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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 13, 2017)
Page 8 Commentary Street Roots • October 13-19, 2017 Street Roots • October 13-19, 2017 Commentary Page 9 ERIC LIU, from page 7 little bubble that will be drained of its vitality, of its creativity, of its diversity. A city is a microcosm of humanity. You want diversity of class. You want diversity of race, of worldview and perspective. You want diversity of ways of solving problems. You want scientists, but you also want artists. You want tech people, but you also want journalists. You want folks who are builders with their hands and people that are builders with code. M.W.: How does class play into this, in terms of political power? an you imagine what it would be changed diapers, made bottles, and I helped like to be sentenced to 280 bathe her. I always held her in my arms months in prison at the young age until she fell asleep, and whenever she of 18? cried, I always worried that she was hungry or hurting because underneath the pink That is 23 years and four months to be little outfits on her tiny body there were exact, a lifetime by any standards, day for several scars left behind by the day, and no chance for early same surgeries that saved her parole. I know what it’s like life, but no one could see them. because that’s my life and I’m No one knew they were there. living it now. E nrique is an inmate They were reminders to me of As I write this, I’m sitting in at Oregon State how lucky I was to have her and my small cell here at the Penitentiary who how easily she could be taken Oregon State Penitentiary in enjoys writing, away from me. Salem, and I’m wondering if drawing, reading and Now, this is my story so I will learning about , this story will give you a history, religion and be honest and tell it like it is. different perspective on prison places. H e says most I’ve been gang-affiliated since I life or prisoners for that o f all, he likes to meet was 14 years old and back then I matter. positive people. didn’t see, or couldn’t see, the I am surrounded by people, difference between what was but no one is like me. We are important and what I “wanted” all different. Some will be to be important in my life. I had getting out tomorrow, and no sense of direction or purpose; no goals some will never taste the sweetness of or motivation. I was just a kid trying to freedom ever again. This will be their figure it out on my own. forever, and hundreds more, perhaps One night I went out as usual and I never thousands will be touched by DOC came back. I’ve been here in prison ever (Department of Corrections) by the time I since. It has been 15 long years. I’m no make it home; this life is not fun! longer a kid! I’m still a dad, but I don’t feel I could speak extensively about the like one, however, I have learned a lot about struggles and injustices that take place in myself, who I truly am and where I want to here on a daily basis. be in the future. I will be 34 years old in a The heartaches and headaches and few months, and I’m happy to announce frustrations that I’ve had to tolerate for the that in eight years, I will be released from past 15 years are very real and they affect prison. I will get a second chance in life. not only myself, but the community in more What I have lost I will never get back! I • ways than one. left a little baby who is a teenager now. But to me there is something else that Soon she will be a woman, and I’m OK with surpasses in importance even the harshest that. of mistreatments and living conditions in I have a personal belief, my own prison, my 16-year-old daughter, Angeles. philosophy if you will. I believe that life I was a kid myself when she was born in does not teach us, we teach ourselves, and 2001. That’s when I felt true happiness for we learn only if we are willing and ready to the first time in my life, but I didn’t know learn. I have learned a lot! I have goals now. what else to expect or how to process what My whole outlook on life has changed happened next. It was a bittersweet dramatically. My way of thinking, my ideas moment and to this day I continue to feel and even my taste in music and literature the same way. has changed, but part of me still struggles Angeles was one of many premature babies that were born that year. At 1 lb. and with my reality. The reality that I created for myself and for my loved ones, for my 8 oz. she was a miracle child. She spent the first 3 months of her life inside an incubator daughter. She says that I’m the best dad because in the Doernbecher neo-natal unit at OHSU I’m funny and I listen to her and because I in Portland. Her mom and I visited a few know how to give her advice in a way that times a week, but were not allowed to touch makes sense to her and because I have her, and that was something that I had not always found ways to get her something on anticipated. her birthday or for Christmas. Because I I always thought that being a dad would write and call constantly and because I send be different. During those 3 months pictures and drawings and I share my Angeles went through several surgeries, poetry with her. Because I engage her and two of which were major, and it was scary.' challenge her mentally with questions about Suddenly being a dad was a scary thing to history and Islam - which is her religion. me. But when she was released from the She says my tattoos look cool, but I know hospital things became somewhat normal. I 6 P H O T O S C O U R T E S Y O F E N R IQ U E B A U T IS T A Enrique Bautista visits with his daughter in 2014 at Two Rivers Correctional Institution. She was 14, and he said he was being kept in the hole. She had been crying ju st before this