Officially no psychopath

Every week I say the same thing - no news from the 'Lazy L'. Well, it gives me a certain amount of, not so much pleasure, more of satisfaction, to say that this week there IS news. For a long time now, years in fact, people who had little or no idea what they were talking about, or what I am like these days as a person, have been condemning me:

"He hasn't got the right ticks in the right boxes!" they cried.

The more removed they were from me, the more vehement they were in this unreasonable bleating.

Finally, they 'ghosted' me from Whitemoor to the 'Lazy L' in March of last year to be psychologically assessed using various engines and tools specifically designed for the job. Then they went back into hibernation - and nothing happened.

Well this week I have finally completed my assessment for the Psychopathic Check List - Revised, the PCL-R as created by Dr Robert Hare. (Although these days, apparently, this seems to be looked on with a certain amount of scepticism by those who know what they are talking about.) This assessment, carried out over several days and involving five sessions of over two and a half hours each, was conducted by a fully qualified person, as opposed to one of the young trainees who are currently holding the whole prison service in thrall.

I can't use this person's real name because apparently that kind of thing is frowned upon, but I do want to say one or two words about her. Now, the last time I was nice about someone in this place they made a complaint and caused me a certain amount of aggro, but I am still going to be nice about her. However, I will have to change her name - which is a pity because it's a great name. I wish I had a great name too. I'd like to be called Aloysius, or Sigmund, or Theobald, or Bob - something exotic. Anyway, back to my psychologist. I shall call her Blodwin, a name I remember from "How Green Was My Valley", a tale of madness and Welsh coalmining, which are probably much the same thing.

I have met a great many people over the last quarter century working (them, not me) for the prison service and, whilst I have met more than my fair share of nasty buggers, I have met a few really nice people, none of whom I intend to list here - you will have to read the book. However, I have to say this, Blodwin could well be the nicest and most genuine I have met over the years. She was prepared to listen, that's her secret, that and simply being a genuine nice sort I suppose. She impressed me. She also has a sense of humour, a rare attribute with people who do her job normally. We seemed to spend quite a bit of time sniggering. (I like a good snigger, ask Boudica - and I'll come to HER in a minute or two. )

I'm not going to attempt to go through all of the things that were discussed (we'd be here all day), but only what was said when it was all over, as far as I can of course. The final outcome of the sessions was that I do not meet the criteria for courses - my scores are nowhere near high enough - that I shouldn't be in this environment and that she would be having a wee chat with The Wallace on the subject with a view to a move to much less secure conditions. Blodwin would also be making enquiries ahout a move to Kingston to join all the other geriatrics. Even my propensity to vulgarianism* didn't bother her at all. Mind, she has a pet cat, and I have found that folk who have cats are generally much nicer than those who keep no pets at all - or dog lovers. (That should annoy one or two.) Now we wait for Blodwin's final report - I expect good things.

At this point it occurs to me that a word or two needs to be said on Boudica's behalf - she of the bad temper and the desire to turn every pigeon in the world into a heavyweight. The Tall Ships were in Hartlepool so, being fond of ships, I asked good old Lucretia Borgia to get me a few pictures in between her feud with "her next door", feeding pigeons, terrorising the postman, taking the piss out of me and generally sniggering at passing pedestrians. I got three pictures and one of those doesn't actually show anything at all - they must have had the cap over the lens. To be fair, Boudica didn't take them so I can't blame her for it, but I thought someone, somewhere would have taken decent pics and put them on the internet for the rest of us.

Now I have to say, with a great deal of sincerity, that I have to show caution when I tell Boudica that I like something or that there is something I could use - she gets it for me almost instantly! The simple fact is that Boudica, despite all of my carping and mockery of dumb blondes, is one in a million. She is a diamond. Miss Twin-Set 1960. One of her pigeons died - she wanted to call in Scotland Yard because it looked like it had been assassinated! (What makes a pigeon look like it has been assassinated?)

However, to get back to the main theme, there is news this week! I am no longer unassessed; everyone seems to be singing from the same hymn sheet at last; all are in agreement - so we can expect progress.

Having said all that, I now fully expect that fickle ould tart Lady Luck to be currently polishing her boots and putting new laces in ready to give me the usual, right where it hurts. Just when I think things are getting better, she does it every time without exception. Of course Boudica says that I should have more positive thoughts and attitude. I've got news for you, Twin-Set - it's not you getting booted in the family heirlooms, is it?

* I know this should be "vulgarism", but I like "vulgarianism" better!

The Voice In The Wilderness

Psychology - and the post - delivered at last

Would you believe that there is finally some sort of progress in my being psychologically assessed? Would you credit it! That's quick! I was sent here with indecent haste in March of last year as a matter of urgency for such assessments - and someone from the psychology department has finally come to speak to me. I call that progress. The fact that she only came (I suspect) because the Parole Board ORDERED it is neither here nor there - we should be thankful for small mercies at the Lazy L.

She came on Wednesday 11th and, I have to be fair about this, she seemed perfectly nice about things. We had a chat - a lot longer than she expected to be chatting I think too. I'm not sure that she had met anyone like me before. Most cons approach such interviews fairly aggressively and with the express intent of "having them over" - lying and cheating their way through the interview. Not me. I am no longer interested in putting myself in a good light, cheating and lying to anyone or attempting to create a false impression. I am who and what I am - people can take it or leave it, I don't care. I am comfortable with the fairly reasonable character I have become. I am comfortable with me and my own company. That's not me being clever, that's me being me - ask Boudica.

However, this first little chat was (I suspect) meant to be nothing more than a prelim to what are to be four sessions during the first three days of the coming week starting tomorrow. Next week's "Voice In The Wilderness" might be interesting.

That neatly brings me to mentioning something about the Voice! I write a letter, generally rude and offensive, to Boudica every day. Each end of each day I sit and write about the day just to keep her in the style of boredom I think she deserves. I write these letters and shove them into the postbox every morning. For ten days she had no letters at all - all my fault of course. Oh she wrote to me every day and ostensibly blamed the post-office or the censors here, but really she blamed me. "Where's my letters?" she would demand. I told her, I can write them and I can post them, but after that it's out of my hands. Amongst the missing letters of those ten days were two "Voices In The Wilderness". So if anyone was wondering why nothing was put on the blog for two weeks, now you know.

On Thursday 10th, Boudica was given ten letters by her postman, a man who probably fears knocking on her door much like the postman in "Keeping Up Appearances". Mind, to be fair, Boudica is no Hyacinth Bucket. Oh no, Boudica is much nicer than that and the fact that the "Voice" didn't show up for people to snigger at is not Boudica's fault, although if anyone feels like writing her rude emails about it, be my guest - I'll get the blame anyway.

She keeps all of my letters of course and freely admits that she does so in case she needs one to blackmail me with in the future at any point. "You old goat!" she will cry in her ladylike way, "You said ten years ago that..." blah blah blah "...and here is the bloody letter to prove it." Oh no, I'm getting away with nothing when it comes to her, trust me on this. Boudica forgets nothing. She may not say much about it, but she hasn't forgotten.

Women in general are like that - they forget bugger-all and stand ready to trot out facts and figures from decades ago. In fact, they have got memories like supergrasses - they can remember things that never happened in the first place!

Thinking about it, so can policemen.

The Voice In The Wilderness

All and sundry

And so we arrive at the end of yet another week during which little enough has happened worth boring anyone with so I suppose that I will have to fall back on that old favourite - facetious comments about all and sundry.

All and sundry, that's a great phrase, covers a lot of ground.

Andrew has gone off to France for a week, taking his brood with him for a bit of a rest, and why not? I was going to say that he has gone off to sunnier climes, but looking at the weather I'm not so sure. When he told me he would be away for a while I presumed that the weekly Voice in the Wilderness would be sort of left hanging in abeyance, or purgatory, and some folk probably think that is the best place for it. They could be right of course - let's face it, I'm no William Shakespeare.
I presumed that while he was away (Andrew that is, not Willy - he's been away a long time) I would simply continue to write these little vignettes (bit of French for you there, Andrew) and send them as usual to pile up on the doormat. In steps the heroine of the piece at the eleventh hour - well she is either the heroine or the villain of the piece, it all depends on a fellow's perception really. Anyway, up steps good old Boudica, or as she is known to her feathered friends, The Mad Pigeon Lady.

"I have a scanner!" says she. "Don't know how to work it, don't know nuffink about it, but I've got one."
"Excellent!" cries Andrew, "Here's what we will do..."
There followed a complicated series of test runs and texts which I do not understand, me being a simple man, and the upshot of it all is that I continue to write this drivel, send it to Lesley by "snail mail", as Andrew calls it, Boudica then scans it or fries it or something, then somehow manages to send it to France
where it is edited and sent back by electronic means to Andrew's base where it is put onto the web for everyone else to snigger at and threaten to send me Emails about.

Clearly I bring out the best in people.

