Lost in Florida

Personal Blog

Categories: Books, Recommendations

January reads

Photo by Claudia Wolff on Unsplash

On my last post I talked about one of my goals for 2022: read more books! I am writing this mid-April so it would be easy to think I didn’t read much and have nothing to share, but I have actually been doing very good (with at least this goal :p). Maybe I should have added to blog more… Anyway, back to the books, I do use my Audible subscription, but I did sign up for Libro too. When you open your account, you choose a local bookstore you want to support and the profits will be share with them.
Then I found out about Libby! This one is free because you borrow books from your actual local library!
With all those apps, I am set up for plenty of reading options of all genres.

Here is what I read (or listen to) in January (I decided catching up with 3 months would be too much for one post so I make separate ones):

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

The title is pretty clear about the book’s subject. I read this book as a part of the Campaign for Justice Bookclub by the ACLU of Florida. I was excited about finally reading this book but even more about the opportunity to discuss it with like-minded or at the very least open-minded people. Each time there was a meeting, I felt (re)motivated by the other members acknowledging the issues of  both the justice system and the corrections system, neither of which does what their title implies.

Michelle Alexander gives us the history of slavery evolving to incarceration for people of color, and expose with numbers, experiments and experiences how our system is still racially motivated and enforced, whether we are actively conscious of it or not.
If you are already well-informed about the American criminal justice system, it will not make your brain explode, if you are not, it might open your mind to questions you had not consider before – or I should that “you never had to consider before” because you are privileged. I think this is maybe where this book is the most powerful: when it acts as an eye-opener to the people who are on the other side of the gate and have the power to embrace change.

 

American Girl by Wendy Walker

This book was all over Audible when I started my subscription. It is about a small-town murder witnessed by the narrator of the book, an autistic 17-year-old girl. I was like, sign me up! Charlie wants out (of the town, her blended family and sometimes her mind), works at a sandwich shop to save money, when her boss is killed. For the rest of the book she is trying to remember what exactly happened while trying to protect others and navigate her feelings towards a childhood friend now police officer (of course).

It wasn’t as dark, serious, or even believable as I expected and I was a bit disappointed. I kept having issues with the story development and some parts were too predictable, but it was a fun quick listen (it’s an Audible exclusivity so only available as an audiobook, and some scene are recreated instead of read).

 

Somebody’s Daughter by Ashley C. Ford

Somebody’s Daughter is a Memoir. Ashley C. Ford tells her story of growing up a Black and poor girl with the heavy absence of her incarcerated father. Because I constantly worry about my son, all I wanted to get out of this book was that Ashley was okay, she was strong, and she had a close relationship with her father despite them being separated by prison most of her life. I was expecting to read more about this relationship but luckily for Ashley, there is more to her story. As complex as it is, because someone did something wrong doesn’t mean you stop loving them (it’s not black and white like people like to think), and also because someone raised you alone doesn’t mean you owe them unconditional love – yes, this book is more about Ashley’s complicated relationship with her mother. It is hard and honest, and beautifully written.
It is even better if you go with the audiobook because it is read by the author herself 🙂

Categories: Life Updates

New Year [Realistic] Resolutions

Every new year comes with its set of resolutions. Usually, we pick a big one and try to at least stick to it. I’ve never really made any resolution… I mean yes I’ve thought “this is the year I become more active or lose weight” (it’s funny how I have always wanted to lose weight and I am only now – now that I AM fat – realizing I was most of the time not fat at all). I never really had any vice I had to get rid of, like drinking or smoking, or partying too much. A few years, my only goal was to make it through another year. When I had just gotten married and I was stuck in France waiting for my visa, I was depressed and didn’t feel I could make it until then. And I did. And this year I should be more depressed than ever, because 2020 was terribly hard and 2021 was just damn crappy, but hey, I take a magic pill every night and then I feel pretty much nothing so I’m weirdly ok in my desperate circumstances. I do cry when my Instagram or TikTok feeds show me dying babies or bereaved parents, but that’s what it takes. For a long time the medication was not enough to get to this stage of unbothered but I’ve been rather stable the last couple of months maybe. Anyway, all this to say that now that I am getting my head out of the water a little bit, I am trying to get my life on track. I am constantly working because that refrains me from overthinking everything (and so getting depressed) but I definitely need a better life balance and some more “chill” time.

So no crazy resolutions for 2022, but some smart goals:

It may seem like a lot, but I don’t intent to start everything at once. Those are my goals for the whole year (maybe now it doesn’t look that much?).

I realized I read almost no books in 2021, because I was listening to podcasts all the time! So I started with this and aimed at reading 36 books in 2022. I am doing pretty okay so far with almost 2 books read. I gifted myself an audible subscription too (I was using scribd before but the books I wanted to read were never available when I wanted to so it got frustrating and I canceled my subscription). I am not crazy about the credit-based part of Audible so we’ll see next year if this worked out better for me or not. I’ve just heard of libro.fm that is apparently a better/more ethical choice as it supports local independent bookstores but since I paid Audible for a full year I probably won’t try it very soon.

The workout routine is going to be the toughest one I think. I have not been active at all for about a year. I had/have very little energy so this is one thing I always postpone (which is a good example of why I need to stop procrastinating 😉).