photo was taken. My daughter By Enrique Bautista "To me there is something else that surpasses In importance even the harshest of mistreatments and liv in g conditions in prison, my 16-year-old daughter, Angeles." E nrique a t Oregon State Penitentiary in 2016 before his last stint in IMU, which is a form o f solitary confinement. He hopes his writing will help people see beyond his tattooed exterior to the m an inside. Read Street Roots fo u rp a rt report on Oregon state inm ates’ experiences with solitary confinement a t news.streetroots.org/caged she secretly wishes I wouldn’t get more. We share a love for books and over the years we have been building our own library. I order books in the mail for her which she reads at home. I order a copy for myself which I read in my cell, and we discuss the books in the crowded but cozy visiting room here at the OSP. There used to be a program with the same concept to bond with one’s children through the reading of books back when Angeles’ favorite was “Diary of a Wimpy Kid.” When she used to sit on my lap for me to tell her stories of when she was a baby and I was still out. Eventually she became “too old” to sit on my lap anymore. And the board games we used to play became boring. The card tricks weren’t amusing anymore and I was forced to learn new ways to be a better dad from prison. I took the parenting class which is offered to us a couple of times a year here at OSP. I read countless books and I participated in different seminars and groups such as the mentorship class through the UHURU SASA club also here at OSP. In 2004 I began to record my daughter’s growth and development as well as our bond and our father daughter relationship because some day I want her to see that no matter how far I was from her, she was always in my heart and no matter how many months and years I spent in isolation trying not to lose my mind, she was always with me, giving me motivation and strength to make it out of there as a man and not as a creature on medication like a lot of people end up turning into only because they have no support from anyone, anywhere. I have bought a journal on canteen for $6. The best investment I’ve ever made. In that journal I’ve written stuff ranging from the loss of her first tooth and to the first concert she went to and the bully at school that took her book while she was reading it and threw it in the trash can. How that made me feel and how she must have felt. I also put pictures in there to show her how she went from knee height to being in high school and having a crush on Luis. I plan on giving it to her on her 18th birthday. The same age I was when I came to prison and I hope that in that journal she finds the answers to some of the questions she may have in the future. But my question is will I ever be a real dad? Will I ever “feel” like a real dad? I don’t know. All I know is that my daughter loves me and I feel it when she wraps her skinny arms around me and she says “I love you dad.” E.L.: When we who are middle class or upper middle class or prosperous take inventory of our various forms of capital, political, social, relationship capital, we face the choice. Are you " I open my book with this story going to hoard it, or are you going to circulate it? of the tomato pickers in Immo We need to be neighbor to kalee, Fla,, who were liv in g in neighbor, member of the Y conditions ol modern-day slav to member of the Y, ery u n til the early 1990s, when member of a community they committed the magic act oi club to member of a community club, peer to organizing. That allowed them peer, be changing a culture to generate brand-new power to say, “Hey, we have a where it didn't previonsly exist. responsibility to start They created this cascade oi circulating our privilege.” change, in the working condi That means investing tions, but then in the broader these various forms of capital to help empower agricultural economy. Almost people who are right now anybody who's reading my book more on the margins of has more starting capacity and political power. M.W.: The Seattle City Council recently passed a law barring landlords from discriminating on the basis o f past criminal record. A nd landlords are saying, well then we have to deal with these people who may not be the best tenants. capital than the tomato pickers ol Immokalee did in 1992. XI they could do it, why can't we?" E.L.: Yeah. We have to deal with “these people.” Their risk perhaps has increased nominally, but what they mainly have to deal with is the stories they have in their head of who these people are. It’s analogous to the conversations that are unfolding in the country post-Charlottesville about white privilege and white supremacy. It’s easy to say, “I’m against white supremacy,” when what you mean is people carrying torches in a parade. It’s different to say, “I’m against white supremacy,” when that means if you’re white, “I’m going to give up on the college alumni admissions preference for my white kid.” Or “I’m going to defer in a meeting when a person of color might have an idea that I also had.” M.W.: Are we really more powerful than we think? E.L.: I open my book with this story of the tomato pickers in Immokalee, Fla., who were living in conditions of modern-day slavery until the early 1990s, when they committed the magic act of organizing. That allowed them to generate brand- new power where it didn’t previously exist They created this cascade of change, in the working conditions, but then in the broader agricultural economy. Almost anybody who’s reading my book has more starting capacity and capital than the tomato pickers of Immokalee did in 1992. If they could do it, why can’t we? Reprinted from Real Change News, Seattle, Wash.
