Loss and Life

My friend, Sandra died on October 20th, 2009. I received this news at 12:45 pm via text message. It simply said “Sandra has passed”.

I didn’t know Sandra long. I didn’t know Sandra from childhood. I knew of Sandra’s feelings about her childhood. She shared with me her inward experiences of the pain as well as the sad, terrible and lonely stories from those days. I believe that this makes the child in her more real to me than if I was with her then.

I know Sandra, the brave and tattered little girl who fought injustice, because she placed her in my heart.

I did not know Sandra when she married nor did I know her during her many attempts at being loved by a man......but I knew of her marriages, her lost loves and her experiences of constant abuse, abandonment, disappointment and heartbreak. I know Sandra, the broken, abused young woman who never gave up on love, because she placed her in my heart.

I did not know her oldest son but knew about his life. She allowed me entrance into their world of abandonment and sorrow. She told me of her inability to be the mother she desired to be. I know Sandra the desperate, abandoned lost, young mother who bravely continued to try because she placed her in my heart.

I know from our daily life together, firsthand, the son of her heart, Michael, and learned through careful observation and with admiration of their great love for one another. She blessed me with entrance into her inner world, Into her inner self.....her holy of holies.

I know from her who she was in the past, I knew from her actions who she was in the present and who she was becoming So although I did not know her long, I know her well. She shared with me who and what she desired to be. And I think we will all agree: Sandra desired, above all, to be loved.

Sandra has passed....

Looking back I think how strange it is that three little words represent so much in both the past, now and our future. An entire life has come and gone. My friend, my sister, her existence just...gone.... I am not sure I believe that!

Sandra. Sandra Myles. Sandra Lane. To me, friend and teacher. To me utterly beautiful. I can honestly say when I think of Sandra one word comes to my mind that describes her perfectly:

Love

“Sandra has passed” flies before me.....

Sandra lived her Love Spirit naturally and gracefully. She gave me this love freely as only one who has learned the one of the greatest lesson in life can give. That great lesson is What we desire the most in life is what we are required to give to others. That we give love even when it is not returned. That we give it because we know, often through our own lack of receiving, the importance of love. We give what we desire the most to others.

Her very vibration was that of love. She asked for it and extended it with every breath. She was acutely aware that she, that all of us, require love the same way we require air. That without it life was just that. Life. She knew, instinctively, that in order to be ALIVE, to truly feel ALIVE, we must learn the power of giving and receiving love. It is what are all designed to do. She pursued love and her ideals of it with a passion. Always talking and encouraging her version of the “Sisterhood,” always striving to be there for me and for others, always letting me know she loved me, appreciated me and valued our time together. Sandra was the great giver of this pure water and holy water. It poured forth from her and I eagerly, thirstily drank of it.

Through her I learned to speak words of love. To not be shy in saying I love you, to hug warmly without reserve, to give, without fear that which I myself require the most.....Love.

How beautiful it is to me to know that I was blessed by the short time I was allowed to walk in the warm light of Sandra’s life. That I was blessed by her intimate sharing of her spirit. That I was given such grace through knowing the heartbreak and joy of her life. I learned valuable lessons of courage, humility and of life beyond survival. Her example showed me that I could and should ask questions, learn about and change my inner-self. Her ways taught me to listen, embrace new thoughts and ways of being. She showed me how beautiful it was to admit when and where I went wrong, where others had wronged me, and to embrace the truth of my life with courage. I learned, through her private “sisterhood,” to stand in the light of truth and experience joy and not to selfishly hold this knowledge and joy for myself...but to pass it freely forward to all that I meet.

How blessed I am that God brought us together, that we spent part of our journey together. No, Sandra has NOT PASSED. The dust that is her body has passed, but the true Sandra, the everlasting Sandra, the spirit that animated the clay that housed her, is alive and always will be. She lives in me and you, she lives between us, every time we extend or receive love. She is alive and here right now in and around all of us and she is laughing and she is dancing... And she is telling us “I am loved and so are you.”

Ralph Lauren Ad: Wrong on So Many Levels

Greetings to the Ladies Jane!

