Talking Walls & Dancing Kites*: Powerful Lessons from a Prison Writing Classroom

Speaker A: 00:00:00

In this episode of Change the Story, Change the World, we sit down with Jim Reese, award winning poet, professor and former writer in residence at the Yankton Federal Prison Camp.

Together, we explore the transformative power of storytelling in the lives of incarcerated individuals, the lessons Riis has carried from prison classrooms into university lecture halls, and the ways art can rewire trauma into healing.

From the center for the Study of Art and Community, this is Change the Story, Change the World, a chronicle of art and community transformation where activist artists and cultural organizers share the knowledge we need to thrive as agents of social change. My name is Bill Cleveland.

In our conversation with Jim, we ask what happens when both students and their teachers discover they have an expressive voice that is constantly evolving? How does teaching writing in prison challenge one's ideas of justice and empathy?

And what can incarcerated artists teach us about both the physical and the psychological places most people avoid? Get ready for a conversation full of honesty, heart and hard won insight. Once upon a time, a writer walks in to a prison.

Speaker B: 00:01:24

So let's just start with what do you do in the world? What's your work?

Speaker C: 00:01:30

Well, I'm an associate professor at Mount Marty University, which is in Yankton, South Dakota. So I'm an English professor, it's a smaller university. So I teach a lot of the creative writing classes. And then I also teach obviously composition.

So yeah, I was working here at Mount Marty in the second year and while it was, the supervisor of education from the federal prison in Yankton, South Dakota came to the university and said, we're looking for somebody that knows something about writing and publishing books. And at the time I'd only been here two years. My first book of poetry had been released by a press.

But I had also been working with a professor friend of mine publishing books as well for a few years at that time. So I knew the ins and outs of business and the National Endowment for the Arts had started this program.

And there were five of us, and there's six now work in different places in federal prisons throughout the nation. And the whole idea was starting another arts and writing program in these different areas. So that's how that happened.

I had no, it was just happenstance. I had, I happened to be here and I was the person that had the credentials. So they came and talked to me about it.

But because of my work in the prisons in the last probably five or six years, I started teaching that really popular crime, literature and film class.

I started teaching that class because I was really interested in sharing true crime stories and really what's going on behind the scenes since we're just overwhelmed with fictionalized stories of crime and punishment. So I wanted my students to know, you know, I knew if I could at least get that message across to 60 to 75 students a year.

And then also some of them will go into the prison with me to my class. Some of my creative writing students will.

Speaker A: 00:03:24

So you and I have a connection because you also spent time out here in California visiting and working with Arts and Corrections. The program I had a hand in starting a thousand years ago, back in the 80s and 90s. So we are fellow travelers of a sort.

How did that association influence your work?

Speaker C: 00:03:42

What was interesting and, you know, brought me just to studying what's going on in California, or reading people like Larry Brewster, or just California Lawyers for the Arts, all these different organizations was the William James association. Because second year this program started, the NEA was working with the William James association and.

And they invited us to go to San Quentin or New Folsom Prison to see their arts programs. And that was really eye opening for me. But you gotta remember at this time, I'm a 33 year old guy who's thinks.

He thinks he's a pretty hotshot writer. And I'm telling people now I'm teaching in a prison, which I thought was cool. Didn't have any idea of really why I was doing what I was doing.

I had a very narrow mind of what prisoners were in my new book that came out Bone Chalk. I write about this pretty extensively in an essay called 12 Years in Prisons and what Criminals Teach Me.

And I wrote that essay in part because of my work in prison, but also because of my friend who was raped and murdered by a classmate of mine who used to help me do my math homework in middle school. So that was the idea of who I thought a lot of criminals were. A heinous person.

When I went to San Quentin, the first day I was there, I walked right into the arts room and I remember going up to a guy and I said, so how long you been here? He kind of stopped and he looked at me and he's like, what? How long you been here? Hey, kid, how old are you? And I said, well, I'm 33.

And he goes, because I've been in here since you were five years old and I'm never getting out. You got another question?

And when I kind of stepped back and look, you better watch what you're doing and start really listening instead of opening your mouth.

And after about three or four years, I started really thinking, what am I doing here because people really didn't care that I was working in a prison. It was cool to say I went to San Quentin and then we would go back there every year we would try to go into New Folsom.

