Our destiny is not created by the shoes we wear but by the steps we take
I am enclosed in solitude, engulfed in loneliness, and submerged in darkness; I am breathing but not
living. They say murderers are not allowed to be with the other inmates. Who’s they? “They” are the
people who are really in charge, the people who are so blinded by their lust for power, they will ruin
anyone’s life to obtain it, the people who think calling me a murderer multiple times will magically
transform me into one.
I believe I have adapted well to life in prison, although the routine is a bit mundane: wake up at
06:45 for morning exercise, eat at 07:15, go back to my cell at 07:45 and then picked up by three
guards at 08:00. At least that is how it has been for the past three weeks, and today is no different. I
am escorted by the three guards to the dreadful, blue-white van and we drive for fifteen minutes.
I am bewildered – the courthouse has never been this busy on a Tuesday morning. My entire being is
cloaked in bright orange so “civilians” do not mistake me for being innocent. I sit down in courtroom
3B, on the chair marked for people like me, and I await the commencement of the 18thth day of my
trial. My state-provided attorney, with her pole-like posture and brittle tone of voice, tells me that
today is a witness-calling day, to which I am indifferent. One by one the witnesses are called up,
each deceptive face unleashing enough fake tears to form a river, condemning me for the murder
they know I did not commit.
At 13:30, court is adjourned as usual, and I am forced back into the dreadful van, driven back to hell
on Earth and manhandled back into solitude. This is when I ponder over the day’s events. The reality
that so many people would not give a single thought to my human rights gnaws at my mind and
helps me while away the time. At first, I had hope, hope that someone would refuse to go along with
this façade, hope that the next day the same three guards would escort me to freedom and not the
dreadful van, but, now, just like the humanity I thought present in the hearts of people, my hope is
dead, and I allow myself to drift into the darkness until 06:45 the next morning.
My only comfort is the soft but ever-glowing light inside me, illuminating me from the inside out –
like that of a firefly. A collection of all my reasons to stay alive. It fires my irresolute clay, and
somewhere in my inner-most being, I recall the words the words of Dylan Thomas: “Do not go gentle
into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light”, and like a cloud of smoke beginning
to surround and engulf me, I am overtaken by an epiphany: Our destiny is not created by the shoes
we wear but by the steps we take.
I am enclosed in solitude, engulfed in loneliness, and submerged in darkness; I am breathing but not
living. They say murderers are not allowed to be with the other inmates. Who’s they? “They” are the
people who are really in charge, the people who are so blinded by their lust for power, they will ruin
anyone’s life to obtain it, the people who think calling me a murderer multiple times will magically
transform me into one.
I believe I have adapted well to life in prison, although the routine is a bit mundane: wake up at
06:45 for morning exercise, eat at 07:15, go back to my cell at 07:45 and then picked up by three
guards at 08:00. At least that is how it has been for the past three weeks, and today is no different. I
am escorted by the three guards to the dreadful, blue-white van and we drive for fifteen minutes.
I am bewildered – the courthouse has never been this busy on a Tuesday morning. My entire being is
cloaked in bright orange so “civilians” do not mistake me for being innocent. I sit down in courtroom
3B, on the chair marked for people like me, and I await the commencement of the 18thth day of my
trial. My state-provided attorney, with her pole-like posture and brittle tone of voice, tells me that
today is a witness-calling day, to which I am indifferent. One by one the witnesses are called up,
each deceptive face unleashing enough fake tears to form a river, condemning me for the murder
they know I did not commit.
At 13:30, court is adjourned as usual, and I am forced back into the dreadful van, driven back to hell
on Earth and manhandled back into solitude. This is when I ponder over the day’s events. The reality
that so many people would not give a single thought to my human rights gnaws at my mind and
helps me while away the time. At first, I had hope, hope that someone would refuse to go along with
this façade, hope that the next day the same three guards would escort me to freedom and not the
dreadful van, but, now, just like the humanity I thought present in the hearts of people, my hope is
dead, and I allow myself to drift into the darkness until 06:45 the next morning.
My only comfort is the soft but ever-glowing light inside me, illuminating me from the inside out –
like that of a firefly. A collection of all my reasons to stay alive. It fires my irresolute clay, and
somewhere in my inner-most being, I recall the words the words of Dylan Thomas: “Do not go gentle
into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light”, and like a cloud of smoke beginning
to surround and engulf me, I am overtaken by an epiphany: Our destiny is not created by the shoes
we wear but by the steps we take.