She is blonde you know and, like all blondes, she pretends to be a bit dumb. Don't be fooled, there is nothing silly about Boudica, she's nobody's fool. They have a saying in Yorkshire, (or somewhere) which goes:

"There's none as thick as them who want to be."

Lesley is currently at war with a neighbour because it seems that the neighbour, an absentee landlady who can't find anyone silly enough to rent the house next to Lesley, has been complaining about good old Lucretia Borgia feeding the pigeons - and blackbirds and bleedin' penguins for all I know.

A big mistake, going to war with Boudica. People learn nothing from history, clearly. She just digs her heels in and gets quite rude, and until you've heard Lesley being rude and offensive you ain't heard nowt! Strong men gulp and quail, the SAS apply for compassionate leave and people of a nervous disposition are advised to double their medication until she calms down again.

I have no idea who the neighbour is but she is one of those who bought the house just to rent out. But whoever she is, she is clearly a fully qualified nitwit for annoying Boudica. Either that or she is a braver man than I am.

Where does that bring me to? Right back to where I started at the beginning of this little meander through the depths of my own insanity, and that is that there is nothing to tell anyone this week, so I probably won't be writing a Voice.

I could of course merely write a catalogue of abuse about the various fools who run things, but that would only annoy them and I don't particularly want to do that. Let sleeping dogs lie, that's my motto.

It's like the story of the ould IRA man who is lying on his death-bed and the priest comes to give him the last rites.

"Do you renounce the Divil and all his works my son?"

The ould IRA man looks up and croaks out, "It's a bit late to go making new enemies now Father."

The Voice In The Wilderness

The unceasing search for power

It may be remembered (or it may not) by those who read this drivel on a weekly basis, that I have been trying to purchase
certain items from Argos, a practice fraught with pitfalls here at the Lazy L. Well, I finally managed a sort of partial success
in that direction during the week, Tuesday in fact. They called me down to reception and handed me two of the items which I had gone to great expense to get - they handed me my new watch and my new alarm clock.

The watch is first class, nothing to be said about it at all. The alarm clock is a retro thing, stainless steel, huge face, large, sweeping hands and two bells on top with a little hammer which will batter the two bells and wake me up like the proverbial.

"Wonderful!" you may cry. "But what is the idiot telling us about a poxy alarm clock for?"

Give me a break! Do I look like Ernest Hemingway?

So, I got the alarm clock. (The rest of the stuff I ordered is lost in the maze of the Lazy L system, better left ignored.) I got the clock and then that fickle ould tart Lady Luck decided to take a hand in the game, as she does with me on a regular
basis. She's got bugger all else to do apparently apart from polish the toecaps of her second-hand army boots, take careful aim and give me a quick crippler in the testacularities, (a word, incidentally, that I am hoping will catch on, but which hasn't so far.)

The alarm clock isn't a wind-up one. (The only wind-up around here seems to be me.) No, it isn't a wind-up one, as I had expected, but takes a battery. Of course, being me, and considering my general association with the Fickle Ould Boiler, it isn't just any old battery - it wouldn't be, would it? No, it's a little fat one that is about twice the size of a pencil battery, such as those in remote controls for the telly.

Okay, I needed a battery, so I gathered myself together and set about putting out the word that the Miserable Old Bastard needed a size 'C' battery.

I had terrorists, armed robbers, thugs, muggers and buggers running around searching - but to no avail.

I got batteries that could have powered the space lab, but not one single 'C' battery that would fit my alarm clock, which by then I was wishing I hadn't bought in the first place.

At that point I grabbed an insane Welshman who assured me that he could wire up a pencil battery to do the job of a 'C' battery.

Taff's ambition outstripped his ability - he failed.

'Right!' said I to he. "Time for lateral thinking." And I went to see a couple of the kangas who are usually quite helpful in problematic situations. I had them searching office drawers, cupboards, desks - and they even went down the Seg Unit and had a look down there.

I got little square batteries and offers of a plethora of others from various sources - but did I get one that fitted the poxy
clock (which by now was in danger of being consigned to the bin)?

Of course I didn't.

Well, yesterday was canteen day and, when I got my order sheet for next week, the first thing I ticked off was of course a 'C' battery at the princely sum of ten bob. (For those born in more modern times, that is fifty pence.)

Hopefully that will be the end of the story. I'll get the battery next week, put it in the clock and.....what if the clock doesn't actually work after all of this? Let's face it, Argos are notorious for sending out duff stuff. If that happens I will have to send it back and start all over again. The saga will continue as I seek power - much like Cameron and Clegg. (Odd that both of their names start with a 'C'.)

Now, at this point I just bet that Boudica, or Lesley (as her mother christened her), will be shaking her head at this little tale and saying, "Are you serious? Are you taking the piss? Are you trying to wind ME up?"

Not me mate - and besides, it's a well known fact that you can't wind up a broken clock.

The Voice In The Wilderness

No news is good news

This week there is news. There have been developments of a sort that, quite frankly, I could have done without. It's a bit of a mixed bag in many ways and, as we all know, it never rains but it pours - there isn't just one bit of news, there are several. Well, isn't it always the case that we wait for hours for a bus to come along... Etcetera.

So, it all started on Wednesday 21st July when I had a letter from the CCRC to tell me that I was to be very disappointed at their final report. They weren't wrong.

Then I examined their Statement of Reasons and, to be quite frank about it, there is no reasoning there at all. They have simply ignored everything offered and trotted out the precise same response as was trotted out years ago. They have taken absolutely no notice whatever of the facts, not a word of it.

However, I have been given until the 13th September to tender my further representations, particularly if I feel they have made any errors in fact. They have made not only errors in fact but a few quantum leaps too. I shall be working on my response.

Then, on the following day - and I make no connection between the two - I had a paper from the Risk Assessment Management Board here at the Lazy L and it said that I was due a board in June of this year and would I be attending? That's a good trick if you can do it. Then, lower down the paper, it stated that the board would sit on 5th October 2010! What happened to June?

I filled in a receipt slip to inform them that I WILL be there and handed that in personally just to make sure that later in the year I don't have any of the "You didn't hand your receipt back!"

Is that the end of it? Not by a long chalk. In the same envelope which held the paper about the RAM board there was another slip, this one from the Offender Management Unit, the OMU. It sounds like one of those secret service units in the Communist bloc in the fifties. "Be very cautious, Comrade, or you may find yourself in the cellars of the OMU in Prague. And let me assure you, in the OMU cellars nobody hears you screaming." Yeah, well, this place could teach them a thing or two.

So there was a slip from the OMU and this one said, "Following your Sentence Planning Meeting, the Chairperson will submit an RC1 form to the Deputy Governor which will contain a recommendation regarding REVIEW OF CATEGORISATION and REALLOCATION ASSESSMENT. If you wish to submit your own written representation to the Deputy Governor you must bring it with you to the Sentence Planning Meeting and hand it to the Chairperson. Offender Management Unit HMP Long Lartin."

That is precisely what it says. It seems to me that there have been decisions made already. It makes me wonder why they don't just shove me onto a van and move me to a lower security dump. That seems to be the plan anyway. Why wait a further three or more months? Oh sorry, I forgot, they have to tick boxes first - they can't function without a tick in a box.

I wonder what else they do by rote, ensuring that all correct boxes are ticked. I'm making no suggestions but their family lives must be quite funny.

"Get yer drawers off, Gertie!"

"I can't, Albert. You haven't ticked the right box yet."

And that's STILL not the end of it. I've been trying to get facilities for prisoners to have their pictures taken to send home to their families - I have mentioned it before. I have now been told by our wing Governor that moves are afoot to acquire a digital camera and printer. When they are in place then we will see progress. I am to wait two weeks and then remind him so that he can check and see where things have progressed to, if they have progressed at all. Watch this space. (You'll never see a picture here but it will give you something to do on rainy afternoons when you haven't got the right ticks in the right boxes.)

Finally, Boudicea has been taking the piss again, in fact she always is. Apparently I'm a miserable old goat. Very nice of her to say so - in fact I think I'll get her to write the representations for the upcoming board.

Her latest scheme to annoy the neighbours is to encourage every stray pigeon to live in or around the house, eating the best of corn and sneering at passing cats. I've told her, keep feeding them, lull them into a sense of false security, it will make it easier for me to get them into a pie.

One of these pigeons is a white one and her niece (or is it a great-niece) who lives in Gran Canaria said that it is an angel come to see her. Stick around, kiddo, one day your Uncle Frank will be able to tell you exactly what angels taste like if that's the case.

I shouldn't have said that, now I'll have all the little girls in the world marching on the palace of the Queen of Hearts and yelling "Off with his head!" One of the little horrors will even be called Alice!

I've said it before, and no doubt I'll say it again, but it's not easy being me.