Some people thought it was interesting, but a lot of people, a lot of people were very narrow minded and didn't, didn't want to hear about it. But then about three or four years into everything, I saw a student in prison class.

He was very standoffish and just always looked angry and he wouldn't share anything. And it was four or five months into class and finally we, we did a, an assignment called an exercise in Empathy.

You know, if you're in an argument with, with somebody, you write from their voice. And that day he shared something and it was really eye opening for me. It really stopped me in my tracks and said, you know what?

I said, all right, you can really make a difference here. He started telling the story about his mom. She was a single mom and she was a waitress. He was living in the dishwasher's trunk.

Some nights he wouldn't go to school because he stumped and the kids would make fun of him.

So we had a lot of things against him and they were homeless a lot of the time and he was really angry with his mom and turned to crime to make ends meet. In that day in class, he started writing about that and then it was like he couldn't stop writing the rest of the year.

And then he was in my class again and he went on to start giving talks around town. While he was still incarcerated, they let him out to talk with high school students and then he was released and went on to good things.

It was some of those moments that really made me realize, hey, what we're doing here can make a big difference. And then I think I got a little older and lost my ego too. And it was really neat to discover.

And this is kind of a question I had for you too after listening to your podcast those days or those moments that we discover he maybe chasing paper isn't what it's all about. And really helping other people. I felt great joy helping that guy that day and then continue to now because it really does make a difference.

And knowing that you can help change families lives for the better by just writing and just by using your voice is a very remarkable thing.

Speaker A: 00:08:16

Part 2 Learning from the inside out. Now, given the years you put in, I have no doubt you have seen that kind of turnaround happen with many of your students.

Showing people a pathway to owning and telling their stories. It's a powerful thing. But as you know, finding your story is a two way street.

Which leads me to ask, what are your students teaching you about what you do as a writer?

Speaker C: 00:08:48

They taught me to listen a lot more. That was probably the biggest lesson, like really listening to them.

Because what I started doing was I was like, why can't I do some of these harder writing prompts at the university? And so I started doing that here because we're, look, we're a private university. It's not cheap to go here.

And what I realized is, hey, you know, it doesn't matter how much money you have there. These kids, there's a lot of depression and anxiety and dysfunction in the families they came from.

And if I can do the same thing I'm doing at prison and get the students here to open up, if I can create an environment where they feel comfortable enough to share their stories, then that's going to help. So the guys in the prison, they did, they taught me that.

Made me check my ego a little bit, kept me on my toes, made me practice what I preach and then really listen more. And once I did that here too. It's just a great feeling. It's more than just an assignment for class or at the prison.

You know, we publish a book every year. And it's more than just getting something published in a book. If you're going to get something in that book, who's your audience?

What are you trying to do with this piece? It's gotta be about discovery instead of just display.

Speaker D: 00:10:05

So, Jim, why do you write?

Speaker C: 00:10:07

I think that idea of voice, using my voice to make a difference and look, I think everybody wants to make their mark, make some changes in the world, make the world a better place. And I think that's my best avenue to pursue.

Speaker A: 00:10:21

So, Jim, I really like your book.

Speaker D: 00:10:25

And the word that came to my mind was that there's a reporter's beat here. You're in a number of places and you're reporting back.

Some of them are in your head, some of them are physical, some of them are in other people's heads. But, you know, there's plenty of people who say, look, I just want to be a writer. I have lots and lots of stories to tell. I just want to write.

It's not that simple a deal.

And I'm just wondering what it is you think is going on, particularly for these students who you see in pretty difficult circumstances, you report over and over that something's going on with them that is different than if they never picked up a pencil or a pen and started to scribble on a page. What is it?

Speaker C: 00:11:13

Well, I think so many people internalize stuff and never know what to do with it. And I think that's even more so with the guys or the women, you know, in prisons.

I think a lot of things have changed in the last probably seven years or so as far as communication goes. I think there's a real lack of communication in talking to people. Right. I mean, everybody's.

The whole world can go by right in front of you, and everybody's got their head down, looking at their phone, and I don't want to get on that soapbox, but. Because I'm guilty of it, too.

