In a single file line we were marched in. First they took our picture. Then they mark a letter on the top of your hand with a black marker. Then they moved us to the bull pin. The walls were stone. Covered in a drab, grey paint. each stone was about 2′ by 2′. the flourecent light cast that stale, steril, dead glow on everything. I hate flourecent lights. we were herded into the bull pin. the bull pin is a cage, about 25′x25′ around. three sides of the cage is grey painted stone and one side of it are floor to cieling bars. The cage door stayed open as more and more men were huddled in. on 2 sides of the cage, there was a bench. it went from the bars to one corner and from that corner it followed the wall to the other corner. at that corner there was the bathroom. 1 stainless steel toilette with no lid. When you pushed the button on the wall about 1 foot above the toilette the flushing sound could be heard in the ohter end of the room. the only privacy that bathroom offered was a waist high wall that stuck out about 20 of the 25 foot length of the that side of the bull pin.
Anyone who had managed to sneak a cigarette in at this point was now lucky. Any one who happened to sneak in a pack, was a hustler. I heard guys selling squares for $5 a piece. At this point, you weren’t going to be able to smoke again for another 12 hours or so, and you probably hadn’t had a cigarette since you got arrested 24 - 48 hours ago, so you would’ve paid anything for a cigarette. If you’re white, and you either have a square or buy one, you wasted your money. If you’re lucky, they let you get a puff off of it before they pressure you into sharing. You watch your precious cigarette get passed around to about 10 other guys who you don’t want to make enemies with. In the world, white is the majority. But in jail, you’re definitely by far the minority.
I quickly grabbed a spot on the bench, as I knew that if I didn’t, I’d be sitting on the floor. I have a thing about sitting on jail floors. After about 3 hours of watching that bull pen fill up with people you are told to come out and get your letters and numbers. Basically, about 10 feet from the bull pen is a row of desks. desks built into a waist height stone wall protruding from the floor. You go and you sit at one of these desks, and across from you is a phsychiatrist. Mine asked me a series of questions. What’s your race? African American. What’s your religion? Buddhist. Do you have any tattoos? Yes, on my upper arm, says Pman. Do you take any medicine? no. Any gang affiliations? no. Are you feeling suicidal?
Damn I thought. Suicidal? Part of me just wanted to go home so bad. I couldn’t believe I was there. I kept saying to myself, I don’t belong here. It had all been some kind of crazy bad dream. Her question of if I was feeling suicidal was like the first time in days anyone had acted like they even gave a shit about me. I wanted to tell her yes, please let me go home. But, I knew that if I said I was suicidal, it would only get me sent to the hospital. The jail hospital. Still jail. And I wasn’t crazy or suicidal and wasn’t going to pretend to be.
Are you suicidal? no. Then she had me hold both of my arms out toward her, with my palms faced up. She wrote some letters and numbers on both arms and told me to go ahead back to the bull pen. As I was walking back I noticed a tall, dark skinned sherif with a mason ring on. I figured, now’s as good a time as any to point out what I was to someone, so I gave it a try. I asked him if he was a mason, he said what he said, I said what I said, and he told me to get my ass back into the bull pin. That was pointless. I was still in jail.
The bull pin continually got more and more packed until it got to the point where the entire floor was covered by inmates. And then we were all told to get up and go stand in a new line. First was posessions. We had to place everything we came in with in a plastic bag. It was a thick, strong plastic. the kind you need a knife to cut, you can’t just tear it. Then we went to stand in line to go into this small door. I wondered what was behind that door, but I wasn’t about to ask anyone around me. I didn’t have to though. That door was famous. So was the man behind it. The dick dr was his name. Every fucked up kid in Chicago who had ever been to cook county jail knows who the dick dr is. he’s a short, huched back man. Black as hell, and totally cold. When you walk into that room, you walk up to this big garbage can, or container or whatever, pull your dick out over it and stand there while the hunch back of County Jail sticks a 5 inch metal cotton swab up the tip of your dick.
I heard all of this from the guy behind me talking to the guy in front of me. I was petrified. NOTHING is supposed to go up there! I began to sweat as we got closer and closer to that door. The line was around the corner so at first, I couldn’t see inside the door. But as the line got shorter, and I began to turn that corner I saw him. He was short, black as hell, wore thick bifocal glasses and had a white dr’s coat on that contrasted starkly with his charcoal skin. I was scared shitless. I’ve always been afraid of needles. I could not take this. I saw the long metal sticks that he shoved up each terrified inmates penis. Everyone of them were quiet as they walked in the room. Not one of them wanted to show one hint of fear or pain. They were all just as scared about that thing as I was. When the person in front of me walked in I could feel my heart pounding. A pounding heart drowns out all othr noise. All you can notice is your heart pounding, your heavy breathing, and whatever it is that has you scared shitless. I breathed fast and hard. I started feeling light headed. The Dick Dr grabbed the guy in front of me by the penis, and shoved that 5″ long metal spike up his urethra with a lot of force and zero sympathy. he didn’t even look the man in the eye. You could see the inmates body tense up as the cotton swab went in. He ground his teeth, and was in his own quiet hell for about 3 seconds. Then it was my turn.
I walked in and next to the Dick Dr was the Mason sheriff I had spoken to a couple of hours earlier. He was handing the dick dr the cotton swabs from hell. He handed the Dr my swab. The dick Dr grabbed my limp dick and prepared to insert. I held my breath, and then the mason looked at me and said, “..wait, he gets a pass”. He threw my swab into the barrel with the other swabs to be tested, and I walked through untouched. God bless masonry.
mpruv.com aims to bring self improvement to the urban crowd. Kingdom. High School dropout. Network Administrator. Pimp. Next…???