The Voice In The Wilderness

Just a snapshot

Pictures at an Exhibition

There is a scheme within the prison system generally which allows for prisoners to get their photographs taken at their own expense, usually about £1.25p per picture. Not a lot of dosh compared to the national debt but a fortune if you don't have it. It's a good idea, this picture-taking. It allows cons to send home pictures to ageing relatives who can't travel perhaps, or young children, or - okay, let's get the jokes out of the way - for those who like taking the piss, people like Lesley, she with the sense of humour like a burning orphanage:

We can use the pictures to frighten babies off the breast!
Put them on the mantlepiece to keep the dog away from the fire!
Send them to Oxfam and ask for humanitarian assistance

 ... and so on. There - is everybody happy now?

Well, for the last month I have been trying to get my picture taken and.. Yes yes, a crime against humanity, I know. Have we finished with the jokes now? Can we get on? Wonderful.

Most of the schemes for getting pictures taken usually involve them being taken during the course of a visit when the con has had a wash and shave, is wearing decent clothing and doesn't put on too bad an appearance - and that makes sense. Well, when I see the state of some cons at times - unshaved, wandering around in dressing gown and flip-flops with a frozen chicken under one arm - or is that the cockney gangsters? Anyway, there are some less than salubrious sights at times, and I am no exception.

So I applied to have my picture taken some weeks ago.

"It will be taken on your visit!" I was informed.

"No," said I. "This has nothing to do with visits. Read the application. I want a picture to post out, nothing to do with visits."

"You have to have it done during a visit!"

"Listen, Einstein," said I. "Watch my lips. This has nothing to do with visits. I just want to have my picture taken so that I can send it out to friends and family - so that they can see for themselves what a miserable old bastard I have become!"

"It will have to go to security!" they cried.

That was about three weeks ago. Yesterday, Wednesday 14th June, I ran into security, who were loitering with intent, and asked about my picture.

"We know nothing about it," said they. "You will have to put an application in," said they.

"Done that," said I, "weeks ago."

"Well, they will take it on a visit," they responded.

"You are not listening," said I. "This has nothing to do with visits. I just want my picture done so that I can send it out in the post - no visits - post - there's a difference."

"Our S.O. has to decide," said one.

"We will let you know," said another. And that is where it sits now. I am no closer getting my picture done (for £1.25p) now than I was this time last month.

The wheels of the prison service grind exceedingly small at the best of times. Ask them something slightly difficult, but quite within the scope of an idiot in a hurry, and they get confused.

"You get it done on a visit!"

"There is no visit! Nitwits!" I cry, tearing out my hair - or I would if I had any.

Finally, Lesley is mad at me. Her latest scheme is to send me lyrics from songs from all eras and I have to identify them. I did it a couple of times, just to show willing, but now I have told her to get stuffed. This has not gone down well with Boudicea of course - she is mad at me. Personally I think she is just mad, but that's only my opinion, and everybody knows that I'm a miserable bastard at the best of times.

But shall I tell you the best bit about being a bastard? I don't have to buy anyone a present on Father's Day.

Perceptions

Once again we have reached the end of an eventless week where nothing has happened. There is no news, and I am beginning to feel like an invisible nomad wandering through the desert of life saying to myself, "I wish an explorer would come and tell me where I am." Alas and alack, such an adventerous soul doesn't seem to be anywhere on the horizon.

I have an automatic watch that doesn't work so last week I put it in a padded envelope to send it out to Lesley to have it repaired and she can then give it to anyone she cares to give it to. It's quite a nice one really. So, I put it in to be sent out by post at my own expense.

They still haven't sent it. They seem to be confused.

I don't get upset by this kind of thing, I simply add it to the list of incompetencies which includes getting my photograph taken and seeing the optician.

Yes! I wear glasses! Well, when we get older and Old Father Time has a quick look at our inventories to see what else he can take away from us, he pokes us firmly in the eyes and we have to get glasses. It is either that or get run over by a passing police car and end up in hospital saying, "What was that?"

So I wear glasses. A few years ago when I started to wear glasses I wasn't going to be a run-of-the-mill glasses-wearer, not me. I had to get myself an antique pair with spring-loaded arms, the sort that grip the side of the head and don't fall off or slide down the nose making us look like myopic owls.

Unfortunately there are side-effects. The spring-loaded arms have been gripping the sides of my head so tightly that I now have two indented lines running from the middle of each temple to the tops of my ears.

The other day I was wandering about without my glasses on and the lines in question were clearly there to be seen.

"Frank!" says one fellow with nothing else to do. "Why have you got two scars at each side of your head?"

"Scars?" I asked. "What scars?"

"There," he pointed. "One each side."

I look in the mirror and he is right, two indented lines, one each side. Well, you know me, never miss a chance for a bit of the ould craic.

"Oh," said I. "You mean my birth scars?"

"Birth scars?" said he.

"Precisely," I nodded and settled down to tell lies. "When I was born my head was too big to come out so the doctor had to get a big pair of forceps and pull me out."

"You're kidding!" said he in disbelief.

"No," lied I seriously. "My head was huge. The doctor got a grip and pulled me out and the two lines are where the forceps dug in. My mother yelled a good bit apparently."

"I fucking bet she did!" said he, examining my two lines again. "They are dug right in!" says he.

"Well," I replied, "I think that I must have been nice and warm where I was and didn't want to come out. Remember, it was 1946, the coldest winter ever recorded - parts of the North Sea froze over it was that cold. I didn't want to come out so I dug my heels in and fought them. I've been digging my heels in and fighting them ever since."

He looked at me for a few seconds. "Is that a true story?"

I smiled my angelic smile, the one that makes me look like a lion with a tasty morsel between its teeth. "What do you think? Does it sound like a true story?"

"It could be true," said he, "You've got the scars to prove it."

I grinned again. "You sick, sad, insane, demented, lonely lunatic. You should be working for Security - they'll believe anything too."

The Voice In The Wilderness

A wind-up

I have the dubious pleasure of informing you that once again we have reached the end of yet another week where there is very little to report. In fact there is nothing at all, not a word. Well, there is nothing unusual about that. It is a red letter day when I DO have something worth writing about.

So, I want to tell a story - and there isn't much unusual about that either. I do it every time there is no news. This one is about a watch - a wristwatch.

I own, and have owned for years, a Seiko 5 original automatic. It needs no batteries and does nothing fancy beyond tell the time, day and date - in French! All I have to do with it to keep it working is to wear it and move my arm from time to time and, lazy as I am, even I can manage that much movement. I have had it stored in reception for about three years and the other day I dumped the watch I had been wearing and got my old Seiko back - good, old, reliable Seiko.

The bloody thing isn't working! It has been inert for so long it needs some sort of an M.O.T. doing on it, so I have decided to send it out to Lesley and she can get it cleaned at the jewellers and give it to somebody for Christmas - or throw it at her pet pigeon for all I care. To replace it I have ordered an Accurist from the catalogue.

Okay, that's the background story - just to keep things clear. The story I want to tell about the Seiko took place about eight years ago in Whitemoor prison. One evening I stood watching a couple of fellows playing pool because I was playing the winner. While I waited I stood with my arm down at my side and shook my wrist back and forth to wind up my Seiko. I often did that in idle moments, and let's face it, if there is anyone who knows about idle moments, it's me. So there I stood, probably looking pretty vacant as I shook my wrist back and forth.

The following day I had a call-up to the Healthcare where I was sent into a room and there sat Dr Muller, a psychiatrist! I used to make coffee for Dr Muller in the early nineties when I had been at Whitemoor on an earlier occasion.

"Hello Doc Muller," says I. "How are you?"

"I remember you," says he. "You were here about ten years ago."

"That's right," says me, "and I'm still in jail. What's all this about?"

"Well," says he, "there is a report that you have a severe personality disorder because you were seen shaking yesterday. I want to have a chat about it."

"Shaking?" said I. "What do you mean?"

"You were seen shaking and it could mean that there is a severe personality disorder. That's what I intend to examine."

"Shaking?" said I. "What do you mean?"

He examined a bit of paper on his desk. "It says that your arm was shaking rapidly and you didn't seem to notice it!"

"Oh!" says I as I stood up, "Like this?" and proceeded to do my watch-winding bit - arm down at my side and wrist going back and forth like a whore's arse when the fleet is in town. "Like that you mean?"

"That's it," says he. "Why would..."

I interrupted him. "Look, Doc Muller," and I pulled up my sleeve to show him my watch, "I've got an automatic watch. I'm winding it up!"

"Oh!" cries he. "Is that all it was?" and he had the grace to laugh. "Well, that's that cleared up then. You don't need to see me about winding watches," and he laughed again.

"Well," said I, "let's not dismiss it as a joke because it's not funny. No wonder people get written down as all sorts of strange things if this sort of mistake can be made. Suppose I had refused to see you, you would have continued with the false assumption, wouldn't you?"

Well, there was more to it but the gist of it all is this - never presume. That's how mistakes are made, and mistakes in the prison service can have catastrophic consequences for some unfortunates.

Still, the watch is being sent out to Lesley now. Let her develop a personality disorder as she stands in the queue at Aldi and shakes like a leaf.

Some little kid will say, "Look Mum, that woman is shaking!"

"Don't look, it's rude to stare Tyrone. She's probably got a personality disorder."

