The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 2,900 times in 2011. If it were a cable car, it would take about 48 trips to carry that many people.
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Hello Bryan!
I now want to mix faith with doing! I’ve read parts of the Bible but not all, I’ve been to a few services mostly Pentecostal. How can I work for God?
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Terrible indigestion last night. Had a shower, 2 cigarettes and 2 capuccinos. Can I take my notebook and a book to court? I am on the 9am transport. Thinking about Nelson Mandela with his long walk to freedom. Mine begins here I hope. I really hope I can get out of here tonight. Have patience with all things but chiefly have patience with yourself.
“Two men look out through the same bars,
One sees the mud and one the stars.”Frederick Longbridge.
“Tirez le rideau, la farce est jouee.”
Francois Rabelais
Fini
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This time tomorrow I should be in court. The condemned man awaits his sentence. One more arbeid hopefully. Hope to keep the intrusive thoughts at bay. Shall I drop an extra tablet tonight, just to get out of it. I’d saved one from the week I was off them. What could go wrong? I don’t get the verdict and have to stay another two weeks. This waiting around is murder. Glad I made the effort to go and do some fitness. Is it just a case of turning up or will something unexpected happen. I have been in prison when I should have been in a hospital. I am not well. I am mentally ill. I have to be don’t I? To suffer like this. I can operate normally but I suffer obsessive-compulsive thoughts which impair my day to day life. I need help and therapy not more prison.
I had a dream, a very vivid dream earlier this year that I would be in a place I couldn’t get out of and that dream came true. Is that what they call a premonition? Why Hilversum?
Tomorrow will pass by as just a blur. You’ve learnt so much about other people and maybe even a little about yourself in terms of dealing with anxiety and stress. I believe you’ve made it a hundred times worse than it should be!
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Wednesday
Countdown to Friday. The comfort shopping is in. Asked to borrow N’s kettle. He comes down and the dozy guard locks him in. I give him a 5 e phonecard. I’ve had so many raised hopes in here that I can’t actually believe that the court case is going to be the formality that they are making out. I can’t believe that I’ve spent nearly four months in prison just for some unwise choice of words in the temple of the moneylenders. Two Arbeids(Work Detail) to go. Mind numbing putting stickers on screws or draft excluders. Something to do with DIY. Cheap labour! I suppose its an opportunity to socialise but I don’t socialise properly because I’m too paranoid. Too much on my guard. Mr H from Suriname is an excellent guy who keeps everybody’s spirits up. A real decent guy. Talk about the right guy in the right job. Generally all the guards seem to enjoy their jobs.
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I have a piece of paper that states in Dutch that the court case is Friday at 11.20. High anxiety trigger the intrusive thoughts. I need JW to tell me in person. This is like a condemned man in his cell waiting for the Pastor to come around and read him the last rites! The dinner was shit, emptied half of it down the pan and had the eponymous cigarette. I read the story of Daniel and the Story of Peter in Acts before being called to see the Psychiatrist. The news that I had been praying for. Court on Friday at 11.20 for possible releas on Monday 12th. My sister is flying over. She has been in constant contact with the authorities. I will have to report my passport stolen by the police. It appears that the Single Judge (They’ve downgraded me at last) also knwn as the Politzierechter apparently rubber stamps the Psychiatric reports and I become a free man on the Monday.
It sounds to good to be true after the see-sawing of highs and lows that I have experienced in here! The Chocolate Teapot of an advocate will visit me on Thursday for a final briefing and to think he came highly recommended from V.
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I’ve just see JW and she tells me that she’s waiting on a call from the judge to see whether Friday 9th December is overbooked at the court and the case could be a postponement until January 9th. raising hopes, dashing hopes, assume nothing, conclude nothing. She’s not sure for definite and will let me know on Tuesday. If it does go ahead, I have to come back here for the weekend and then release. But now the doubt all over the weekend. If it is postponed she said that she will try and get me back into the Velarius over Christmas. I’ve heard that before.
I go to bed and I am in an agony of anxiety. Curled up in the foetal position on the bed! Your life in their hands. Just fucking release me you idiots. What perverse pleasure are you taking from keeping me in here? At 11.45 shouting and banging. Sounds like a fire drill. This place is hell on earth
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Prison life is again your life until the 9th December. Two Psychiatrists prepare the last report. Everything looks promising for the 9th. A 99% chance that the judge will look favorably on the case and let me go. Assume nothing, conclude nothing. Thank God for the Psychiatric Profession. Where would I be without them? I would be charged with attempted bank robbery and be looking at a minimum 3 stretch. Three years would finish me off. This has been hard enough. I’m putting too much emphasis on time. N has been in since May 4th. He’s in court on Friday. On the outside time passes quickly, on the inside it passes far too slow. The recent events have taken their toll. I am numb. The whole experience has been disorientating. A man who lives in fear of himself and of others. Indigestion on the way. In one paragraph a whole week has gone already. Even the Psychiatrist said that I should have been in Hospital rather than prison. Should receive my court papers any day now. You’ve got to forget about the 9th if you can because it won’t come any quicker. It’s a poor diet in here and I’m comfort eating in with biscuits and chocolate. Everyone is rooting for you…apart from yourself. All you’ve got is your writing, your medication and cigarettes to get you through the next two weeks. Think about the others who are on longer sentences. You’ll be out by Christmas! This is just imprisonment .The weather outside matches my mood. From Prison to Psychiatric Hospital and back to Prison. A part of you dies in prison. Some survival instinct keeps you going. You’ve had loads of letters of support which you’ve had to read and re-read.