So if we can help people write and communicate and share their stories, what a joy that is just to see happening and to hear somebody tell their stories. But I don't know, lately, especially with some people, if they've even had many teachers that would know how to tell them to start doing that.

And then when somebody goes to prison, they put up walls around them to protect themselves. They. They have to try to fit in or do whatever they can to survive. And so they.

They don't have a lot of spaces, especially in prison, to communicate with anybody. And if they do, it's a certain way of communicating to get through the day or get what they need to get. I.

ting things I saw. So this is: 2008

But as soon as those guys walked into that arts room, then they went all talk to each other. But the minute they walked out, it was the same thing again. I mean, they were segregated. They wouldn't talk to each other.

But the reality is that happens, unfortunately, in a lot of places. And we're seeing it in the news and on tv, and.

And I really wish there was more focus on community and just all of us sharing our stories and not being so divided.

Speaker D: 00:13:15

Yeah. I mean, it's a tough one.

It's part personal and it's part based on your experience observing and seeing other humans get in touch with the connection between their head and their heart. Here's the thing, over and over again, both for myself and for the thousands of people I met in the prison system.

It's that people like you sort of help them rewire their own communication system so that the thing that drives them to rage, it gets a place for it to go and a support system and an encouragement System and ultimately a reward system. And the first reward is someone saying, oh, good job.

But the next reward is saying that to yourself, which for some of these guys and women, it's a first. I did a good thing. Someone else thinks it's a good thing, and I don't need permission from anybody else, and I can do it myself.

It's a pretty powerful thing.

Speaker B: 00:14:19

Yeah.

Speaker C: 00:14:19

I think, especially in that setting, somebody might think they have absolutely nothing. And then once they realize they have, oh, no, you do have your voice.

You do have all kinds of stuff you can do here with a piece of paper and a pencil, if that's all you have to work with. And, yeah, it's really cool to see that when they figure out.

And then they go on to help other people and they start their own little workshops when I'm not there. And, yeah, it's pretty cool to see how that all happens.

And pretty quickly when they start taking it seriously and they get some good feedback from maybe the guys or the people in class with them. Also, if they send it out, maybe this is the first way to communicate with some people.

You know, I've had those stories, too, where different people in class have written something. I said, just try and send it out to your family and see what happens. And they're like, I haven't talked to them in 10, 20 years.

One guy was 20 years, hadn't talked to his daughter, and he wrote this piece, and he did a reading, and then some journalists wrote about it, and paper, and his family read, opened the door back to his daughter, and that was cool. So those kinds of stories, where people are connecting again with families, even their victims, can make a difference and help change how we operate.

Speaker A: 00:15:35

Now, the main theme of this conversation is, of course, to try and find and then listen to some stories. So I'm wondering if there's a story or two you'd like to tell, particularly since you're such a good storyteller. Jim.

Speaker C: 00:15:50

Well, thanks. Thank you. It's good to hear, because sometimes you never know, you know?

Speaker B: 00:15:54

Tell me about it.

Speaker C: 00:15:55

This book came out, and I was like, okay, there it is. And it keeps receiving some really good feedback.

But when you write, especially nonfiction, when it's really personal, you're putting a lot out there. And that was a risk, but it's encouraging because it makes me think that there's really not much I can talk about if it's done the right way.

And again, going back to that idea of discovery and not just display. Right.

Speaker B: 00:16:22

So you got a story for me?

Speaker C: 00:16:24

I've got all kinds of stories. Which one do you want? Anything in particular?

Speaker D: 00:16:29

Well, you know, the underlying thesis of this conversation is the audacious assertion that a story, a small story, a big story, a worldview story, we all have them. Some people are more aware of them than others.

And the degree to which we adhere to the rules of our story or the rules that are imposed upon us by the story can have a big influence on our life path. And at least in my experience, art making is a way to examine the stories.

And if you want to go back, go back in and do some editing and change the narrative of a life. And obviously those men in prison do that. So I'm just wondering if there's a story, a moment in your own journey that personifies that idea.

You know, change the story, change the world.

Speaker C: 00:17:21

I think there's two little short pieces I'll read. And they both have to do with the federal prison here in town.

