You know everything's been focused on the negative, whether it's somebody who's just
coming in or somebody who's been in for a long time.
It's so easy to get lost in failures and disappointments and letdowns and what-ifs and maybes and might-haves
that you never appreciate any gratitude for even the smallest thing.
And it's just...you get lost in it sometimes.
So it's nice to be able to feel like we've done something and that it has a meaning.
And we did it together.
And that's rare for us.
This is Christmas and we are doing dorm decorating contests.
And everybody's in the competitive spirit because they're all getting ready to compete
tomorrow at ten thirty.
And there's a first place, a second place, and a third place.
First place is a chicken dinner, second place is pizza and third place is hamburger and
something...chips.
And they're gonna judge tomorrow at ten in the morning and hopefully we win!
This contest that we're doing, it brings us all together, even in the other dorms.
You can see them when we walk past, they've done something.
You don't see a whole bunch of guys in jail working together, you know.
Like I said, I'm grateful just to walk down the hall and just seeing all the other dorms,
other dorms working together.
It kind of helps everybody to sort of bond where we wouldn't even think of speaking to
each other at other times.
I've been doing them for like four days, off and on.
And this guy right here, he came out of his shell, and started helping me.
At about the third day, I brought him out of his shell and he helped me do all the icicles
up here, and he's been helping me do this.
You know it probably ain't gonna be a good Christmas for a lot of people in my family
this year, to be honest.
You know I got a six year old, she just turned six November 24th and I got a four year old,
a daughter and a son.
This right here, of course I wish they were here to help me but at the same time you know
it's, it brings up good ideas of stuff I can do later when I do get home with them and
stuff.
Hey look, let's do this and that, because they're very creative as well.
We all want to take care of our families.
We'd love to be at home putting gifts under the Christmas tree and watching our children
you know, but man that heroin out there, it's terrible.
It does things to people that they wouldn't normally do.
It becomes your survival.
I lost everything that I had.
Housing, clothing, everything.
Everybody I know is affected, every family that I know is affected in some way by this
heroin to hit the streets.
We're given PDs for most of us and we're fighting serious cases and it doesn't really, they
don't have the time to help us with our cases.
So its kind of a lose-lose situation.
It's hard for us to get out there and make it.
I mean we've already been blacklisted by the fact that we have felonies alone.
I mean I do home remodeling.
Do you think somebody's going to look at my record and want me in their house?
I wouldn't.
I don't know how to be anymore.
I don't know how to go to the grocery store, I don't know how to ask for help, and a lot
of those things are, for me that's my deepest demon.
That's why I'm trying to do everything in jail to better myself, because I know when
I get out that I need to do something different.
People are not bad trying to get good.
They're sick with an illness trying to get better.
And I think if people started looking at it like that, I think it would help.
And I think people are beginning to see it as an illness.
As a public health issue.
And we need to be able to treat it as a public health issue.
And so we need more treatment beds.
Women need more treatment.
But also we need other people who understand what treatment is.
And if we do that I think we're going to be a little bit more successful.
I just think people should know that we are recovering and that everyday we grow stronger.
And one of us may not be able to beat it alone but collectively we can beat it together.
Hello ladies these are the judges for your dorm decorating.
So judges please feel free to move around a little bit and look at all the hard work.
On the twelfth day of Christmas the CO gave to me, twelve detox puking, eleven scary snowmen,
ten NA meetings, nine creepy santas, eight work-aids mopping, seven TVs playing, six
extra trays, five HIPs.
Four collect calls, three work releases, two psycho killers and an early release for me.
Thank you so much.
Best of luck.
Merry Christmas.
My little baby, she's so nervous.
God loves you.
He needs one-hundred and seventeen chicken dinners for the one female floor.
Dorm three blew it away, they had synchronized singing and dancing.
How you going to compete with that?
What about pizzas?
Oh you got the pizzas.
Congratulations guys!
Yea sobriety!
This Christmas, will be, a very special Christmas for me.
That's all I got for you!