No she hasn't! She's got a bleedin' automatic watch!

The Voice In The Wilderness

All at sea

For a long time now we have been struggling to get some sense out of the prison service, and several other places, about my salubrious past. I'd better explain that statement because on its own it makes little sense. If anyone should know about my past it is me, but apparently I don't know what I am talking about, not according to the prison service anyway.

I had a brother who is now dead - he died of stomach cancer about fifteen years ago. He, like me, had a colourful history. Two men, same date of birth, same initials, same surname - some idiot saw this and decided in his wisdom that they were both the same man. He (or she) understandably lumped both records together and now it is proving impossible to get the authorities to admit that they have made a mistake. Hence the struggle.

When I was young - as the Beatles would have it, "So much younger than today" - I went to sea. Well, I was an adventurous sort of cove, like most youngsters. Sailors are strange fellows. They must be - how else do we explain pirates? In fact we were only one step up from pirates at times. Young men, no morals other than those of a particularly wayward alley-cat, and a conviction that, once out of sight of authority, we could do as we pleased.

Mostly we were around the Medway towns as home port. I went onto several ships, signed on and went to sea. As we all know, water always finds its own level and birds of a feather etcetera. As soon as I joined a ship I just as quickly got in with the worst elements on that vessel, although what we did could be seen more as stupid escapades rather than crimes - though there were plenty of those in various ports.

Let me tell a wee tale to illustrate...

In Chatham we, as a group (a very flexible and changing group), were of course forever chasing the ladies and, being sailors, the ladies we knew were the ladies we met in dockside bars and other dens of ill-repute - the ladies of the night, shall we say? Of course we would have one we considered our girlfriend, although she often left us in the pub while she went out to earn a quick fiver. That never bothered us - as I say, we had no morals.

I am not saying that we lived on immoral earnings, although if a lady of the night bought me a drink today it wouldn't be the first time. I am sure that when we were at sea these ladies would have other boyfriends on other ships - that was in the nature of things. This story is about such a lady, in a way.

One of my pals, and he will remain nameless for obvious reasons, had a girlfriend, a lady of loose morals and knicker elastic, who had a prow on her like a Russian icebreaker. I won't use her name, she may be a long-married grandmother by this time - she will certainly be well into her sixties. I'll call her Bouncy Barbara and, from henceforth, BB. BB was a very pretty girl with this luscious, buxom figure which made lusting young sailors drool - and older sailors too.

One day we were to take a cargo across to Holland, so off we went and, as was the unofficial practice in those days, a couple of us smuggled our girls aboard to come with us. We were only going to be away for less than a week - but if the Old Man had caught us we would all have been looking for a new berth. One of the girls who came with us was BB. I had a girlfriend too, of course, a lady of the night. In fact, never mind the night, she didn't give a toss what time of day it was when it came to dropping her drawers for a quick fiver.

In Amsterdam, whilst we mucky little matelots did our matelot stuff - such as unloading the ship - the three girls went ashore to have a look around and maybe score for a few knee-tremblers here and there - after all, they were working girls! BB met a Dutch Captain in a bar, much older than her of course, and one look at her inviting curves and he was smitten. The first I knew about it was when BB's boyfriend came to me and told me all about it. BB had been to the Dutchman's home - very plush, a safe with a lot of money and other things just asking to be evacuated to England. The best part was that the Dutchman had asked BB to marry him! My pal wanted me to pretend to be a vicar and do the job. BB would go off for a few days' honeymoon with the Dutchman, leaving the house keys with us, and we would strip the place bare. BB would come back, slip off, join the ship and we would all bugger off back to Chatham with the loot, leaving a deserted Dutch husband with an equally deserted house.

This of course is a wicked crime, no doubt about it, but it is also a great adventure and a laugh for young sailors who had no morals. I couldn't do it of course because I would have started laughing before we got halfway through the fake wedding - another fellow did it. We robbed the Dutchman's house, BB legged it from the marital bed and we were on the ship when she was ready to sail back to Gravesend with our loot. We were the toast of The Royal Exchange in Chatham High Street when the tale was recounted later for the benefit of those who hadn't been there and we spent our loot on several days of debauchery.

I was involved in hundreds of such dodgy incidents around the world - pure adventure mostly, although some were a good bit darker and nastier than BB's marriage to the Dutchman. It wasn't always the same people involved, sailors are transient at the best of times, but they were all the same calibre - crooks, and as I say, only one step up from pirates. (We'd have done that too if we could have gotten away with it.)

The point is, all of those men, and women of course, are my age now, or older, and some will probably have passed away. They will all be settled grandparents and if we were to get together no doubt many a laugh would be had about our murky deeds as youngsters. The trouble is, they won't want any of it being brought out and THAT is where I think my problems lie! I've asked several fellows to get hold of people to prove where I was at certain times in the past but everyone seems to be a bit reluctant to talk about any of it. Quite understandable too really - the great majority of those old crimes will still be on an unsolved register somewhere.

I can see their thought processes. They think I must be going to drag it all up again, tell tales out of school. Well, I'm not! All I need is people who knew me between 1963 and 1983 to verify that they were at sea with me and where we were, what ships we were on, that's all. I don't want to discuss anything we might or might not have done.

Life is like a garden that we create. When we first get it, it's a patch of mud and soil. We mess about at first but as time passes we flatten the ground, grow grass over the ugly mud and trim it until it is a nice, neat lawn. Obviously we don't want some prat coming along and digging up the lawn we have created to cover all of our past blemishes and indescretions.

Don't worry. The lawn is safe. I just need someone to verify the facts of where we were in our salad days, not what we did. What we did wasn't so bad anyway, not by today's standards, and we saw it all as more of an adventure rather than a criminal sort of thing. But criminal it was, and it is best left in the past. Maybe one day we can get together, those of us still alive of course, and snigger about it into our grey beards.

The Voice In The Wilderness

Neglected toys

Once again we reach the end of one more week where nothing at all has happened or been said on any subject whatever. This business of me being the invisible man isn't all that far from fact - I might as well not be here. Come to think on it, that's not a bad idea. I'm working on it.

Of course all of that gives me little scope for news - no scope at all really - so I'll just have to fall back on something either esoteric, philosophical or just downright pointless but semi-amusing.

The other day, as I sat here sweltering in the heat, I decided to get the mail order catalogue and buy myself an electric fan - it is allowed these days. In fact, on the enhanced wing, cons are given free electric fans. Mind, they are given a lot of stuff which we lesser creatures do not get even though we too are of enchanted status. They get free duvets, bedside lights and so on. I had to buy my own duvet, just as I am buying my own little fan to stave off heat-induced heart attacks.

So, I got the catalogue and, as I perused the pages, I saw soft pillows at a tenner for two, so I got them as well. Then I just browsed, and it is quite amazing how many gadgets and little toys are on sale these days - toys for the boys. This got me to looking around my cell and checking to see what utterly pointless toys I have bought over the years to play with and keep myself amused, bought for no other reason other than it seemed like a good idea at the time.

Let me see...

I've got a portable personal CD player which has never had the batteries in it. It's brand spanking new and I've had it a couple of years. There is an extremely sophisticated calculator, which I don't even know how to use, and an electronic spell-checker which is still sitting there in its little velvet presentation bag. I've got an electric shaver which I've had a couple of years but can't use because it makes my face sore, me being a tender-skinned fellow with a hide like a numb rhino.

What else have I got?

Playstation of course, but I use that. Fancy stereo, but I use that a lot too. Hair clippers, electric alarm clock, transformer and charger and, the pride of any idiot's collection, a watch which does just about everything, including tell the time in Australia. I can't actually work it, don't know how to set it despite the fact that I've got the instruction booklet which makes no sense to me at all. I think it must be translated from Chinese. Of course I have the ubiquitous transistor radio which never gets turned on, hasn't been for years - we are on the mains these days.

There is more but I've made my point - toys to play with and utterly useless. Why then have I decided to buy yet another one? By the time I get it, summer will be over and it will sit in its box under the bed, neglected and ignored. I know how it feels - I've felt like that for a long time.

Some fellows have more than me of course - and that's just the electrical stuff. What about the mechanical stuff such as the very typewriter I am bashing away at with great abandon?

I think it all comes down to two things - modern living and the fact that none of us ever really grows up. We like our toys no matter how old and silly we are.

Bloody watch! Cost an arm and a leg, and it is sitting there on the shelf an hour slow because I don't know how to work it to put it onto BST - all those little buttons to push, it's very confusing to a fellow like me. Let's have it right - I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

So, the end of another week and all I've got to report is that I have ordered another toy for my collection. I'm not telling Lesley - she just takes the piss.

The Voice in the Wilderness

Flaming June!

Why am I surprised? Just a few short weeks ago I wrote that I was full of hope for June - shall we say that I had great expectations! There were three main reasons for my hopes for June, three arrows fired into the air, seeking targets.

