Prisoner # 97G552

intended to be a character journal, more of a short

         My name is Peter O’Reily, but around here I am know as Prisoner # 97G552. I was convicted February 17, 2005 for aggravated assault in the first degree. I am currently serving a sentence of eight years in the Attica maximum-security correctional facility…
         I don’t think I have actually said that in the two years I’ve been here, but I’ve been seeing Doctor Kessler, the psychiatrist here in Attica, and she recommended that I start writing things down. She gave me this notebook over a month ago, but I haven’t touched it ‘til now. I don’t want to write this shit down; relive what I’ve done or see it in ink for that matter. Up until now, I’ve tried not to think of how long I’m stuck in this shit hole. I mean, two years have passed already, which is good, but all I can think is how I still have 1,698 days left. Eight years is a long fucking time to waste, rotting in a prison.
         I’m doing this whole thing with Doctor Kessler to stay out of trouble. And who knows, maybe it will do me some good mentally and emotionally. If I’m on my best behavior for the next year and a half, I have a better chance of being paroled. I can get the hell out of here when I’m 27, not 31… so I’m trying extra hard to be a model prisoner. A model prisoner. That’s kind of a contradiction, isn’t it? Whatever, I guess it’s worth a try to write all this shit out.

         I grew up in Astoria, New York in a very strict Irish-Catholic Family. My father is a contractor and my mother is an artist. A lot her work has to do with Catholicism and Irish traditions. She paints a lot for our local church, but doesn’t really make money off of it. I had a couple of her pieces tattooed on my arms. Despite that they are my mother’s work, my parents are very much against tattoos. They despise mine and told me that I am disgracing my Irish heritage and Catholic faith.
         I have a brother who is seven years younger than me. I’ve always tried to be there for him and be a good older brother but my parents think I am just the opposite. Ryan, my little brother, was looking for something in my room one day and found a pack of condoms. He asked me what they were and I didn’t see any harm in telling a 13-year-old boy what a condom was, so I explained it to him. That week, Ryan spent his allowance on a pack of his own condoms and showed my parents. At first they weren’t mad because they felt that I was at least informing him, but then my dad decided to have the sex talk with me and that led to him asking how many girls I had slept with. He was appalled by the number of partners I had and accused me of being a sex addict. I hardly think, 8 partners at the age of 20 qualified me as a sex addict, but it more than qualified me in my father’s eyes. I got the lecture on how I was an abomination to the Irish-Catholic faith for the hundredth time in my life that day. They kicked me out of the house because they said they couldn’t have me corrupting Ryan any longer.
         Before I got kicked out of my parent’s house, I had a job working for my fathers construction company, but it turned out that they wanted me out of their lives completely. Homeless and jobless, I moved to Buffalo, NY to live with my grandmother. My grandma had been a widow for close to ten years. My parents disowned her when she started dating again, so it seemed fitting for me to live with her.
         Living with my grandma was good for me. For the first time since before my little brother Ryan was born, I felt like I was a part of a family. I had a job working as a janitor at the Buffalo Museum of Science where my Grandma was a Curator. It was at the museum that my grandma introduced me to Katherine, this beautiful and sophisticated girl who befriended my grandma on her many visits there. My grandma tried extra hard to convince Katherine to let me take her out. I think she thought I was just some dumb, tattooed janitor and didn’t want to give me the time of day. She came around eventually and agreed to have dinner with my grandma and I. I guess it’s true what they say, that opposites attract. After that dinner, we were completely enamored with each other and my life was beginning to feel perfect.
         Perfection, or happiness for that matter, were never really a part of my life before living with my grandma so I don’t know what made me think it would last long. My grandma had been complaining about a tightness in her chest for about a week before I forced her to go to the doctors. We found out, after a ton of tests and my grandmother going in and out of the hospital for weeks, that she had Ischemic Heart Disease. The doctors told us that her coronary arteries were blocked so badly that she was due for a heart attack at any moment. They suggested that my grandma stay in the hospital but she insisted on being able to live her life. The heart disease caused my grandma to have an irregular heart beat, Cardiac arrhythmias as the doctors called it. It was her irregular heart beat that ended up killing her less than a month after she was diagnosed.
         Naturally the death of my grandmother was pretty hard on me, but I maintained my sanity because I had Katherine. I became dependant upon her for my happiness, my sanity and my strength. She became tired of having a college drop out, loser boyfriend depending on her for everything. She said we should take a break. I can’t count how many girls I’ve, “taken a break” with. It’s just a nice way of breaking things off, but I knew better. She told me that she didn’t want any of my things at her place because it hurt her too much to constantly be reminded of me. That Katherine, she must’ve been fed a ton of lies in past relationships because she was good at feeding them to me.
         With my sanity and happiness gone, I went to Katherine’s to pick up my stuff. I must admit, I had every intention of trying to persuade her to stay with me that day. Guess I should’ve used a different method. I remember what happened vaguely. You’d think the day that landed me in prison would always be fresh on my mind, but it’s not. I remember trying to hug her, but she pushed me away. It made me angry but I tried not to show it. She said something about how she loved me but it just wasn’t working between us. I asked her to marry me and told her that whatever wasn’t working we could fix. She told me I didn’t get it. And I didn’t. I remember holding her hand tightly so she wouldn’t walk away from me. She told me I was scaring her and that I should let go of her before she screamed. I didn’t let go and she did as she said should would. He screaming caught the attention of her father, which I’m sure was her intentions. He started calling me a worthless punk or something along those lines. I couldn’t stand it. It was sounding like my parents speech on how disgraceful I am for the 101st time in my life. Before I knew it, Katherine’s father was on the ground bleeding and there I was on top of him punching with all my might. And that’s what landed me in Attica.

         Growing up, I always felt like my life was a prison. My strict family forcing their Catholic beliefs and Irish traditions on me constantly. Once Ryan was born it was like my parents gave up on me because they had a new boy to start over with. Of course back then I had no clue of what prison was really like. Before I at least had some control over things. But now…Now, I have no control over anything in my life for as long as I’m in this prison. I’m told when to eat, when to sleep and confined to the inside of a maximum-security prison. I am limited to a friendship with the three other Irish guys in my cellblock because in here, you are separated by race. I am forced to work in a dress making shop because the Italians took over the kitchen and didn’t want a “Mick” working for them. I have disgraced my Irish-Catholic family, so no one comes to visit me. Katherine recently responded to the 20 letters I wrote her, but all the letter said was, “Fuck you, you bastard.” And I don’t blame her. It was silly of me to think that Katherine could still love me after what I did to her father. It’s like Doctor Kessler told me, I can only make amends with my past by fixing my future. Although, most days, it seems like I have no hope for a future, I’m hanging on and trying to make things right in the hopes that my grandma will look down on me and be proud. My grandma was the only love I’ve ever known, so I’m doing this for her.