We are in count right now. It is 7:45 PM and they are recounting which means someone counted wrong on the compound. At night most inmates are in their dorms. The highlight of the week is packages. We can get packages ordered for us from the outside if we are fortunate enough to have family or friends who care to order one for us. We can do it twice a year. My mom and my sister bought 3 100.00 packages for 3 indigent inmates (see www.inmateslivesmatter.net for info on packages). You have no idea what that means to them. It is awesome to receive packages because it is stuff that we don't get on canteen and will never get if we don't get packages. These packages have shampoo that smells sooo good-cheap but way better than anything we ever get. Our shampoo is 1.12 on canteen but it is cheap and watered down called Prescription Care-ever heard of it? Sounds a little suspicious. Our bars of soap are now SILK. Most girls probably use about one a day between bathing (2 to 3x daily) and washing their clothes by hand.
Bathing or as some women here call it "baizing" is a whole job in itself. It's a pet peeve of mine I will probably not get over until I leave here because I have to get a shower before I start my day. Our showers are usually locked during the day. Most girls put their towels up on the bars (cell barred doors on shower) of the shower. Sometimes you can get in from your day and their are 3 or 4 towels hung up already. If you have people who care, they will put your towel up in line while you are gone. It sounds orderly-but it is not. A girl will put her towel up in the early afternoon knowing she is not going to try to get in the shower until after 8pm count. So, when she wants to get into the shower and someone is in the shower she is going to yell at that person. Showers are serious business. I don't know how many fights I have seen over showers. This happens every day-crazy right? So once you find a shower you have to gather all your shower stuff into a bag and grab your clean clothes. You always wash your underwear in the shower and if you do your own laundry, you wash that also. I hate the shower ritual. The showers are nasty-full of mold and rarely cleaned by the dorm workers who sit around and sleep all day. So, god forbid you drop something on the floor of the shower. I have almost thrown up dropping my soap on the floor and picking it up with a clump of who knows what on it. I could throw up thinking about it. I am a very neat person so it is really disgusting. We do shower in shower shoes so that's good.
The showers only have one button that has a timer on it. The temperature is either too hot or too cold. You would die if you saw what squirts out of these showers-it is literally the width of a water fountain stream. No joke. And if you don't shower at least once a day then you are a "dirty b---h". And don't forget to cover your neck with baby powder to let everyone know you "baized" so no one talks about you-and they will. Then you trudge back to your cell, hang your towel and wet clothes. I cannot wait for the day I can step into a nice hot shower with my shoes, all my fragrant body washes and a poof ball already there and no underwear to wash. Now that's living! And don't even talk about a bath-do they still exist anymore? Next time you all take a nice hot shower, remember how lucky you are. We take a lot of things for granted on the outside.
So, that is my shower rant.
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