I actually spent, oh, it's probably been two and a half years now I've spent doing ride alongs with the police in town, in the city I live, so I could see crime on the front end. So that's what that book is about. Really trying to understand that and really walk on both sides of this fence.

Still, I don't have a true black and white like this is what I believe. Because there's just too much there. There's too much going on and too many variables to crime and punishment to land on any side.

One of the stories that I'll never forget was called Hoses. One day in prison, a student in Klaus told me a story about one of his greatest regrets.

What I began to discover was that addiction, in all of its gross immaturity, will make people go to extreme measures. The student, an inmate in his late 20s, was built, as we say here on the plains, like a brick shithouse.

He and I talked briefly at the back of the class. He said, my grandfather had a Farmall 300.

You had a need for hoses for your tractor so you could raise the lift cylinder and tilt bucket with the hydraulics when the hose was missing. I'm sure he was shocked. When he asked me if I'd seen it, I lied. He said, I've had that tractor I don't know how long.

No one's ever taken a hose off it. What he didn't know was that I used the hose to cook men. I can't keep feeling guilty about my past. I'm done paying that bill.

But I tell you, I wish I'd never ticken that hose. That story stuck with me for a lot of reasons. That particular student was a great writer. Just got mixed up, you know, in drugs.

And a lot of the guys I work with, it's the story and another one that has to do with drugs again is one of the assignments I have at the prison is I'll get permission. And I am able to walk around the walking and running truck at the prison with the guys in my class. It's a quarter mile.

And I have him go out there and I tell him, just try to find three things you never noticed today and come back and we'll write about them and talk about them. And some guys in class say, hell, this is prison, man. There's nothing good to look at out there. Nothing's changing.

And I argue with them that, oh, there's all kinds of stuff out there. You just gotta be less mean looking. This is called Back to the Track. I really like the student I'm talking to on the trail.

He's a lot more honest than most people I know outside of this prison. He means what he says. He's the kind of guy you want on your side. He's a good listener. He's in here for drugs. And honestly, I don't care.

I'm not the judge and jury. We are beyond that. My job to help him never come back here. He's an amazing writer, spinning yarns at deep woods, Missouri kin.

So it's surprising to me when he asks what specific tree is in front of us with the bard peeling off the trunk river birds. I tell them, that's it. How did I forget that before I got here, I was at a different prison?

Most of us trickle down a system to get to a place like this if we're lucky. And most prisons aren't like this. I never saw anything green. Just concrete, dirt, razor wire. I remember arriving here in a minivan.

The instant I got out, I saw this tree, walked right towards it, and I touched it. I grabbed a hold of it and squeezed. The guard said, get back here. I need to process you. I told him, just hold on a second.

I haven't seen a tree in three years. And I wrapped my hands around its trunk. I squeezed so tight. I'm country boy. To be denied the outdoors was like a death sentence for me.

That was one of those moments again, and it stuck with me.

Speaker B: 00:21:35

I got one.

Speaker C: 00:21:36

Okay, good.

Speaker B: 00:21:37

It prompts a question.

Speaker C: 00:21:39

Okay.

Speaker B: 00:21:39

And it's your riff on being an outsider. I'd love for you to read it. And then maybe talk about that inside your head, inside the building.

Feeling that you can get sometimes in the world, and particularly as a writer.

Speaker C: 00:21:53

Yeah, this is at the end. It's kind of the coda for this particular, I say. I suppose it's just habit when I pass the guys in the yard and ask, how's it going?

Always since I was a kid, I'd ask, how's it going? To strangers, to friends?

And today, as I pass men in their prison issue khakis, numbered shirts, one stops and tells me, don't you know you're not supposed to ask us that? In those few seconds that we stand face to face, I try to conjure up what should have been said before a CO orders him away.

What I should have said was, no, I didn't know. How stupid of me not to think of something smarter to say. Me, the teacher who can leave this prison anytime I like.

Things that have altered me are crimes. When I was young, I felt like an outsider, a stranger, especially as an only child, but someone who is never afraid to ask why.

And I've never shaken my head, nor do I intend to. We as humans are indecisive, are unpredictable. We act out.

Have I ever been an insider with my freedom, I will never be one of them, a prisoner behind bars. But I am human, and so are they. We are all family.