Today I've stubled upon an odd intersection of feminism and digital rights to share with all of you. My two favorite subjects, rolled into an unlikely bitter pill. This doesn't happen often, so I'm going to enjoy it!

The Ralph Lauren Blue Label ad to the right was originally posted (and commented upon) at the PhotoShop Disasters blog. Apparently, Ralph Lauren objected to said activities and issued a bogus DMCA takedown notice ("bogus" because Fair Use includes criticism).

Since Blogger's policies include automatic removal of content subject to any in/valid DMCA takedown notice, the PhotoShop Disasters post disappeared.

The Streisand Effect immediately came into play, and that's how the outraged feminist in me stumbled upon this advertisement glorifying a soul-crushingly unobtainable female body shape. Thank God for the Streisand Effect, otherwise I would have missed my weekly dose of self-righteous indignation! >only slight hyperbole<
Yes, Blogger also happens to host TJP. As a result, the picture you see to the right is actually residing on a TechDirt server. In fact, because of Blogger's policy to remove any subject of an in/valid DMCA takedown request, all pictures in this post are actually links to files residing on servers that in no way belong to me. I hope those server owners will forgive my poor digital manners because I'm doing this to both prove a point and keep this post alive, not to suck their bandwith.

As for the myriad issues with the advertisement itself, suffice it to say that this is a knuckle-dragging step backwards from the news of recent years that indicates a glacially changing (but changing!) international perspective among swimwear designers, magazine editors, runway model organizers, clothing designers, and a portion of the French fashion industry in the unconscionably thin body types displayed by these industries during the entirety of my lifetime.

Of particular interest is the case of Crystal Renn. In her book Hungry: A Young Model's Story of Appetite, Ambition, and The Ultimate Embrace of Curves, she discusses the experience of having lost 70 lbs to land a $250K modeling contract while still in high school. Suffice it to say that while she had that $250K contract, she looked like this:

Eventually, surviving on "lettuce with a side of batshit" caused a break. One day, "something snapped," leading her to quit her agency and move to the Plus Size division of Ford Models. She now shoots fashion campaigns for the likes of Jean Paul Gaultier, Dolce & Gabbana, and UK clothing chain Evans. This is what Renn looks like today -- Healthy, happy, and the most successful American plus-sized model:

You can read more about Renn's experience and book here and here.

Posting this recent picture of Renn brings into focus the sharp contrast between it and the monstrous Ralph Lauren ad above. I've studied design at an undergrad level, so I can usually figure out what ads that fail were trying to accomplish, who their target market was, even if they missed that target. This ad that someone intentionally altered to glorify an impossible-to-achieve crack-whore/cancer-patient silhouette simply baffles me from a design perspective. I can't figure out their target market except to know with utter conviction that I was not part of it. Because of this atrocious ad, I will never, ever purchase anything from the label, even as a gift.

Note to Ralph Lauren: When your model's head appears larger than her pelvis, you have created a side-show freak, not an attractive living mannequin for your clothes, so you might want to reconsider the message your freak is sending about your product.

Renn is a realistically-shaped, realistically beautiful woman. She looks like someone that I might befriend, someone that high school girls who aspire to be models (like she once was) might one day become. The fact that this woman is considered "plus size" (just look at her!) astounds me.

Renn is the archetypal beautiful, healthy woman. She is what we need to be portraying as beautiful and glamorous to not only our girls but to the never-good-enough half of the adult population that is female. If we're to ever win the fight for the hearts, minds, and souls of our females, we have to practice what we preach, live what we speak, and further what we write.

That we cannot discuss an advertisement (with legal digital supporting material) that doesn't further a corporation's monetary aims without legal bullying (I am looking at you, Ralph Lauren) and without the recourse the law provides (I'm looking at you, Blogger) is a powerful statement about who has the power in this country.

I, for one, do not generally believe that just because Big Money always has the power that it is always right. I, in fact, believe that in the vast majority of cases, the power that Big Money wields is morally (if not legally) wrong. In this case, it is both. Releasing that ad was morally wrong, and submitting a bogus DMCA takedown notice was legally wrong. Since Blogger is complicit in the injustice, PhotoShopDisasters cannot fight back.

We can. Just a little, but we can.

