THE ROYAL FLUSH; WORKING IN A SHITBOWL

The consummation of work lies not only in what we have done, but who we’ve become while accomplishing the task.

                        —David Whyte, “Courage and Conversations,” p.5

Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it.

                         —Anonymous

Everything has changed; there’s a “new normal.” With all the prison closures my former colleagues have vanished, replaced by teachers with more seniority (but I am still here—the sole survivor).

My new peers, like me, are called “Old Heads.” We’re the dinosaurs of the prison school program. We’re the employees who’ve seen too much of the wrong thing, including the latest employee consolidation. We continue to navigate the shark tank; our heads held above the water, searching the horizon for that Promised Land called “retirement” (a peculiar mirage at best).

I walk across the prison mall area with my new coworker, a veteran special education teacher. He has 24 years of correctional education experience. He reminds me of Truman Capote; I think it’s the scarf, or maybe the Croc shoes. He sympathizes with me. “Yeah,” he says flicking his scarf across his shoulder, “I know about those types of circumstances. I’ve got this one turd that simply won’t flush. No matter how many times I jiggle the handle he spins around the bowl and floats. Whenever I get in his line of vision he looks aside.”

“The dog and pony show,” I say, “his way of surviving.”

“In the animal kingdom,” he continues, “if you look away from another animal you become its bitch.”

We both laugh before parting ways, treading water the only way we know how.