I perhaps can only help them realize through my classes and by helping them write memories they have of the past. But who really is alien in our culture? Could the stranger be the prison staff? The prison professor? How can anyone stand in judgment?

Petty or not, we are all guilty. We exist within physical and sociological entrapments, our concepts of freedom and staunch viewpoints.

But these are all ideals we can free ourselves from if we are willing to learn.

I daydream that maybe I'll spot some of you holding your children's hands, running your tattoo parlors, catfishing in your favorite holler holes, facing your demons the best you know how.

I imagine a greeting from an aging mother who still relentlessly milks the Holsteins imprisoned on their own farm, the smell of rotten silage and the overwhelming burden of not having enough time. She, though, will be waiting at her threshold, doors wide open for you.

Imagine the toy brontosaurus on laminate flooring pointing its head to your childhood bedroom. You will be welcomed again. And when you board that Greyhound bus to the halfway house, keep your head high.

With smart time, you'll have only two months to go. And perhaps I played a part in some of this. Here in this place any of us could have wound up in after a few misdirected decisions.

As kids, we are taught to never talk to a stranger. But who is he? The kid in junior high who helps you with your homework? The unfamiliar person who takes you safely to school, who really knows?

I've been instructed to never get too close to any inmate. But I'm your teacher here, and I'm afraid that's just not possible. So tonight, like most nights, I carry you home.

It's interesting that you asked me about that, because here's something nobody knows. That very ending of that incident, in that last paragraph or so, was a poem. And I published in a book of mine called Ghost on Third.

And I showed it to my first supervisor of education at prison, and she said, hey, I want to publish this. Also in. In the prison journal that we published called 4pm count. And I remember that first month I was teaching at the federal prison.

I would say, I'm like, well, so what if something happens to me? Where are the guards at? Or what do I do? And she's like, look, listen, I'm going to tell you one thing.

And she said, you just remember, any of us could have wound up here after some bad decisions. If you remember that, then it'll be just fine. And that was a good thing for me to hear right away.

And also to kind of answer your question about being an insider or outsider. I think you can become more of an insider by just learning when I was really still an outsider.

That first trip to San Quentin, they have their own newspaper there, and I remember reading an article in it, and it said, look, you can lock a person up and teach them a trade while they're in prison.

And I felt, fine and good, but unless you can teach them to come to terms with those emotional instabilities that brought them to prison, you're going to just send an angry person right back onto society. And I remember reading that and thinking, oh, I better write this down. This will come in handy later. Still, like, hey, dummy.

Like, this is going to be kind of that thing you live by in another 10 years from now or something. But, you know, that's. I'm glad that was brought to my attention. And then I'm glad I finally really started living that, because I would.

Around here, people would say things to me, and they still do. They're like, well, why should I care about prisoners? Why do I care about inmates? Put them in jail, threw away the key, whatever.

They'll say stuff like that.

And I never had, like, statistics so now when somebody says it's a waste of my tax money, now I can just rattle off all kinds of statistics to him and tell him, well, here's what your tax money's paying for.

Like the Rana Corporation, that was a five year study where every dollar spent on prison education equates to about four or five dollar taxpayer savings. So if that's all you care about is your tax dollar, then you should care about education in prison.

Speaker D: 00:28:07

Part 4 the lesson so here's a question. In some ways you're in the imagination business.

And I'm wondering if you see, part of your job is introducing people to their imaginations in a way that isn't just about daydreaming, but in fact has a little muscle to it.

Speaker C: 00:28:31

Yeah, I have to remind myself that too. I do so much of that, really imagining projects or stories. What could this be and what is it?

And then helping my students that just want to write fiction. And I say that right away, I'm not writing any true stories. I'm just going to write fiction. I'm just going to make it up.

I'm like, okay, but where does fiction come from? Well, yeah, it comes from real life. And then how much they're fiction oftentimes mirrors their true life. So yeah, it's a neat thing.

What a great thing to be able to imagine like that. And it's odd to me when people say they don't imagine things.

I had a professor here recently said to me, she goes, my brain just does not work like yours. She's like, you see things and then you really are looking at them and you see them in a totally different way.

And she said, sometimes I look at things and it's just now it's it. And I think there's all kinds of ways of looking at things. It's not just black and white, it's just not a thing.