The first was the decision that was being made by the CCRC, and we fully expected that they would order another investigation - on many grounds, not the least being the new evidence that has been uncovered, turned up, call it what you will. That decision isn't coming now, not for another six weeks or so. Still, what is six weeks after over twenty-four years? I'll tell you - six weeks is six weeks I'll never get back. It's not as though they will be tacked onto the end of my life, is it? (Never end a question with a preposition - my tutor, Sandra Forrest told me that.) So - no CCRC decision.

The second arrow was the Parole Hearing of course, but that has gone much the same way as the CCRC decision - in fact it has gone further. The Parole Board has ordered that proper reports be done and assessments too. That has all got to be completed by November 7th, so there's another delay - no decision.

The third arrow was my manuscript that I sent off to the Koestler Awards in my quest for yet another award to go with my Galberg and my David Astor. We expected that decision to be by the end of June too, but it won't be. In fact it will probably be August before we hear anything - so yet again, no decision.

Story of my life really - hurry up and wait. So, I sit here in my kennel on the Lazy L and cogitate, muse, meditate, contemplate and vegetate, doing absolutely nothing, zilch, nada, nuffink. It's all good for me of course, character-building, so they say. However, the way I see it is that after getting on for twenty-five years of it, my character is formed, built, erected and cast in concrete - and some people probably think THAT wouldn't be a bad idea. I'm getting quite the expert at doing bugger all now. I can sit in my cell and keep myself entertained for long and sustained periods of time, doing nothing.

At least the lock-down is over now, more or less. They locked the prison down on Saturday 19th June and kept it that way until the morning of Friday 25th June. That's six days, the longest lock-down I have ever been involved in, and I've seen a few over the years - more than most in fact. Not many fellows have been in jail as long as me. Ha! There's something to be boastful about!

So, the lock-down came to an end at 9:30 am on Friday 25th June and the very first thing I (and most others) did was head for the showers. It's all very well washing in a sink but that can never give the feeling of cleanliness that a shower gives.

As a bit of an aside - have you ever stood in a shower and heard, from the cubicle next door, a fellow who is tone deaf singing in a fake Jamaica accent - he's from Birmingham - "Polly Put The Kettle On"? And the beautiful part was HE DIDN'T KNOW THE WORDS! Having said that, knowing the words is hardly the point really. We've got this hairy-arsed gunman who is doing thirty years or more singing a nursery rhyme in an accent he THINKS is real but is as phoney as his 'sense of honour' and I think he must be in the middle of a personality crisis of some sort. Does he know who he is? I doubt if he knows WHERE he is, never mind anything else.

But, like me, he was happy to be getting a shower - which brings me neatly to the statement that most people are happy with the little things in life. But now and then, just for a change, we would like to get at least SOMETHING to give us hope - like a decision from the CCRC, Parole Board, the Koestler Awards or the idiot in the kitchen who seems to confuse apples and bananas.

It's all character-building is it?

The Voice In the Wilderness

Lock-down

Here we are at the end of yet another week where news of any sort is in short supply - there is a dearth of information, we may say. When I reflect on things it seems that every week is a bit short on interest - it's the rare occasion when there IS any news in fact.

Howsomever (I like that word), there is an interesting subject to bring up - well, almost interesting: we are on a lock-down! A lock-down is when everything comes to a halt and the whole place is locked up to be searched for however long it takes, usually about two to three days. No showers, no exercise, no work, no nuffink. Mail isn't supposed to be affected but it invariably is - apparently they are short of staff to do the mail because they are all needed to search places, and especially cells.

So what has brought on this lock-down? You may well ask. All I know is that as I was in my cell watching the football on Saturday afternoon there was a kerfuffle out on the wing and voices shouting about "Everybody lock up!" I haven't seen or spoken to anyone since, although the gossips have been yelling out of the windows.

I don't know what happened and, to be quite honest about it, I don't really care - it has nothing to do with me. All I know is that we have been given a sheet of paper under the cell doors to inform us that there will be no further issue of knives (for cooking I presume) until further notice. That can only mean that there has been an incident and somebody was bleeding. Another paper came under the doors this morning telling us that we are to be kept on lock-down until the whole place has been searched. Going on past experience that could mean about three days.

Apart from the fact that my cell will be wrecked at some point in the next several days, I don't mind a bit. In fact I quite like lock-downs because I am quite comfortable with my own company and I can read or write or just watch telly and play with my PS2. I have plenty to occupy my tiny little mimd. Some fellows are not so successful when it comes to entertaining themselves, that's why they yell rubbish to their friends out of windows. Most cons, however, take the opportunity for a bit of peace and quiet so, for however long it takes the search to be completed, we have peace generally and most cons actually like it.

Not the junkies, of course, they need to be out of their cells so they can duck and dive and 'flex' as they seek the wherewithal to chase the elusive dragon, that mythical creature which doesn't exist and therefore cannot be caught. But the junkies don't count.

Another bonus is the break from the perpetual beggars who are always on the look-out for fags, or fag papers, or sugar - or anything else they can get their hands on, the poor managers. Yes, a few days of peace and quiet are ahead of me and the rest of my contemporaries scattered around in the silent cells, the only sound at the minute being the tapping of a typewriter. Oh yeah! That's me!

So, over the next couple of days we will all be searched, cells will be turned topsy-turvey, little, inconsequential items will be confiscated out of vindictiveness, like sellotape, paperclips - stuff which makes every day living that tiny bit easier. That will all be taken away, but it's a small price to pay for peace.

Finally, I wonder who got stabbed or cut? No, forget I said that, I don't want to know. If I don't know then I can't tell anyone, and that seems like a sensible policy to me. Let me live in peace, quiet and total ignorance, just like my life has been for years now. Why change a losing combination?

The Voice In The Wilderness

Putting my foot in it

Once again we come to the end of another week without any form of news worth mentioning. However, I did manage to get my very own personal officer to finally have a word with the psychology department here at the Lazy L, the realm of Hoss the Boss. He - my personal officer, henceforth referred to as my PO - came back and said that he had spoken to some fellow who, without reference to anything, said that he had nothing to do with my "case" and that it was being handled (or dealt with) by a female who is away on leave! They must get long leaves in this place - I've been here since March of last year and seen neither hide nor hair of a member of the psychology department nor had any form of communication from them. Perhaps I really am invisible!

My PO also said that this person, the elusive dealer in cases, knows all about me. Well, that's a good trick if you can do it! Never met me but knows all about me. I don't know all about me and I've met me several times. Anyway, let's not be unkind - we will see.

All of that notwithstanding, I have had yet another encounter with my favourite female, that ould tart, Lady Luck. Yesterday, as I was passing the kitchen door, I slipped on a patch of wet gravy that some slob had dropped and either didn't know he had done it or - and this is my theory - thought that he was above such menial tasks as cleaning up his own mess.

Flat on my back in front of several eye witnesses and, let's be honest, some of them have got memories like supergrasses - they can remember things that never happened in the first place, just like policemen. Flat on my back - but I simply bounced back up again, no harm done and no damage. I should have stayed down and demanded a huge compensation package, but I didn't - not a quick enough thinker obviously.

Ha! When we fall over we feel such fools! Everyone takes the piss. No wonder we get back up instantly and try to pretend it never happened. Life's like that.

As I say, I didn't hurt myself and I had completely forgotten the incident until I got into bed last night at about half ten. I couldn't get comfortable because my right shoulder was sore. I can't even remember landing on it - I thought I landed on my arse if I landed anywhere. But trying to get comfy in bed I found that I couldn't, I was sore. I dropped off to sleep quickly enough as usual but was soon awake again, my shoulder being really sore. By the time I got up this morning it was giving me a lot of grief and it will probably take days and days to settle down again. I won't take pain-killers - I never do, unless it is something seriously painful like listening to Leonard Cohen singing. 

It's all part of this getting old game, that's what it is. When we were young we bounced off floors, no harm done. These days I am in agony if I put my underwear on wrinkled.

What's all this got to do with Lady Luck? Well you may ask. The patch I slipped on couldn't have been any bigger than an inch or two square, no more, and I've only got size seven feet. Yet in that large expanse of area I managed to put my foot in it. Some folk think I've been putting my foot in it all of my life, but they are merely anti-social types better ignored. Oh yes, Lady Luck did it, she guided my foot!

Lesley keeps telling me to think positively, and before I forget I have to stop saying she has no sense of humour. Done that then. Apparently I have to think positive thoughts - she read it in a book recently. Yes, okay, I'll do that, but when I go arse over head as I slip on the gravy of life (left there by some unscrupulous nitwit), forgive me if I utter the odd word of a censorious nature on the way down to hurt my shoulder - and I don't mean, "Oh gosh! Ooops!"

The Voice In The Wilderness

Pensive mood

"When oft I sit in pensive mood..." as the poet would have it - a state of affairs, incidentally, which I find myself in at the crack of dawn every morning. I get up at some ungodly hour every day for no other reason than that my eyes are open. I normally make myself a cup of tea and a fag then sit there listening to, and completely ignoring, Radio Four. Well, it makes me feel a bit intellectual and I find the drone somewhat comforting.