If I get more sleep, maybe I will have some energy for some kind of workout. But the primary goal is to get enough sleep to stop struggling to stay awake at work! I can confidently say that in 2021 I did not sleep more than around 5 hours a night, except for some occasional Sundays. Not even close to enough. I was doing okay since the beginning of the year but I am failing this week (like right now, typing this at midnight when I need to get up at 6:30 am). This sleep goal is very important so go to bed Sigrid!

Develop my businesses. Wire of Hope has developed nicely in 2021 so we feel our hard work is finally being rewarded. But we have bigger goals for WoH and hope 2022 will be a breakthrough!
Sweet Undertone has been inconsistently around since 2015 but making cards (almost always inspired by my husband) is my happy place and after finding a more sustainable way to produce them, my shop has started to have regular sales since August. Nothing crazy but the average would be a little over 20 orders a month so I think there are good grounds for development.

Speak up. Well, I have been vocal about many things, especially about the enormous flaws of the Florida Department of Corrections. But I also kept a lot to myself about my personal experience visiting Union Correctional Institution. Now that I feel that I have lost everything, I see no reason to keep those – traumatic – experiences to myself anymore. I might have a bigger  platform to talk about all that sometimes this year, so I will hold on a little longer, but I will have to release this eventually, just to get it off my chest.

The reasons why procrastinating should be a no-no this year are obvious, however, starting a new hobby is an even bigger NO. I discover something, research it for hours/days/weeks, decide it’s for me, buy all the supplies (and I mean ALL the supplies), do it like a mad-woman for a few weeks (until I get it pretty much right)… and stop? I guess I jump to another hobby more than I stop but the reality is half my house is full of craft supplies that it’s likely I might not touch some of those again. I do not have the space, I do not have the money to waste. NO NEW HOBBY. Go back to an old hobby and keep rotating. Maybe that’ll work? Well, I’m back to knitting at the moment so there is hope.

Any realistic but still challenging goals for you this year?

Categories: Life Updates, Prison

Autumn Mood

We do not celebrate Thanksgiving in France, or in Europe altogether, so this is something that was new to me. As someone who is constantly fighting against injustices and other dark — , it’s sometimes hard to keep a positive mind and see the good. Thanksgiving is a good reminder each year to take a breath and note that not everything is bad and list everything we are lucky to have.

All my Thanksgivings have been the opportunity to hold my husband’s hand and tell him I am thankful for him. Not this year. I am still grateful for him but I don’t get to tell him, or see him. I have not seen him in close to a year now. I will get to that when I am able but these holidays will probably be the worst of my life, until now at least as the situation might not get better. It’s hard to be thankful when you feel you lost everything. With no visits and the new mail rule, there is no place for a private conversation anymore and I am wondering how a couple – more so one who is based on conversations and communication – is sustainable in those circumstances. I have already felt pushed back in the last year because my husband’s own lawyers requested copies of ALL his mail, emails and phone calls. Luckily the DOC did not keep copies of letters, so they could not get that, but the fact that they were asking was such an invasion of privacy to me. I have only sent pretty superficial emails since. His lawyer told me that he didn’t see the problem because I never had privacy, only the illusion of privacy. On this, he is very wrong. Yes, letters are screened before they get to him or his to me. Screened. They are not read word by word, copied, distributed around and potentially used in court and so, made public. When you write several-page letters, there is a place in there that is just yours. The letters he writes to today have no relevance in a crime that happened 16 years ago. Do they think we have discussions about the case in letters? Or are they just curious? When they are more interested in finding former one-night stands than go talk to the people who put him on drugs and used him to steal and deal for them as a kid and who are still right there down the street, we have to wonder. I still hope one day I’ll say “wow, they did such an amazing job, and they saved his life”. Then next Thanksgiving I’ll have something to be really grateful for.

I actually liked the people in his legal team that I have met, and I know, as public defenders, they are slammed with too many cases and it’s objectively impossible for them to dig each one. If you work in capital cases I think there is a very hard balance to find between caring enough to really fight for your clients, and being detached enough that you can live with them getting a death sentence. Evyrone hates them too for defending “murderers”, “evil”, “monsters”. Their place is also a tough one to be in.

But back to the mail. The lawyer thing was a while back but it took me some time to calm down and talk about it. I was so upset because I was hurt threefold. I found out while reading court documents, I got slapped in the face that not only he (my husband) is dehumanized, but his whole family is too, and then they were basically telling me it’s not a big deal and didn’t even see a problem or understood why I had a problem with it.
As someone who fights everyday to show the humanity of people behind bars, it was a tough reminder that I, Sigrid, is not seen as human either. My struggles, my feelings don’t matter.

Now that the incoming mail will be digitized, this last tiny place of privacy is gone. Letters will be stored for years (even years after release… which is never, for us). And lawyers and/or prosecutors will be able to request them. I have no way left to talk to my husband, and my husband only.

I still have a little list of things I am thankful for:
– cooler temperature season, finally!
– having a job & health insurance, and my baby boy getting healthier.
– my husband, always.
– kind people (they’re hard to find but I am lucky to know a few).
– Wire of Hope’s growth – but honestly Elodie and I work so damn hard on it, we simply deserve it.
– those who scroll without the urge to leave mean comments « just because » ✌.

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