Incarceration

The classroom I am currently sitting in looks quite like a normal classroom, except the floor is, for some reason I do not care to know, a cobalt-blue carpet rather than an earthy tiled pattern found so commonly. The optimistic posters of encouragement adorned across the off-white wall instead whisper to me with a pessimistic prose of perpetual imprisonment. The features of the room suggest that the entire building could double as an accounting office. My new teacher seems nice enough; a short black woman with an accent that clearly states that she is not from North Carolina. She is to teach me Chemistry, a class that I would still be taking back at Wake Forest if my one-time-only performance had not gone horribly awry. The invigorating enthusiasm for a good laugh and a good time is for all intents and purposes, gone from me. The symphony of sights and sounds that was my life has been reduced to a single, droning note.  But there is not much to be done at this point, and I can only hope that the steps that myself and my family and taking will let me back to where I belong.

           The boredom of being the sole member of a singularly populated classroom is becoming increasingly painful and unbearable. The menial tasks issued by my world history teacher, Mrs. Colbert, only occupy my morose mind for mere minutes. While my Chemistry teacher, Ms. Jordan, is a charming middle-aged woman, Mrs. Colbert is an older woman with a manner of speaking that demands to be listened to. She speaks with a deep slow southern drawl with all the articulations and greater-than-four letter words that a well-education person should use.  My short-lived attempts to strike up a conversation with Mrs. Colbert, or even to express a complete train of thought are quickly shot out of the air with a gaze and a nod that would have made Newton have second thoughts about that whole “gravity” thing. She seemed very disinterested in making me feel any more comfortable than I already was.

             With the day finally over I wait patiently in the parking lot of the very fittingly named “Getaway Plaza”. I admire the autumn colors that have been so recently painted upon the trees; almost overnight they seem to have changed, or it could be that my mind has been too busy with thoughts of hearings and “the question of intent”.

             Upon returning home after a grueling trudge through traffic, I retire to my room for a few-hours-long mid-day nap. I lie down and put on a late-classical period piece to take my mind away from my perceived injustice. I am abruptly awakened by the call of my mother; she speaks of a man with a camera that wishes to have a word with me concerning my recent exhibition and its mixed reviews.