This morning was no different. I crawled out of my pit at six-fifteen ack emma and, after I had completed the tea-making ceremony (it'll never catch on in Japan), and had my fag going at a satisfactory level (I do it for the coughing you know), I found myself staring out of the window while some female on the radio told me about black-faced sheep running around the Yorkshire hills. I wasn't actually seeing anything out of my window - there's not much to see beyond the sky and a steel fence. Still! The sky is a long way away - how far does anyone need to see?

I got to thinking about days of yore - I do that a lot. In fact I think it is a common trait - the older we get, the more we think on the past. Let's have it right, we are comfortable in the past - we know what happened and no surprises. The future we are not so sure about - there isn't much of it for a start.

So, there was I, thinking about the past. I got thinking about those I have known and who I will never see again - and before anyone starts to think that I am going to go off on some maudlin or mawkish trawl of misery, I'm not. I just mentioned that in passing because it took me to mistakes, bad decisions and poor choices, stupid ideas and even sillier remarks and actions. 

Let me put it this way - I've made mistakes. But who hasn't? In this life our mistakes are the only things we can lay full, undisputed claim to. Show me a man or woman - or the ambigous come to that - who hasn't, at some stage or point, said to themselves, "If I had known then what I know now..." and I will show you a person with all the regrets that I have myself. On the other hand, show me someone who says they have NOT said that and I will show you a bleedin' liar.

We all make mistakes. From the moment we begin making decisions the mistake count starts to rise, and goes on rising until the day we hand in our dinner pail and they nail down the coffin lid. We can't change the past and, as I have said before many times, not even God can change the past. All we can do is our best for the future, whatever time may be left to us.

I'm sixty-four years old this year and I could shuffle off long before my allotted three score and ten. On the other hand, I could live well into my nineties, who knows? But however much longer I have got, I hope I can keep my mistakes and poor decisions down to a bare minimum - and hope that I don't cause too much misery and upset as I do it. All things being equal I should be okay and hopefully not make too many errors in judgement. I've learned a couple of things over the years. I have a certain amount of experience in the game of life, shall we say.

Of course I can't factor in certain things such as the actions or decisions of others, that's always a problem. But - and with me there is always a "but" - one thing I have to be aware of at all times is my old girlfriend Lady Luck. She of the big boots and habit of swinging her handbag at passing pigeons. All of my life that ould bag has been lurking and hovering in the shadows, waiting for me to feel complacent or good about things. Then she simply polishes up the ould toecaps, takes careful aim and... WHAM! Right in the testacularities. Then, as I writhe in agony on the floor, she gives me one of her smiles and says, "Oh good, I thought I'd missed!"

Well let me tell you something, petal, you've never missed, not once in sixty-three years have you missed. Haven't you got someone else you'd rather kick? The novelty must be wearing off a bit by now.

Finally I will finish, as I have done before, with a perfect description of my luck:

If Dolly Parton had triplets, and I was one of them, I'd be the one who got the bottle.

The Voice In The Wilderness

An apology to Christie Moore

There is a little bit of intelligence this week - although, when dealing with officialdom, "intelligence" may not be the best choice of words. I have had a letter from my appeal solicitor informing me that my file will be passed to the decision-making team at the CCRC in the next couple of weeks, which sounds great at first glance. Ah! But then I am informed that after that the case will need to go before a panel for a decision and that could take some time, a couple of months in fact. For all I know it will also have to go before the office tea lady and the cat!

I am being unkind and, after all of these years ,I shouldn't quibble over a few more weeks. After all, I am getting younger by the day and fully expect to live forever.

So, that's the position with the CCRC - watch this space.

The other day I had a letter from Lesley. (We all know Lesley, her of the blonde hair, bad temper, lack of patience and the sense of humour of a burning orphanage - THAT Lesley.) She wrote and said she had seen something I wrote a couple of weeks ago, a response to Mr Anonymous, (author of the political tirade in reaction to something I had said). Lesley had seen my response and the verses that I had included under the title 'An Ordinary Man' and she (Lesley) thought I may have written it. I didn't. It is by a fellow called Christie Moore, an Irish singer. In fact I thought I had attributed it, I normally do, so I must have let that one slip past without attribution.

To make up for that, and by way of an apology to Christie Moore, I am going to include another here, and this one is called:

LAWLESS

He was Lawless by name and lawless by nature,
Trouble, right from the start.
Hard as nails, running wild through the streets,
He was breaking his poor mother's heart.
Nature played a trick on Lawless
And the humour of Nature is cruel.
He grew up as we all had expected
Into a dangerous fool.

He was a hard man, a man for all seasons,
Always out for a fight.
He couldn't hold drink but still he'd get plastered
In Clarke's, every Saturday night.
He'd strip to his vest and challenge the best
Until the Gards they were called to come fast.
Then they'd lock him away for the rest of the day
And let him out on a Sunday for Mass.

One night he went down to the Ringsend Regatta
Where he met up with the bould Dolly Glass.
She wasn't exactly what you'd call beauty
But she was the belle of her class.
A whirlwind romance and Dolly took a flier
With Lawless, she would settle down.
It was pure coincidence, three month before,
There was a Yankee destroyer in town.

And the couple were blessed with one of God's miracles
Before six months had elapsed.
Dolly gave birth to a nine pound black baby
And Lawless was fit to collapse.
She swore She'd NEVER been touched by another
And Lawless took her at her word.
And the neighbours exclaimed, "He's the SPIT of his father!"
And the cuckoo's a wonderful bird.

Now Lawless stays in to look after the family
While Dolly goes out for the night.
The ould gossips all say, "She's free in her ways!"
And their evil rumours run rife.
When Lawless heard this, he waited for Dolly
On the bridge where the river runs low.
No one will ever know what happened next
But Dolly drowned in the water below.

Some say he's crazy, most say he's evil,
Everyone says that he's mad.
No one will defend him because he was no angel
But I'll tell you, he wasn't ALL bad.
They locked him away for the rest of his natural,
Never again will he see -
That at the back of Ringsend there's a lonely child playing
Where the Liffey runs into the sea.

The Voice In The Wilderness

Delays are inevitable, resistance is futile

I have had a letter this week from my solicitor. He has been chasing up both the Parole Board AND the prison here at the Lazy L in connection with reports and such other mundane matters which mean nothing to them but which are life-affecting from my point of view - but my point of view doesn't matter.

Reading the letter, which enclosed a document from the parole board, I get the feeling that the board is less than delighted with the reports submitted in my parole dossier. In particular they seem to be wanting to know why their previous instructions appear to have been ignored. I may be reading this all wrong of course but that's the impression I get. The board seems to be giving the prison until the 7th November to comply with their previous instructions. That isn't for the prison just to produce the necessary documents, it is the deadline for their production and submission, allowing time for my solicitor to digest the content, time for us to respond, if any response is necessary, AND a month in which to organise everything.

It takes the prison service an age to turn around, never mind adhere to instructions as complicated as 'Tell the truth,' so I can see problems ahead. My solicitor has actually sent a letter direct to the prison asking for some kind of clarification on dates when we can expect things to be done by. I very much doubt that he will get any sort of sensible answer. The simple facts are that the system is in chaos and nobody has the nous to get anything done properly. All they seem to be capable of is harping on about matters which took place forty or fifty years ago and which had nothing to do with me in the first place!

In the meanwhile I sit here in my kennel and sedately rot away. As a rule I never indulge in self-pity, and I'm not about to do it now, but I have known a certain amount of hardship during the years since 1986 and yet I am expected to pretend none of it happened and forget it all. Okay, fine. I can be pragmatic about it all and put it out of my mind - the past is gone and done so let's leave it in the past, it's the best place for it.

If I can do that (and all I say is leave it in the past - I will never forget it of course and certainly will never forgive it, but it IS the past, let's leave it there). If I can do that, why can't the prison service? Why this silly, unrelenting harping on about things from fifty years ago which had nothing to do with me in the first place?

I shall answer that question myself. Because they have nothing else to point a finger at me for! Nothing! (Bless me, I must be a saint.)

"0oooo!" they say. "There is no evidence of change!"

What cobblers! Pure, unmitigated shite. I challenge anyone, or any living entity, to look back over the last quarter of a century and ask themselves, "Have I changed in that twenty-five years?"

The answer? "Of course I have! Everyone does!"

So, if everyone on the planet can see and understand that, why can these trainee psychologists not see it? These young girls, these children, are daily destroying lives on a much greater scale than any prisoner incarcerated within the system and subject to their mercies. And the most frightening part of all is that they don't care! They have neither thought nor remorse for the destruction they create, the lives they ruin unthinkingly, the hearts they break, the misery they create, the children who cry for their fathers and the despair which lives in the cells around the place. They care for none of that in their arrogance - they care not.

