Silence is about as rare in prison as a cold front in hell. For those over the age of forty with a semblance of inner serenity, silence is a welcome companion. However there is a demographic of people in prison who fear silence like cats fear water. Early morning hecklers make unnecessary noises in dormitories in order to chase away the moments of quiet before the day gets active. Silence is shunned by those kinds of people because in the museum like halls of silence, artifacts of their pasts are displayed and shined upon by the light of the consequences that they’re forced to deal with.
Prison is filled with broken and disturbed men who hide behind false machismo-like characters.
Sadly, I happen to be one of the people who seem to attract those with sordid pasts that are inclined to share their experiences. I’ve been involuntarily privileged to some disturbing details of some men’s pasts which I would have been better off not knowing. I would not breach protocols of confidence by naming names, but I’ve had men confess to me of being raped. Men have told me of instances where their own mothers have had sex with them. I don’t like gossips or rumors, so if the information isn’t coming from the horse’s mouth, I give it little to no credence, so I would not speak of cases that I didn’t read about or given first hand accounts of.
I sometimes wondered why a killer would find it okay to tell me of their crimes, why would a rapist think it okay to divulge their tells of predatory exploits to me? It’s known that I’m a follower of Christ, but confessing to me offers no absolution of those trespasses, only the Living God can forgive sins. A lot of the stories I’ve been told were gruesome, and on some, I had to politely cut short and make an exit.
All of this is said to explain the underlying cause of noise and the fear of silence in the penal system. For the tormented soul, a few minutes of silence is torturous at best, horrendous at worst. They choose to make noise to drown out the whispers of voices in their heads, or the constant replays of secret deeds done that haunt them in the quietest of times. It’s not uncommon to have a man yell out at the TV when there’s nothing to yell at. Some deal with the lack of noise by placing their headphones on and blasting music loud. Others work out, some find other productive ways to occupy their times because at the end of the day, the old adage still stands, “An idle mind is the devil’s playground.” When the devil is not whispering sadistic ideas for them to try or echoing thoughts of suicide or homicide in their ears, he does what he does best. He replays their sordid deeds to them loud enough for them to welcome noise.
Right now there’s an ongoing Department of Justice investigation into the high number of inmate deaths in the Georgia prison system, particularly the high number of suicide rates. I’m sure the violence, heat, lack of proper medical care and lack of adequate staffing are the primary cause, but the main cause of suicide in the hole [solitary] is the silence. The times when walls start closing in on you and the inaudible jeering starts in your head, and there’s not enough noise to chase those voices. Those are the witching hours when those who are too tired to fight their inner demons finally fall asleep and you’re left awake to wrestle with the ghost of wicked pasts.
That’s when the thought of eternal self-destruction seems more appealing than living. When you can’t pick up the phone and place a collect call to mama or big sis to help fight off those crazy thoughts. The suicide line the prison offers is too impersonal, and may expose you as weak to your fellow inmates. That’s the detrimental hours when suicide happen. Guaranteed death, all in the name of escaping the Silence.
One Comment
Makes me remember all the commotion in Jail that just drove me nuts. I finally got used to it a couple weeks in but I couldn’t sleep well those 2 weeks at all.
We’ve all got our demons and evil tendancies. I’m sorry I can’t relate to you much I don’t know much about you but this was impressively written. I’m going to think about you for a while that struck me good.