Comment on this post. Tell us how you feel. Drive traffic to this post. E-mail it to everyone you know. Post about it in other blogs that have audiences that care either about women's issues or digital rights, or both. Write a letter to Ralph Lauren, include a copy of the ad. Write about how their ad affects you, personally; women, as a group; and us, as a culture. Write about how their ad is a throwback to an earlier time, and how shamed they should feel. Talk to people: About Crystal Renn, about the small changes we've been seeing in the perspective in the fasion world, about the importance of actual humans as the people we see, not painted stick figures that couldn't possibly be alive. Demand that companies that sell the products you buy use advertising that features people who look like people who could actually exist.

Read. Write. Talk. Demand. Change begins with us.

~Riot.Jane

Ralph Lauren ad: TechDirt
Crystal Renn then: The Sun
Crystal Renn now: The Sun

CVS Pharmacy WIN!

Overview: There are several CVS programs/tools that I've become familiar with over the last few years of shopping with them. Over time, I've developed an eye for combining and stacking the benefits of all of them to obtain remarkable savings.

CVS Card: Like a grocery store discount card, the CVS Card allows CVS to track your purchases, but also entitles you to discounts. Such cards enrage privacy advocates, but I think that paying me (in the way of discounts) is fair compensation for using my purchase history as marketing material. The CVS Card comes in key-chain and credit-card sizes, and a telephone number can be tied to it as well (I did not provide mine). I believe only 2 CVS Cards are allowed per household, but different cards can be linked online so that they are treated as the same account (even with different card numbers) so that a household's aggregate spending can be combined.

Extra Bucks: Tied to the use the use of a CVS card and awarded quarterly, these are usable like cash in CVS stores on most products (alcohol, tobacco, and prescriptions excluded). The main source of EBs is a percentage of your purchases, but additional EBs are awarded for filling new prescriptions (or transferring them from other pharmacies), and as after-the-fact discounts on items (buy X, get Y EBs). The EBs are printable online and also print on CVS receipts, so they're easy to cash in once awarded. The trickiest thing about after-the-fact discount EBs is that they aren't always awarded the same way: Some are awarded immediately after a purchase (printing on that receipt), others are held until the quarterly EB award. To be sure of when such EBs will be awarded, the yellow stickers on the shelf underneath the merchandise in question will indicate when the EBs for that purchase will be awarded. EBs do expire, but the expiry date is clearly visible on the EBs (either receipt-prints or online prints).

Circulars, Clip-Free Coupon Books, and In-Store Sales: Like grocery stores, CVS has a weekly circular (available online and in-store) with that week's in-store sales listed, most discounts requiring a CVS card (but no coupon clipping). The clip-free coupon books (also available online and in-store) seem to appear every month or so in addition to the weekly circulars.

Marketing E-mails & CVS Website: Like most other on-line retailers (and make no mistake, CVS is an online retailer as well as brick-and-mortar), you can register on the website to receive weekly marketing e-mail. If you register a CVS Card online as well, you can review/print EBs, weekly circulars, clip-free coupons, and create/print shopping lists. I am on their e-mail marketing list, and I receive printable coupons via these e-mails (my favorites are the $2 off $10, $4 off $20, and $5 off $25, seeming to arrive every 4-to-6 weeks). Product-specific coupons arrive by e-mail as well, and I can't remember receiving more than 1 e-mail in a given week (unless the second e-mail was one of my favorite coupons, that is!). NOTE: The in-store and online discounts are often different. Below is today's in-store WIN, but I've accomplished the same sort of WIN with website orders, too.

CVS Website Edu-Quizes: This seems to happen roughly twice a year. You take a less-than-5-minute quiz on a health topic, and at the end you can print a $5 off $25 coupon. You don't even have to answer the questions correctly! The last two quizzes were about the importance of refilling and taking prescriptions on time and about the flu shot.

In-Store Coupon Kiosks: Like the price-checkers at Target and Wal-Mart, these price-checkers will print coupons if you scan a CVS Card instead of a UPC. I scan mine on every single visit.