Arbeid (Work) over. 3 coffees, a cigarette and a shit. No post. Trying to keep the intrusive thoughts at bay. These intrusive thoughts that I can do nothing about have haunted me since a teenager. Thoughts that I give power to, thoughts that I fear, thoughts that I can do nothing about. Finished a good book called the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, an excellent book about everyones personal fortune being found closer to home.
Being in prison you’re on a heightened state of alert, if you’re me it’s impossible to relax properly. I should have known that the cannabis would have dislodged something or was masking something. I was self medicating. Life is about choices and you have been making the wrong choices. The young psychologist in training told me to shout stop when the disturbing thoughts arrive. Also to write phrases down that you might find helpful. Positive Affirmations I believe they call them. I go from optimism and pessimism in the same thought! You have to focus. She said that I was good, polite and friendly. Nice guys come last eh? If Jeffrey Archer can turns two weeks time into a book then I’ll have to see what I can do about four months of bird. Doing Bird! I’ve been doing bird.
I need to come out of prison and become born again. If I’m allowed a second chance. I would really like to serve God after getting home, having the check ups, mentally and emotionally become stronger in the name of God. Become a fighter (metaphorically) like Muhammed Ali in his heyday. This is a jungle and this is the rumble in the jungle. Prison is the purgatory, the purging of the soul. Prison is the valley of the shadow of death and I know whatever happens on the 9th I will be closer to the other side where Jesus walked. I would be happy to devote whatever time I have left to restoring my and other people’s faith! I need to reaquaint myself with his teachings.(This was not religious mania as I was in the grip of post psychotic depression at this stage)
Where is this bloody advocate? He’s taking my freedom pretty lightly. He’s another one of these laid back types. A week to go now and I don’t seem to be noticing the medication. It definitely helps the sleep and must be stabilising the mood.
Òne thing it hasn’t done is sort out my paranoia! I have been paranoid since coming in here. It’s like the feeling of having a hundred pairs of eyes boring into your head and just a thin membrane to deflect the stares.
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Sleepless Night, No Arbeid (Work) Gave me medication in the morning. Looks like a full mornings lock up. Here we go again. Smoked 4 cigs this morning. The crushing ennui overcomes me. Banging and Drilling outside. Not much of the notebook left. Not sure as yet whether the week away has strengthened me or weakened me. Writing has been my only salvation. It feels like the longest morning of my life already. JV the Psychiatrist comes to visit me in my cell . She also couldn’t believe what had happened. She told me it was the Judges decision, I wonder whether because i missed that court date but it wasn’t my fault. The advocate told me nothing. She tells me that I will go before the judge in three weeks time. 3 more weeks in here. 21 days. The Murder Mile.
I can’t believe that words that were uttered on August 11th are causing me to still be incarcerated on November 18th. Valuable months of my life because of bureaucracy and authority. If that Post Office outside rotterdam had only given me the money when I asked for it., I’d still be on the run.
Luchten(Lunch) and then Library. The Polish lady ready to greet with a smile again. Wonderful, Wonderful Books
Ok so the court date is Friday December 9th. Assume Nothing, Conclude Nothing. The door is bolted. There is screaming and shouting from a double cell. JV told me to switch off and block everything If I can. Your going to have to do a lot of blocking in the next three weeks. Feel Flat as Fuck.
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I am on anxious alert. Just had a phonecall from my sister telling me that JW the Prison Psychiatrist had rung her yesterday and said that I might be going back to prison because of lack of beds. This is bastard fucking ridiculous pardon my Dutch!
Put me in an unlocked ward. You;’re preparing me for release not further incarceration.
I was tempting fate by moaning about this place and the boredom.
Am told by a sympathetic nurse that the prison transport will be here at 4.00 to take me back to the Huis Van Bewaring Havvenstratt. All because of words that came out of my mouth. Makes me think about words that can get you prison. This meant to be a democracy. Why can’t I say the word Bomb in a Bank? The Temple of the Moneylenders. Look what they did to Jesus! Your not comparing yourself to him surely!
J on hearing that I am going back to prison has just gone out and bought me two packs of tobacco, 5 packs of Rizlas and a 10 E phonceard! What a generous and selfless act! An act of solidarity which raises my spirits just as the Transport arrives. As I leave I see J’s head bobbing back and forth to the sound of Jo Whiley on Radio 1.
Back in Cell 41, back after a week away. The first person I see is N. He didn’t get out then. Was greeted by two lady psychologists, one of which I shouted at back in the day. They said they hoped that they would keep me there. If I had been briefed to act madder than I actually was but nobody told me it was for observation. The Cell is as it was! I wonder who had it for the week! The spirit of famous prisoners down the ages perhaps, Papillon or Nelson Mandela. Your not comparing yourself with him surely.
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