But I've had to learn that and I continue to learn it. That idea of learning, I mean, can you imagine if you had to go through a whole day and you never learned anything? I mean, that that has to be help.

There's a lot of people that are closed off to that.

Speaker B: 00:29:43

Yeah, there are a lot of people that are encountering things they don't want to know. Yeah, maybe about themselves or about the world they live in. And our brains are pretty darn good at filtering out stuff that causes pain.

And so, Jim, you're writing, there's two parts to it. One of them is an ear and an eye for every the poetry of everyday Life, the quirkiness of everyday life and of everyday people.

Everywhere you look, there's a character somewhere, but the other one is giving just enough of the context. Whether it's a cloud in the sky or the sound of a machine that turns a two dimensional imagined picture into a three.

Speaker C: 00:30:31

Well, thanks.

Speaker B: 00:30:33

And I mean, that's the job. One of the things I keep remembering, and I saw it happen over and over again, is prison artists who were able to say, this is a good day.

I forgot where I was, I went somewhere else and. And I did it on my own with a piece of clay or a song or something like that.

Speaker C: 00:30:56

Yeah, it's a neat feeling. And I think we have to remind ourselves that every day too. So, you know, the days I'm not writing, I'm. It's just like being an athlete or a runner.

If you don't work out or if you don't train or if you don't run, you just get agitated. I mean, I do. And it's the same thing for artists, I think they're not creating, they just go to an unhappy place.

But I have to keep doing it because it is work too. Because work is. You can sit down with an idea and it won't go anywhere. And. But you got to still sit there and keep trying.

And yeah, I mean, there's the hope is that you can then present it to the world and it looks like you just dashed it off, that it just came so easily. And now and stuff like that, they don't see the 40 or 50 revisions that went through. I don't know how many times all this stuff has been revised.

I lost count.

I got sick of looking at it, but I knew I had to do it and go at it with fresh eyes and listen to people, listen to criticism, listen to good editors tell me, even with detail, like, hey, don't catalog this person.

All right here in this paragraph, break it up and let's see bits and pieces of hammer curve, just little things like that and how it can make it so much better and what you need and what you don't need. And so, yeah, it's always work. It's just like anything. You can't show up to the game without practicing and expect to be good.

Speaker B: 00:32:28

Yeah. So one of the things that. One of the aspects of your gig is not only doing the work, but also helping other people who want to do it.

And so one of the things that I try to throw in here is basically, if somebody is inspired by your writing, your work, the things that you do like two years of ride alongs, if they're inspired by that, if it seems like an interesting path. What kinds of things do you have to share that might be helpful?

Speaker C: 00:33:01

I think the big thing is being honest with yourself. Don't ever try to hide from who you are. Because I think the more some of those stories, you think, well, they're not going to apply to this.

And like being in the prison.

I mean, I remember the day I was talking to the guys about things that I had done wrong and things I wasn't happy about personally and how I'd screwed up a lot of things. And as soon as I started telling those stories, I remember this guy, I was embarrassed, I was a little nervous.

But I said, hey, look, if I'm asking you to tell these stories, here's some things that I'm going to offer you. And I remember one of the guys, right when I got down, he said, boy, I have a lot more respect for you now.

But I had hesitated, I had waited to tell some of those stories for a few years, but it was really me coming to terms with who I was.

And then when I did, and then wrote about it and talked about it to my students, it was like I made all these connections, more connections that helped me personally and professionally and continue to help me. And I.

So I think that just keeping that honest voice and you got to just be able to work, you can't expect any door to open for you just because you're there. You know what I mean? Or close to being there, whatever that is. Like, oh, I hang around this place long enough, something will happen.

Well, that's not true. Every good artist, good writer, creative person. I know that really, truly talented, successful people work their ass off. And they understand that.

They understand that going to work every day is the key to it. And then sometimes it's luck, sometimes it's happenstance, right? I mean, I worked to get my job here.

You know, getting a job as a creative writing professor in the country is very hard. You had to publish a book before you could even go on the job market. I mean, that was a given. So I worked hard to find a job.

And I got here and I didn't think I would be in Yankton, South Dakota. I wanted to go to a tier one university. And just like a lot of people, but I found this job and then I was like, wow, okay, that was a lot of work.

