we are not loved and nurtured. Though in the end many of us do manage to leave prison better men than when we entered it decades before. I can’t imagine how much better our system would work if the United States treated its prisoners with respect and dignity. If we started with the idea that almost all men are redeemable with a little love, nurture, and hard work, how many of these men might then exit prison rehabilitated the way our Paws With a Cause dogs leave here? 60%? 70%? 90% even?

The sky is the limit.

I’m a Prisoner Observation Aid, which, requires a high degree of trust from the Department of Corrections because I not only monitor suicidal men who suffer from mental illness, I also sit and talk with these men about their problems in confidence.

Last, but not least, I’ve been on a spiritual journey these past 26 years. And along the way, I’ve read, practiced, or studied just about every religion known to man, seeking what parts might best fit me. I now meditate and pray each day to maintain a beautiful spiritual health. I also exercise and stretch to maintain mind and body health.

“If prodded, he will tell you that he believes God is actually a Goddess. Or to be more precise, a duality like yin and yang, with the male half playing more of a hidden role.”

I am currently 47 years old with 8 years left until I become parole eligible.

My new mission in life is to serve others. Like my hero, Nelson Mandela once said: “The rent we pay for space here on earth is service to others.” I truly believe this. That’s why I’ve adopted it as my motto. Thank you, Mr. Mandela.

My name is Jerry Metcalf and I wish to make the world a better place, if you do too, please join me on social media.