Today's Extraordinary CVS WIN:

16.99 OptiFree Express Saline, 2-pk
            (in-store sale 14.99 + 2 Extra Bucks awarded immediately)
4.79 Gold Emblem Roasted Almonds (in-store sale 3/$10)
4.79 Gold Emblem Roasted Almonds (in-store sale 3/$10)
4.79 Gold Emblem Roasted Almonds (in-store sale 3/$10)
12.49 Maxwell House Coffee (in-store sale 6.77)
9.99 Ferreria Hair Color (in-store sale 7.99)
9.99 Ferreria Hair Color (in-store sale 7.99)
7.69 CVS-brand Acetominophen Arthritis (i.e. extended release) (in-store sale $5)
7.69 CVS-brand Acetominophen Arthritis (i.e. extended release) (in-store sale $5)
4.99 Repelle hair-color stain shield

Total, Non-Discount (off-the-street retail): $84.20

-2.00 Extra Bucks from Saline purchase, completed separately first
-2.00 2 off 10 Gold Emblem Nuts coupon printed from in-store kiosk
-2.00 2 off 10 pain reliever coupon printed from in-store kiosk
-2.50 Clip-free manufacturer's coupon for Maxwell House coffee
-5.00 5 off 25 from online flu-Shot edu-quiz, computer-printed
-5.00 5 off 25 coupon from marketing e-mail, computer-printed
-9.00 Extra Bucks from previous purchases, printed on previous receipt

Discount Total, Extra Bucks, Kiosk/E-Mail/Edu-Quiz Coupons: $27.50

-2.00 Saline, CVS Card
-4.37 Nuts, CVS Card
-5.72 Coffee, CVS Card
-4.00 Haircolor, CVS Card
-5.38 Pain reliever, CVS Card

Discount Total, CVS-Card-Required In-Store Sales: $21.47

Total Spent on Today's Discounted Purchase: $35.23

Total Savings: $48.97

Ring Around Society

Sexuality is coextensive with power; one is one’s sex and, not the other.

Sex is produced within service of social regulation,and in control of sexuality.

Sex conceals and unifies artificially.

We all fall down.

Juridical model presumes power and sexuality.

Power only subdues and liberates sex fundamentally.

Sex is recontextualized with in sexuality.

We all fall down.

Notion of sex brought fundamental reverse,representation of power relationships to sexuality is invert.

Latter, not essential or positive to urgency.

We all fall down.

Sexed body not in need of deconstructions,sex to be subjected to social regulations.

Sex regulative and a power knowledge regime regulative; sexual regulation is refute.

Disappearance of sex, though intelligible.

We all get up again.

~Olga Cisneros

My Man's Been Crack-a-Lack'n!

My man’s been crack-a-lack’n and now he’s in the jail.
His hair is all crazy and he says it’s really hell!
He needs some commissary!
He needs some money, please!
My man’s been crack-a-lack’n and now he’s prayin’ on his knees!
He says he’s really sorry! He says it wasn’t him!
He tells the judge he’s not the same. “No, really Judge, it’s not a game!”
My salvation's REAL!
My man’s been crack-a-lack’n but God’s delivered him!
He’s been washed as white as snow from that crackin’ sin!
If the judge will let him go, if he’ll only set him free!
When he gets out he’ll stay straight; just you wait and see!
My man’s been crack-a-lack’n.
And now he’s in the pen.
He’ll hang out and speak of God until he is set free.
Within two months he’ll be right back,
because he’ll run right back to crack.
His salvation's real!!

~Barbara Rhyne-Tucker

The Taker of Innocence

She stepped on the grass, still moist from the morning dew, the dried leaves beneath her feet made small crunching noises with every step she took. The sky was a majestic blue with a few white clouds and the sun peeking through offering the beginning of the heat that would permeate throughout the day. Dressed in a white and yellow dress, ruffled socks and black patent leather shoes, her hair swept up in two ponytails tied with ribbon, she was the vision of innocence. Led by the hand they continued their walk to their secret place, a place where he would sit her down and tell her how special she was.

His name was Sam and he was her uncle, everyone’s favorite son, brother and best friend. Sam had a charisma about him that melted everyone he met, he could do no wrong and his touch was truly recognized as golden. Nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters, they all adored him and always poured the accolades his way. A sharp dressed man, a connoisseur of all that could be considered the finest, a collector, a giver and a taker.