And I'm here and then all of a sudden, oh, here comes somebody walking in my office, telling me or asking me if I could be part of this program. Well, I didn't see that coming, but because I was working hard, I qualified for that.

And now, all of a sudden, 13 years later, I'm a leading advocate and a voice for criminal justice reform, transformative justice, especially around this area. And that's nothing I could have predicted. That's nothing I could have planned for, really, I mean, because I didn't know.

So, I mean, being there and being open to possibilities, too, I think is very important. Trying new things.

Speaker B: 00:35:58

So, last question.

Speaker A: 00:35:59

So what's.

Speaker B: 00:36:00

We all sort of have a kind of a little job description in our head, I think, a little bit. And I was just wondering, given the fact of the world upside down and inside out these days, is your job description changed any.

You think we have a responsibility to engage the world a little differently now that we're in this crazy moment?

Speaker C: 00:36:25

Boy, that's a good question. Yeah, I think we have to keep doing what we're doing, especially those of us advocating for things and trying to make a difference.

Helping people utilize their voice and to use it in the right way, I think is important. More important now than maybe ever.

Speaker B: 00:36:47

So you had a question for me.

Speaker C: 00:36:49

I just wondered when, after I listened to your podcast and hearing your stories and stuff, you do you remember some of those first moments, maybe the first two or first moment when you were making art or helping somebody in prisons and something happened and you're like, wow, this is what I need to be doing. What was that moment for you?

Speaker B: 00:37:10

First moment was I got offered a gig and I told them, you're out of your mind. That was my first response.

Speaker C: 00:37:19

Is this when you're playing music?

Speaker D: 00:37:22

Actually, I was a Cedar artist, so it was the Comprehensive Employment and Training act, which was putting unemployed people to work, and I was involved in that. And so I had all this experience with kind of a hybrid crazy federal grant work, artisan communities and jails.

And I was both an artist and a kind of a coordinator for that stuff in the city of Sacramento. And this guy, this crazy guy, a potter, said, hey, come work with us at the California Medical Facility at Vacaville.

We're doing this thing in the prison there. And I look at him, I just said, I mean, no, thank you. And I got home and I realized, oh, wow, I'm scared shitless. And I have.

I don't know what you call it. I have a little trip wire in my head. It says, if the principal reason you don't do a thing is because you're scared, you have to do it.

So I tortured myself and went back and said, yeah. And then almost immediately, and I. I don't know, this story circulated quite a bit.

My first mentor was a prisoner named Verne McKee, and he was actually the person that turned Eloise Smith onto the idea that artists could come into the California prison system and make a difference.

Now, she, Eloise was director of the California Arts Council, and he was basically a force of nature as a potter, a painter, a songwriter, a musician, and a creative leader inside the institution as an incarcerated person, you know, at the time when those things weren't being encouraged at all.

And he just said, look, lady, you want to come in here, you're gonna save some lives, but just make sure that your people have their shit together, because we don't want any fakes.

And, you know, she was working at the time with Jerry Brown, who was in his first stint as governor, and she just said, yeah, Jerry, if you want to know what's going on with art and humans and healing and change and transformation, we need to go to the worst possible place and try and prove the case, right? So they went in there, and I came in just after. And a couple weeks in, Vern pulled me aside, and he said, bill, all due respect, you look like shit.

You look like a raggedy old hippie, and nobody here is going to pay you any attention. The prisoners aren't, and the administration isn't. So I have some advice for you. Take it or leave it. Go out and buy yourself a suit. Get a haircut.

And I was in my hippie dippy headspace. You know, nobody tells me what to do. I'm an individual. I'm wearing my freak flag, that whole number. But I sat there for a while, pondered it.

Next time I saw him, I had a suit on and a haircut. And the most amazing thing was the administrators, well, they didn't know how to classify me.

And Vern said, oh, that's because your new costume is confusing. And that's really good, because everybody here has a costume and you have a transcendent costume, right? You're an artist, but you've got a suit on.

And so it doesn't fit the narrative. That was number one.