As for me? Well, I care. Every night when I get into bed and wait for the encompassing arms of Orpheus (or should that be Morpheus?) to take me away to the Land of Nod - a process which never takes more than a few minutes - I have a little soul-search. I review the day in my mind and if I think I have said or done anything which may have offended anyone, I apologise the next day. But that's just me. I'm a bad person, I must be - the trainee fraudsters say so.

Oh well, I am going to go for a drive now in a fast car with the police chasing me at speeds of up to 241 mph - that's as fast as the game will go. All good for my rehabilitation I expect.

The Voice In The Wilderness

Cabbages and kings

Ramblings

Yesterday, Monday 17th May, they came for me for an M.D.T. which, for those who do not understand the acronyms of prison life, is a Mandatory Drug Test. Everyone gets them every so often, although it is a long time since I had one myself. After all, what is the point or value in testing someone who is well known for being anti-drugs? It's a waste of time and money. Having said that they test all of the non-users from time to time just to make their figures look good, and that is verging on fraud in my opinion - but nobody is asking for my opinion so forget I said that.

The point is that as we traversed the corridor, myself and my escort of po-faced jobsworths, we passed a nurse from the healthcare department.

"Oh!" says she. "You are on a Well Man clinic on Wednesday, did you know that?"

"I do now," said I.

So, tomorrow, Wednesday 19th, I am attending the Well Man clinic in the healthcare where I will be prodded, poked, drained of bodily fluids (they take a blood sample) and generally given an M.O.T. (human bean version, circa 2010). The last time I attended such a bloodletting was in Whitemoor about two years ago and everything was found to be in good order, apart from my cholesterol level which stood at a little over five, and, while it's not disastrous, it's not particularly good. The doctor put me on medication of 40mgs per day of Simvastatin and I've been taking them ever since. I expect that the ould cholesterol level will be greatly reduced by now despite the sedentary lifestyle which I have adopted since becoming medically retired.

I have to admit that I spend a fair amount of my time sitting here at my table, staring out of the window and thinking about all manner of things.

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To speak of many things.
Of balls of string and sealing wax,
Of cabbages and kings."

I sit here and, as I say, I stare out of the window. It was a good bit more interesting in Whitemoor, the view that is. I had grass, flower beds, a road and an awful lot of birds to watch. It's not the same here, all there is is a barbed-wire-topped fence that surrounds the excersise yard. Having said that, there are a few birds to watch from time to time so I shouldn't be carping - although a carp is a fish.

I had a letter from Lesley yesterday, as I do most days, and she is her usual self. I thought I was grumpy but next to Lesley I am a positive ray of sunshine, a proper little Pollyanna. Lesley would fit right into that programme we see from time to time on BBC1, "Grumpy Old Women" with Sheila Hancock and Jenny Eclair and that mob. I quite like it, the programme, it makes me laff. Well, let's face it, there are times when I need a bit of a laff in this place. Lesley told me a joke:

A blonde takes her car to a garage to be checked because it is not working correctly.
The mechanic checks it, sorts it out and says to the blonde, "Just shit in the carburettor love."
She says, "Have I got to shit in it every day?"

Lesley is blonde! Ha! It's not the Well Man clinic I need, it's counselling! :)
 
Response to Anonymous

A couple of weeks ago, around about the time when we heard that we no longer had a government and the Body Politic were at their endearing best as they scrambled for a better seat at the trough, I wrote a fairly tongue-in-cheek bit which ended up on the blog. I didn't intend to upset anyone, although I seem to have managed to do so. I just thought I had made one or two general observations in a fairly light manner!

We had an almost instant response from a Mr Anonymous (from Purley for all I know) and he (or she) seems to have taken what I said to heart. Touched a nerve there, did I?

According to the Purley Vigilante, Labour are nothing short of being CRIMINALS (which was how he - or she - wrote it).

Basically what the Purley Purveyor of Piffle says is that Labour flogged off the family jewels to foreigners, liberated the working classes from their serfdom and generally acted in a way that brought the country to penury. No, sorry, the True Blues did the liberating, Labour just did the rest.

Should I correct the glaring errors for the Purley Pontificator? Well, nobody likes a smart arse but I'll say a couple of things. Those wonderful men and women under the guidance of Mad Maggie started the selling and destruction of the industrial base of this country. Shall I make a little list of what was either sold or destroyed both by and under the Mad Ould Cow?

Steel, Coal, Shipbuilding, Gas, Electricity, Water, Telecommunications, Banks, Railways, Public Transport, Prisons 

- and so the list goes on, all flogged off under Thatcher.  (Incidentally, there is a large organisation in Yorkshire who intend to attend her funeral. They want to see her planted in her grave and then have a party over it.)

Millions of jobs went, the industrial power of this country. The navy has been reduced to next to nothing, the army can barely protect and arm its soldiers and as for the pretty boys of the air force, they are training to fly gliders because there is bugger all else for them to fly. (I'm a navy man myself - maybe I gave it away eh?)

I quote the Person From Purley: "The Conservatives let the working class loose".

Loose from what? A job? The chance to earn a living? The chance to rot on the dole? A waiter's job? This country was once a heavyweight. Our industrial muscle came from the blood, sweat and tears of the working man in the yards, the mines and the foundries. People were proud of themselves. Now? Well, let's try this one for a finale:

I'm an ordinary man, nothing special, nothing grand,
I've had to work for everything I own.
I never asked for a lot, I was happy with what I got,
Enough to keep my family and my home.
Now they say that times are hard so they're handing me my cards,
Because there's not the work to go around.
When the whistle blows, the gates will finally close,
Tonight they're going to close this factory down.

I never missed a day, or went on strike for better pay,
For twenty years I served the best I could.
With a handshake and a cheque it's so easy to forget
That I've served them through the bad times, and the good.
The boss says that he's sad to see that things have got so bad,
But the captains of industry will never lose.
He still drives a car and smokes a big cigar
And likes to take his family on a cruise.

And so condemned I stand, just an ordinary man
Like thousands beside me in the queue.
I watch my darling wife trying to make the best of life,
God knows what the kids are going to do.
Every day I've tried to salvage something of my pride,
To find some work so that I might pay my way;
But everywhere I go, the answer's always "NO"
"No work for anyone here today!"

And as long as I live, I never will forgive
How they stripped me of my dignity and pride.

The things is, Mr Anonymous, it's about people and national pride, not scoring political points at the expense of others.

The Voice In The Wilderness

Trust and loyalty

I have been cogitating over the last several days on the subject of trust and loyalty. There isn't a lot of it about around this place - or any other prison for that matter. Rumours spread like an anti-social disease when the fleet is in town. The majority of it isn't malicious, the rumour-mongering - it's boredom as much as anything else. Cons, or at least some of them, gossip worse than old women at the Darby and Joan weekly meeting. The lives of prisoners are so empty, all they have is gossip in many cases. That's all very well - we all need a hobby in this world - but gossip can be malicious and dangerous.

Personally, I avoid gossip and the purveyors of it, but every now and then somebody comes to tell me something. Why do people feel the insatiatable urge to confess? It must be some sort of latent residue from their childhood when they actually believed all that rubbish about their noses growing like Pinocchio's if they lied, or some such cobblers. Fellows come to me and start to tell me their secrets - but I stop them. I don't want to know them. We all have our secrets and reasons for keeping them, but once we tell someone else then they are no longer secrets.

Not all secrets are harmful, and reasons for keeping secrets are not always sinister, but whatever the secrets may be I don't want to be the keeper for anyone else - but I am. I am not exactly sure how it came about, but I am full of the secrets of others. Oh it is all very gratifying to know that I am seen as trustworthy, and I would never disclose the secrets of another, no matter what that secret may be.

The way I see things is that I have every right to tell anyone about what I may or may not have done, but I have no right whatever to tell anyone else's secrets or confidences. That's why I get a bit irritated when I read these books by retired, so-called gangsters who seem to think that just because they are retired they have the right to tell all. They don't. Even though we might be free to tell all about ourselves, we have no right to tell about others - we are compelled to keep their secrets and take them to the grave with us. Just because we give up the life does not mean that we can give up the ethics. We cannot abrogate responsibility - even the guilty must be cared about and protected, rightly or wrongly.

This train of thought all came about a few days ago when someone came to tell me that he had told someone something in confidence and that a third party had been told about it. In effect the fellow felt that he had been betrayed!

"Why did you tell him in the first place?" I asked.

"I trust him!" was the response.

"Well," said I, "that was a mistake, wasn't it?"

He replied, "If you can't trust your mates, who can you trust?"

"Nobody, my son, nobody," said I.

"I trust you."

I grinned. "Then you are a bigger fucking mug than I thought."

The point is, in the life I have lead as a career criminal - a term it took me a long time to accept in fact - I have always been of the opinion that villains are intrinsically unpredictable and will commit all manner of stupidities. However, we can forgive just about anything and invariably do, sooner or later. The only thing that is unforgiving and unforgivable is treachery.

Which brings me neatly to the words of E.M. Forster who died in 1970:

I hate the idea of causes, and if I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.

The Voice In The Wilderness

Good prospects and bad communications?