He took her innocence, that little girl with the ponytails and the wide eyes. Her desire to be loved and shown affection was her downfall. He preyed upon her, showered her with little tokens; he was the big bear of men that always was ready for a hug, a tussling around on the floor, a piggy back ride, a game of hide and seek.

Her mind blocked the beginning of time; she had no recollection as to when it started, but the memory of being under the covers with him as they lay on the sofa in a seemingly adult pose. Like spoons in a drawer they laid side by side, he stroked her hair, her shoulder; slowly his hands moved under the covers and found their way between her legs.

At the age of five she had the knowledge that what was happening was wrong, it felt good, the touching, the closeness, the sweet nothings whispered in her ears. She was beautiful, she was special, she was his favorite, he knew what he was doing, was she his first victim, was someone else before her in the same spot as she was, hearing the same words, being told she was the one, the special one.

As they continued to lay there under the covers they were interrupted, her look at the intruder was one with a plea of help from her round big tear filled eyes. He was commanded to stop and let the girl out from under the covers. SHE knew what HE was doing. SHE knew. And just like that she was rescued from HIM.

A couple of years passed, a call in the middle of the night came with the news that Sam had been killed. That little girl felt a sense of sadness, but beneath that sadness came another feeling, a much stronger feeling. Relief, relief that he would no longer be able to touch her, touch anyone else. That little girl knew she wasn’t the only one; there were other little girls younger than her. She often wondered who else he touched in that special and loving way. She would never know, that was their untold secret.

Her joy at his death cost her dearly, a price she gladly paid with tears. When she was unable or unwilling to show the proper emotion of sadness at his passing she was punished. That big leather strap came at her, not once, not twice, but many times, each time it came in contact with her bottom she was commanded to shed tears, the tears finally came, but not because she was sad. The tears came from the pain being inflicted upon her. And just like that her walk along life as a victim would begin.

~Ruby Cantu

Back-to-School Shopping Lesson

Long before “Tax-Free Weekend” became a component in our Back-To-School ritual, my mother used the August clothes-shopping ritual as an object lesson in fiscal responsibility. This particular lesson was probably the most valuable financial lesson she ever taught me.

I spent most of my time growing up poor. With the few exceptions of particularly lucky years sprinkled throughout my child- and teenager-hood, back-to-school meant endless hours sifting through used clothes at the local Goodwill or Salvation Army supplemented by sifting through trash bags of hand-me-downs my mother would bring home from neighbors/co-workers or my father would pick up near Dumpsters. The vast majority of cash was usually spent on actual school supplies: Paper, pencils, pens, and folders. Even though my mother would stock up on the actual supplies, taking advantage of the once-a-year sales, I often didn’t have the “required” school supplies.

In fact, here’s the 2009-10 list of Eighth Grade school supplies for the district from which I graduated high school, with the items I would not have taken with me marked with *. The bracketed comments are mostly things my mother would say:

      *2 packages of notebook paper (to be replenished throughout the year)
      *6 spiral notebooks [You’ll get one 5-subject and deal with it.]
      *3 brad folders with pockets
      *2 pocket folders
      *12 pens (to be replenished throughout the year) [You get five, and if lose ‘em, you deal with it.]
      *1 package of highlighters [Use the map pencils.]
      *2 packages of map pencils [You only need one, and you don’t need the big one. Five colors is enough.]
      *1 hand-held pencil sharpener [There’s one bolted to the wall in every classroom. Use them.]
      *1 personal hand sanitizer [No one outside of the medical community even knew what this meant when I went to school.]
      *1 stretchy book cover [Use the ones the school gives out. I don’t care what the list says.]
      *1 composition notebook [Here’s another brad folder. Put notebook paper in it. Don’t look at me like that, we are NOT the VanAsterBuilts!]
      *1 package of graph paper (1/4” quad-ruled) *1 spiral set of 3x5 index cards [Here’s a rubber band to hold these normal index cards together. You don't need the fancy ones.]

