Then back to our presses until 6:30 pm, when we went back to X dorm for a lean and healthful, but almost tasteless meal of beef, pork, mutton or chicken (raised at the prison), plain rice or mashed potatoes, and canned peas or fresh vegetables in season, with another glass of milk.
Mail call was after dinner…perhaps our only privilege besides visiting day one Sunday per month. We then had one hour to write letters and talk to other inmates…the only time talking was permitted all day…then we took a shower before lights out at 9 pm.
As bad as our daily life was, it was pale compared to the girls in max. Locked in their tiny cells with nothing, eating only Nutra-loaf and water, and having to ride those damned elliptical machines all day to generate electricity had to be totally unbearable. A camera was in each cell aimed at the ellipticals, and the feed was shown on monitors throughout the prison, randomly scanning between cells. Whhen I saw Cory, she was barely recognizable….thin and looking totally broken.
Twice a month we had to get our buzz-cuts repeated…they were done in the dorm by our guards, with the same loud clippers. Quite annoying! They sat us in regular chairs, but if you resisted, they had a restraint chair handy, and it cost you ½ strike if they had to use it!