Parole Board hearing

I finally have some news of a sort. I have received the draft of the representations to the Parole Board, which my solicitor is submitting on my behalf. I have to say that he has done a good job considering what little he has to work with. The fact that I have made my own reps to be included would seem to have taken a fair amount of the wind out of his sails in that I have said a lot of the things he would have said. However, I don't suppose it matters where the details come from as long as they are represented.

My solicitor is requesting several things, the first being an oral hearing because of the complexity of the matter brought about by the intransigent innaccuracies included in the dossier. He is also informing the board that he intends to seek my release, or failing that a transfer to open prison. My probation officer - The Wallace as we call her, in memory of William Wallace - has also asked for open prison for me and her recommendatlons should carry weight.

I have asked my solicitor to ask the board to allow either witnesses or observers. Andrew wants to attend, but I'm not entirely sure whether he wants input into the hearing or just wants to see if there is fair play.
[Andrew - I have let Frank's solicitor know that I shall certainly speak on Frank's behalf if asked to do so.]

In addition, there are several private individuals who have taken the decision to write to the Parole Board on my behalf and have said good things about me. (At least I hope they have said good and sensible things about me, but seeing as one of them is the world famous Lesley, she of the bad temper, blonde hair and proclivity to ineffective bullying, she might have said just about anything.) I don't know what friends have written about me. I thought it best that I shouldn't know really, that way there can be no suggestion of collusion or attempts to manipulate anyone's decisions. Let's be straight, the Prison Service would just love a good conspiracy theory - they make them up as they go along to brighten up rainy afternoons. 
[Andrew - Several people have written very helpful letters to the Parole Board making representations on Frank's behalf about how he has helped them or their relatives in some way while in prison. These letters paint a very different picture of Frank from the dry, impersonal official reports that make up the bulk of the dossier that is presented to the panel. Unfortunately, the Parole Board has said that it cannot accept representations directly from individuals in this way. They have suggested that any such representations should be sent to Frank's solicitor. I would suggest that they be sent to Frank so he can decide how best to use them at the hearing.]


Lesley only wants me to be released so that she can put her cold feet on me anyway - she says it's cheaper than running up large heating bills. Lesley has pets - a blackbird, several pigeons and recently a robin has been added to the little feeding frenzy on or near her washing line. She has gone all Mystic Meg lately, but that's okay - just do like I do and ignore her insanity.

Her latest complaint (about me) is that I have been giving her a bad name as a bully to all the world and she is insisting that I correct it, so that's what I'm doing, putting it right. With the greatest of sincerity and humility - and in the interests of my personal well-being, which includes the unreasonable desire to keep my head on my shoulders - I wish to say the following:

Lesley - the blonde version of Bodicea in a strop - has given up bullying me now and is being nice. (Actually she has always been nice, her bullying is pretty much useless - she ain't no good at it.)

Well, I think that just about covers that little contretemps. I am now going to make a cuppa - I'm as dry as a funeral drum.

A hung parliament?

We've had a General Election. Apparently, the country has been waiting for this event for years. If you listen to David Cameron - or as his friends lovingly refer to him, "I'll say anything for money" Cameron - the country has wanted rid of the Labour Party for a long time, or so we were told.

And what about the Lib Dems, the "Er, let me see", "I don't want to upset anyone" party under a fellow called Clegg? (There's a good, solid, working class, Yorkshire name for you - Clegg. It conjures up pictures of Yorkshire dales, closed coal mines and "The Last of the Summer Wine" - Clegg, Nick Clegg, Cleggie.) Everyone thought that he would be the kingmaker, so to speak, in that he would, or at least his party would, get many more seats around the trough than they had previously and might even beat Labour into third place.

As for Labour, they did surprisingly well considering how much the electorate dislike Gordon "Does this smile look creepy" Brown. The country has been desperate to get rid of him ever since Tony "Just call me Smarmy" Blair legged it for greener pastures.

Say what you like about Blair, he knew how to handle people. He had a certain charisma that the others simply do not have. It has nothing to do with popularity, it is more to do with perceptions. Blair, rightly or wrongly, was seen as a charismatic figure; Brown is seen as a disater area. He should have stayed at the Treasury where he was a success - or perceived to be a success - but he allowed his ambitions not only to ruin his own standing but in the process to drag the Labour Party down with him.

The country quite simply did not want Brown, yet has been extremely reluctant to hand the power to Cameron! So we've ended up with a hung parliament, and some unkind people would probably think that is a great idea - hang the lot of them! Now we've got all manner of creeping about and whispering behind closed doors as they conspire to get their hands on the keys to the safe. Promises will be made, and they won't be the promises which are aired publicly - oh no, not a bit of it. Dirty dealing will be going on, wait and see. It would come as no surprise to find that we have another General Election in a relatively short time.

In the meanwhile, what does it mean to prisoners and those who make up the class from which prisoners generally come, the working class? The working class my arse! There is no working class anymore, the Conservatives saw to that in the eighties. There is no work anymore, not what is generally seen as work. Steel has gone, shipbuilding, coal, heavy industry - gone. The Conservatives did that and it seems to have been forgotten by the country. The cry is, "But we had to curb the unions!" - the unions could have been dealt with without destroying the country's industry.

Back to prisoners - what will the election mean to prisoners? Not much apart from new austerity measures which will make life that little bit worse, as it will be made worse for pensioners, the sick, children's education and all the rest of it. This austerity won't affect the politicos as they gronff and snuffle at the trough that is the public purse of course, certainly not.

So we have now got a hung parliament - it's a pity we haven't got one literally!

(Right then, that is my rant over, most of it designed just to get up people's noses and get reactions for the sake of a good argument, but how many will realise that? I wonder...)

Gone missing?

Once again there is nothing to report this week, beyond the fact that I managed to get into a fight with my typewriter in the middle of the week - a fight which I lost. The story of my life really.

In one of her letters during the week, Lesley told me that there had been some information on the internet or facebook or some other engine (I'm not entirely clear where) that someone called Maria Jansson had sent me an email. The email was sent on May 1st but I have not received it.

There is a service running under the title of "Email a prisoner" which apparently is a good deal quicker and cheaper than surface mail, or Snail Mail as Andrew calls it. What it amounts to on balance is that people can send emails to prisoners and they are delivered the same day. That's the theory. However it seems that, like everything else to do with the Prison Service, it is not working properly. Maria Jansson's email is not the first one that has not reached me because Lesley's sister sent me one from Gran Canaria and I haven't had that yet. She sent it at the start of April I think. In fact Christine has come across from Gran Canaria and arrived in this country last night, so she has got here quicker than the same-day delivery email which still hasn't turned up!
[Andrew - Actually, Maria sent her email directly to me and not through "Email a prisoner". I just haven't forwarded it to Frank yet, so its non-delivery is entirely my fault. Personally, I have always found the "Email a prisoner" service very dependable - all 21 emails I've sent to Frank so far have arrived with him safely and quickly.]

How many other emails have been sent to me by well-meaning folk on the internet? I have no way of knowing the answer to that of course, but I think I could make an educated guess that there are SOME. So, given that, I thought I would take the opportunity to thank anyone who may have tried to contact me. If I had received the letters or emails then I would have responded. I answer everything I get without exception, because if someone is kind enough to take the time and trouble to write or contact me then good manners alone dictate that they deserve a written "thank you". Let's face it, it's not as though I have anything else to do all day but correspond with people.

If I had the people to correspond with - strange to think that while my circle of friends on the internet expands, my circle of actual correspondents contracts! How do we explain that? Is there someone somewhere meddling? Well, going from past experience, I wouldn't be surprised. I have lost count of letters that have been sent to me which have never reached me and which I have only found out about when someone writes to complain about me not answering their letter or I write asking why they haven't written. These are the ones I know about. What about those one-offs which I have no idea about and no way of knowing of?

So, if anyone has sent me a letter or an email at any time which hasn't had a response from me, I am ever so sorry but I simply haven't had it to answer. I answer every letter I get on the same day that I get it and post it the following day. I LIKE writing to new people. I LIKE people. People are great, even those I may not agree with - they are still interesting and let's face it, I need interesting in this place, not to mention all the friends I can get.

Finally, let me mention the coming June, next month in fact. There are several prospects for June - it will be an interesting month I hope. The CCRC hope to have completed their examination of the case in June, but may run over. I have a manuscript entered into the Koestler's, and that could be judged in June, although that may run over too. Then of course there is the Parole Board hearing/paper-reading in June too! However, since my solicitor has applied for an oral hearing of the case which I fully expect to be granted, that will probably get put back or postponed for a couple of months.

All of that notwithstanding, it is all happening in June, or at least it is starting to happen in June. So as I say, it could well be an interesting month. All I have to do is to keep out of fights with my typewriter. I think I can manage that. (Oh yes, and to stop accusing Lesley of being a bully. She's not really, she's just got a mind of her own and is nobody's fool, which isn't a bad thing at all.)

I've said it before and I'll say it again - it's not easy being me. :)

The Voice In The Wilderness