The summer before my Eighth Grade year was happened to be in the middle of a lucky stretch. Both of my parents had decent jobs, and money wasn’t as tight as usual. My mother saved every dime she could for four whole months to give me a great experience: back-to-school shopping for new clothes. New! Hot damn, here we go!

My mom, at the last minute, decided use new clothes shopping as a learning experience. As we sat at the Waffle House across the parking lot from K-Mart, we made a list . . . Shoes, check. Underwear, check. Socks, check. Jeans, check. Shirts, check. Barrettes and ponytail holders, check. Light jacket for fall, check. Backpack, check. Belt, check. Winter coat, hat, gloves? After-Christmas sales.

All set? Good.

Then she handed me what seemed like an un-Godly amount of money and said these words to me . . .

I think you’re old enough to do this on your own. Remember, what you buy now, you’re stuck with for the rest of the year. Be smart. If in doubt, don’t buy it.

I was stunned. I had no idea what to do. I shoved the money in my pocket, keeping it in my fist and my fist buried so deeply in my pocket that I almost pushed my shorts down, as I blindly wandered across the parking lot to the front doors of K-Mart.

What I sight I must’ve been! That I never thought to ask her whether she watched me go and look back two or three times is a shame. She died before I thought to ask.

I’ll spare you the details of a prospective Eighth Grade girl’s first solo shopping expedition. Suffice it to say that by Christmas Break I was crying for a hell of a lot more than just winter gear . . . I’d either not bought enough of one thing, or too much of another, or cheap versions that fell apart or shrank so much as to be unwearable because I had no idea how much I needed of anything or what might constitute a good purchase or a bad one. I bought things that didn’t match, didn’t fit, and didn’t hold out.

By the time my mother asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I’d already been borrowing her socks for two months and had stolen her work-worn oldest jeans, cut them off at the knees, and hemmed them myself. Years before workman-chic became the rage, I’d pulled my dad’s ruined light-blue uniform button-ups out of a trash bag, had a friend draw pictures over the stains (with a black Sharpie, the only kind then!), and covered his company patches and embroidery with music band logos from other people’s torn-up concert t-shirts salvaged from another Dumpster.

Needless to say, all I wanted for Christmas was, “Clothes! And you’re coming this time!” Christmas break was a thrift-store bonanza. And good God, was I was happy for the opportunity. I never went shopping with her again, for anything, without paying close attention and asking so many questions that she would eventually have to give me “The Look” to shut me up.

We didn’t have uniforms in public schools back then, so there was no “financial assistance” to purchase back-to-school clothes during the other years when we really could have used it. I wonder what kind of changes going to “uniform schools” would have made in my life, if any at all

~Riot.Jane

Help Needed

Hello Janes!

As you may have noticed we’re slow lately. Very slow. We need your help to keep going! We need all of you readers out there to send us submissions!

Please, consider writing something up for Jane, send our link to your friends and family and encourage them to do the same. You’re needed to make the Jane Project an active and positive place for women.

The Jane Team

Trafficking, Truth and the Abuse of Texas Prisoners

The incarceration of addicts and many other non-violent is Human Trafficking in its’ lowest form. Money is being made, billions of dollars through “legal means”. Prisoners in Texas work in these camps for no pay, in businesses that profit from the goods or services produced. They have no choice, they are held captive. They routinely are tortured, beaten raped, abused …

I want to let you know why I was sent to prison before you read this. I want you know what crime I was guilty of. I was in a car with many people and we were pulled over. The police officer found a miniscule fleck of crack cocaine on the floorboard where I was sitting by spraying the carpet with an agent that renders this drug blue. The piece they found was no bigger than the head of a pin. Texas sentenced me to six months state jail for this heinous offense that in other states would not even warrant a misdemeanor charge. Texas deemed it felonious…
I was, admittedly, an addict. I know I needed help. What I was not is a criminal. I am now drug free but I must tell you I will never be free from the memories of surviving a corrupt and dangerous system that exist to profit off the flesh of the addicted, the poor and the broken.

