A Stab at Rehab

Unintentional comedy from an authority figure.

The subject looked like this, melting down after an inmate called him a snitch.

The following is an excerpt from Lookout for Shorts: A Prison Memoir, which chronicles my comeuppance for being a slacker. This episode took place at a North Carolina minimum security prison, one of my stops during a three-year sentence. All names have been changed for obvious reasons…

As a “drug offender,” I was assigned to a ninety-day prison rehab program early in my sentence. I welcomed this opportunity to analyze and correct my unproductive thoughts, which was the aim of “A New Direction: A Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Curriculum: Mapping a Life of Recovery and Freedom for Chemically Dependent Criminal Offenders.” This was a fancy version of the AA saying: “fix your stinking thinking.” To end vicious cycles. It looked great on paper for those who wished to change.

Since I considered myself to be an “embedded reporter” during my prison stint, I also liked the prospect of finding top-notch writing fodder in this temporary home. And perhaps most importantly, I sent a letter to the authorities requesting this transfer at the start of summer, knowing this facility enjoyed air conditioning, unlike my “home camp.” This saved me from a brutal, weeks-long heatwave, temperatures as high as 104, not including the heat index.

The concept and curriculum of A New Direction were sound, but the well-meaning counseling staff seemed overmatched in administering it. After all, the best and the brightest counselors probably don't end up working in prisons. And god knows most of the “clients” are not interested in bettering themselves anyway; they’re trying to compile prison brownie points to be eligible for work release jobs and other perks.

Unsurprisingly, beleaguered counselors and unenthusiastic participants led mostly to chaos. As with minimum security prison life in general, it was like being in seventh grade all over again. People speaking out of turn and generally clowning around, or even sleeping, as the instructors tried to forge ahead with lessons.

The usual counselor for my class was Ms. Wyatt, a flighty and sweet woman pushing sixty who wouldn’t recognize a teachable moment if it prison-raped her. She’d miss therapist opportunities to simply read the workbook verbatim, and let the inmates run the asylum. This was cruel and unusual punishment for anyone trying to glean wisdom from the class, and what might have been a rewarding experience became drudgery. Thankfully, Ms. Wyatt took a vacation for a couple of weeks toward the end of my rehab stint. Enter Norm Carver – and maximum entertainment.

Mr. Carver, the Head Counselor, greatly resembled Breaking Bad actor Dean Norris, except for oddly dead eyes (most likely thanks to psychiatric medication). I’d heard wild stories about this guy who usually counseled the class next door, so I was excited to see him in action. His first day addressing our class began with the rhetorical question: “How did you come upon the thinking process that landed you here?”

Pursuing an answer to this would’ve made sense, but instead, this proved to be a launching pad for a bizarre, detour-ridden lecture that had nothing to do with the therapy concerns of those in the class. Following his opening query, Carver planned to lecture about the evolution of addiction throughout generations. What substance use among, say, the Baby Boomers had to do with the criminal thinking of addicts was never made clear, but this hardly mattered because topics flew all over the place.

Counselor Carver proceeded to make a sensationally incoherent, aimless analysis of seemingly anything, leaving me scrambling to take notes. The counselor noticed my studiousness at one point, giving me a wink of approval and a satisfied nod. Little did he suspect that the outrageousness of his lecture was the draw, not its educational value. Whatever the case, the non-sequiturs highlight reel came fast and furious.

The first generation analyzed was “The Veterans”, born between 1920 and 1945. According to Carver, this was when couples stayed together no matter what, government assistance didn’t exist, and it would have been shameful to accept even if it did. This prompted several previously bored inmates, many whom were likely welfare recipients, to look around in what the fuck did he just say fashion.

Ignoring any reaction, Carver professed that Japan took the U.S. by surprise in the Pacific because we were busy fighting in Europe, with Italy on our side and Germany invading Ireland. The war ended when the U.S. dropped the bomb on Japan’s "largest city." Not Tokyo, of course, but Hiroshima.

Next up for Carver distortion was the Baby Boom era, 1946 to 1964. Henry Ford provided cars for the masses during this period, a divorce epidemic took hold due to women entering the workforce, and everyone tried to keep up with the Joneses. Marriage licenses in Vegas included divorce applications on the back, and California was the center of the LSD scourge…in the early sixties.

According to Carver, this was also the era when families ate dinner together, regardless of whether the siblings were getting along or not. Heroin came to be abused during this period as well, and is now making a resurgence because “these things are cyclical.”

Having endured misinformation too long, and assuming a class discussion was underway, I raised my hand. Carver seemed annoyed by the interruption as he surrendered the floor by pointing at me.