Welcome back to our new series for the OPEEP newsletter, called “A Day in the Life.” This month the entry is “A Week in the Life.” Each newsletter we will continue to profile a student at the Ohio Reformatory for Women who is enrolled in the bachelor’s degree in Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies or who participates in Liberation at the Margins Collective (LAM Collective); some students do both. Our goal with the series is to demystify the everyday lives of incarcerated people and the spaces of prison. We believe that it is everyone’s responsibility to learn more about prisons and the people they house so that we can work against the harmful stereotypes that buttress our country’s carceral state and logics. So thank you for reading and sharing in this work!
The students’ days are busy ones, with courses, study halls, and class assignments. OPEEP students are also leaders in the prison facility who design and administer groups focusing on wellbeing, religious practice and spirituality, grief, addiction and recovery, parenting, arts and crafts, music, and more. Many have earned certifications that allow them to lead groups, while others have just taken the time to develop materials based on their own lives and lessons learned. Some are self-taught musicians and artists, or have learned new languages, or have personal passions that motivate them to spend significant time and effort to learn about a range of curiosities, from how to raise chickens or plant a garden, how to understand the universe and outer space.
We hope that you enjoy getting to ‘meet’ OPEEP students from ORW! We have created a false name for each contributor to protect their privacy, but each contribution is written and shared by the student directly.
Email us at opeep@osu.edu or DM @opeep_osu if you’d like us to share your thoughts on the series with the authors. Enjoy!
“Misty” is another member of the OSU/OPEEP cohort. She’s been an incarcerated person for a while, and she’s become both a member of LAM and the college degree program. Misty is also very religious – she’s devoted to her Christian beliefs and reading the Bible. Although not everyone is religious when incarcerated, it’s common to find that a large percentage of incarcerated people follow some sort of religious guidance.
Misty wakes up early (around 4:30) every day to study – sometimes her readings for her college classes, but always her Bible. Before everyone else gets up, she makes sure to take a shower. Some people get up around the same time that she does, depending on their different jobs around the prison. Most people, though get up at the 7:00am time that they are required to be out of bed. While other people are racing for showers, Misty has already been up and ready. She likes that this gives her a jump on her day.
Her daily schedule is different depending on the day of the week – on Mondays, her afternoon is devoted to her LAM meeting. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are largely filled up with OSU Office Hours and classes. She has a little more free time on Thursdays and Fridays, but she spends much of her free time studying, reading and writing for her OSU classes. Every day, of course, is divided up by “count” – the times where everyone must go back to their living spaces to be counted.
To get a little more time in her day, Misty doesn’t go to wait in line and eat in the common eating area. Instead, she buys items from commissary and uses the microwave in her living area to cook food. That way, she can eat and study in the same area. Her microwave recipes are fascinating!
Misty’s evenings include Bible study, groups with fellow incarcerated people, and relaxing with friends. There is a television that incarcerated people can watch, and they commonly watch current politics and then discuss what’s happening. By 10:00, it’s lights out, and Misty quickly falls asleep – after all, she’s going to be up bright and early the next morning.