Arriving at Plane State Jail

After being held for twenty-four hours in a freezing, over-crowded Harris County Jail cell, we were roughly hand-cuffed in pairs and loaded onto one of the many Texas Department of Correction buses. We bumped endlessly down the road to, what my imagination and several had told me, Hell. I watch the familiar scenery of my forty years fly by through the meshed window, mourning the beauty of the sunrise and thought “will I ever see my home again?” As we moved into unfamiliar scenery I began to doze off, not only exhausted from the ordeal of the holding cell, but needing desperately to escape the reality of my existence. I pulled my coat warmly around me and gratefully tumbled into the arms of Morpheus.

I woke when the bus came to a stop. We had arrived. This was the infamous place that stole your name and reduced you to a number. This was the place where you could just as easily die at the hands of an inmate as at the hands of a prison guard if you made a wrong move. This is where I would be spending the next several months of my life and I was deeply afraid. The Constantine barb wire that ran endlessly around the fences might as well been wrapped around my very soul.

I stepped off the bus carefully so I didn’t trip the woman they had cuffed me with. I felt tender towards her and was especially careful to be gentle. She was of a simpler mind than me and often appeared confused and lost. One of the prison guards freed us from our handcuffs. She looked at me with swollen, tear-filled eyes and simply wandered off to the sidelines. Then, unbelievably, we were ordered to take off our coats. As I obeyed, I was immediately knocked senseless by a huge gust of icy wind. Even though I had tried to brace myself against the impact of the wall of cold, my breath caught and my tears of pain and fear froze on my face. I watched helplessly as they took each woman’s coat and threw them back on the bus. Fearfully I watched two male prison guards with shotguns pace back and forth in front us, screaming obscenities at various women. As I watched what little warmth left in my body escape as frozen breath, I thought, “This is me. This is all that is left of me and even IT is leaving me, freezing and dying in this terrible moment. The guards forced us to stand on a line beside the bus. I watch in wonder as more buses arrived and more women stood bleak and coatless beside their bus. Over one hundred arrived that day.

After about half an hour in this frigid, surreal reality, we were allowed to enter the large steel and cement structure that housed the yet unknown prison administrative process, inoffensively called “Intake.” While the building itself provided little relief from general cold, it did shield us from the bitter winds. I was unprepared, though, for the emotional and psychological effects this process was designed to inflict.

“Intake” was both terrifying and humiliating. Already under tremendous physical and emotional strain, we were required to form a long line and strip naked in mass. Many of the women cried out loud, others wept silently, all covering their bodies as best they could from foreign eyes and to guard against the bone chilling cold. Most of us looked down and away in shame. Concentration camp movie scenes had nothing on this. As for me, I stood erect, stepped out of my clothes and folded them neatly, laying them at my feet. I quietly comforted the young girl beside me who was close to hysteria. I made eye contact with other women to show them quietly that they need not be ashamed. “Stand up straight, keep your head up, this is only a moment and it will be all right” I whispered to the weak and to the fearful. Some actually did, others managed a small smile, crying, but still a smile. I think I needed it more than they did.
The female guards picked up bras and panties, dropping each set back at the feet of the woman to whom they belonged after a thorough inspection. A tall, thick prison guard commanded us to take our orange county uniforms and throw them into a pile across the room. All of us naked, many still crying and as always, freezing, we complied and reformed our pathetic tear-streaked line on a long wall. I began to notice that all the guards had on very warm coats, while we were naked. Another heavy-set one began to scream at us to stop covering ourselves. That it wasn’t THAT cold. She stood face to face with several girls and leaned in so close she almost touched her nose to theirs and shouted for them to stop crying. She shouted into their eyes that they were no good stupid bitches. She shouted into their hearts that they deserved what they got. She shouted into their souls that they were so bad nobody loved them anymore. I watched in silent horror as this evil being shouted these wounded, broken spirits into Sheol. Several broke down and became hysterical, but still she forced them to stand up and look at her by threatening them with a night stick and stun gun. She bellowed to all of us that we needed to be afraid, that we belonged to the State of Texas now and she could do whatever the hell she wanted to us. We all stood stock still, arm at our sides, the basic need to warm ourselves lost to the terror of this woman. As if staged, suddenly, one very young girl fell to the ground in a seizure. I moved to help her but was shoved roughly against the cinderblock wall. Every offender looked on in horror as the naked woman-child convulsed violently on the floor. My attention was riveted to her painfully contorted face and sightless eyes as they moved in and out of view. I watch in horrid fascination as she skittered across the icy floor. I silently prayed for her as she unknowingly performed this strange and terrible dance, each part of her private self exposed then gone, exposed then gone. The only sound echoing through the room was the THUD… THUD… THUD… of her head striking the cement floor. At last, mercifully, her body lay still. The terrible drumming stopped. The prison medics arrived and dumped her unceremoniously unto a stretcher, her battered body twisted, arm under her back, legs askew and head lolling partially over the side. I noticed there was no blanket to cover her. Were they going to transport her to the hospital exposed like that for everyone to see, I wondered? As they carried her out a back door, an older female prison guard walked up to the stretcher and gently covered the girl with her own coat. Bless this woman I silently prayed, bless this woman for her compassion.

Still lined up against the chilly wall, naked and freezing, we stood utterly lost in our own horror. The screaming guard demanded that we turn to face the wall, squat and cough. We did so one at time as she slowly passed each one of us. Stand up end over at the waist and spread your butt cheeks was the next command. We each in turn performed this most embarrassing task while a brutal rubber gloved women inspected our most intimate parts with a flashlight seeking contraband. Being forced to display ones’ self, regardless of our feelings, to a power that would cause us harm if we refused, was like being raped. Finally, what we thought must be worst, was over and we were allowed to turn around and put back on our bra and panties. Relief spread through each one of us as we covered ourselves in haste. A few even cracked a quiet joke here and there and others giggled gently.

We walked in line into a nearby holding cell to wait for processing, clothes and coats. We sat on steel benches in our thin panties, the freezing cold relentlessly assaulting us. When we attempted to huddle together for warmth, we soon learned that this was against many as yet unknown prison policies. There was one particularly nasty guard, constantly screaming that we would go to “the hole” if we continued to “touch each other.” She used the words “fucking queers” quite often in our direction as she happily paraded back and forth in her warm down coat, hat, gloves, and winter boots.

We waited like meat in cold storage as they called us out one by one. Each girl would walk up to the metal desk and a box of their personal items was presented and dumped aggressively on the table. Each thing was held up by the guard and as the woman looked longingly at it she was told she could not have it. They asked if she wanted it thrown away, mailed home or someone could pick it up at visitation. Pictures of children and lovers and letters all hit the garbage with regularity when woman confessed over and over for all to hear that she had no money for stamps to mail it home, that she had no home to mail it to, that no one would be visiting her.

Many, many women watched helplessly as what little they had left in the world was thrown unmercifully in to the trash. After each was stripped of any and all personal items that arrived with them from county jail, they were handed an official looking yellow paper that declared that they are now chattel of the State of Texas and have been renamed offender number such and such. At that time each was advised to memorize it, because no longer did you have a name, you were a number.

My turn finally came and I stepped to the metal desk. I watched gratefully as they boxed up my personal letters and photographs, my art and my poetry. I had the money to mail them home, I had a place to mail them to and I had a mother who would visit me regularly. I felt nothing but resolve as they handed me the horrid yellow paper that took away my name. Only after all of us had been reduced to offender were we led away to our temporary housing assignment. I marched along in this silently long bitter line of hopeless, nameless women. Our hands clasped behind our back, heads down and eyes forward, as prison procedure demanded. All I could do was wish that I could shove my hands in the pocket of the puke green coat they provided me during intake that was riddled with huge holes with all of the stuffing pulled out. And pray as our ill-fitting plastic sandals slapped out a haunting rhythm that echoed through my head like a march of the living dead.

Written by: Barbara Rhyne-Tucker

Edited by: Rhonda McLearen

Abuser Psychology?

When it comes to abusive relationships, I think I understand the psychology of the victim, and how the abuser ends up psychologically cornering the victim into not leaving (or delaying leaving).

What I don't understand at all is the psychology of the abuser. Maybe I'm missing the piece of my brain that such behavior appeals to, but I can't understand why abusers do what they do, especially the escalation process.

So, understanding that much of the Jane community has lived and/or researched such things, I address this question to you:

Can someone explain or offer insights into the psychology of the abuser in abusive relationships?

~Jo Jane