And then the other thing he said was, but, you know, none of these guys here are going to believe that you're an artist anymore, so you're going to have to do something pretty dramatic in order to get their attention when you walk in the room. So that was when I started. Before I ever opened my mouth to introduce myself or say anything, I would start to sing in my suit.

And that screwed up their narrative too, because suits don't sing. And that was the beginning of my graduate degree in prison survival, and Vern was my professor.

Speaker C: 00:41:22

That's very cool.

Speaker B: 00:41:24

Yeah.

Speaker C: 00:41:25

Yeah, I love those stories. Just sharing different things like that, where we have these really eye opening things that happen and then they go on to change our lives.

And I truly believe what we're doing is making a difference. And that's why right away, when I started listening to your podcast, I'm like, oh, I gotta reach out to this guy.

Speaker B: 00:41:44

I really appreciate it. So, last thing I just, I want to share.

When I ran the prison program, I do a lot of Rotary lunches because most prisons are in rural places and Rotary is a big deal in those towns, and that's where leadership is. And I figured I was the best place to go to touch base with the powers that be that are there.

And I used to introduce myself as a visitor from the prison planet. And this is why the outsider insider thing rose up for me.

But the other thing that rose up, and it's one of the things Vern yelled at me about, he said, look, you're going to get burned if you take your definition of trust in here with you, because I have more at stake than you do in here. And he looked me in the eye and he said, if you're in my shoes, you do this too.

But I have life and death things here I can't talk to you about and I will betray you if I have to. Nothing personal. And it that turned my head around. I'm not sure it's ever gotten back to the place where it was since that moment.

But that whole idea of carrying your idea of trust, which on the outside is really different, it's like, are you a good guy? Do we agree? And then inside it's like, sometimes I have no choice. Trust that I will do the best I can under the circumstances.

But it's not always going to be what you like.

Speaker C: 00:43:17

Yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. I think it's a learning thing when you're in there.

And students will say, well, the group of guys you've seen in here is going to be a lot different in about 10 minutes when they walk out of here. They're not gonna be using those same voices. So that's part of the territory, I think.

Speaker B: 00:43:34

Well, part of it is, I think, is that incarcerated people are better at detecting bullshit than almost anybody I know.

And a lot of times people think they're being really forthcoming when they're bullshitting and you're just giving me the okie doke so they don't need it from somebody who's there, who supposedly is there to share something that's worthwhile and useful. And that, to me, is the place where you get the biggest trouble when you pretend to be something that you're not.

Speaker C: 00:44:06

Yeah. And here, thankfully, when I first started early, I had students that would just call me on my bullshit, too.

I got a letter at one point from one of the guys, and he said, are you writing some stuff? And what is it? And where are you getting it published?

We want to know exactly what you're doing, because usually in class, you're giving goals to set. And I was like, yeah, Yep.

But I had to really buckle down and finish some of the things I was talking about and then set goals for myself and do what I'm saying I'm going to do, doing the same thing. I'm asking my students, like, all right, it's time to start practicing what I preached.

And so that was good that they kept me on my toes and kept me honest. I thanked them numerous times. They're a tough crowd, too. I'll say something funny, and they'll just look at me. I'm like, it's okay to laugh.

And then once they realize, oh, literature can be fun and we can laugh at stuff, they're not used to that. No.

Speaker B: 00:45:00

Well, Jim, I'm really glad you reached out.

Speaker C: 00:45:04

Thank you so much for your interest in my work.

Speaker B: 00:45:06

Thank you. Same here.

Speaker C: 00:45:08

Adios.

Speaker A: 00:45:10

So, kind of a spoiler here. Believe it or not, that show was recorded way back during the beginning of. Of the pandemic.

I think it just goes to show that things may seem to change dramatically, but there's always struggle and always progress. So here we are again in a world obsessed with punishment over understanding.

And we go on this journey with Jim that took us on a deep dive into the transformative power of writing in places people never dare to go. And along the way, we heard about how incarcerated artists find their voices and reconnect with family and humanity through their storytelling.

About how teaching in prisons reshaped Jim Reese's understanding of justice, redemption, and the role of the artist, and ultimately, how authentic connection, vulnerability, and purpose can truly break barriers, even in the most rigid and punishing of environments. So there you go.

And please know that next week we'll be sharing our third in the ongoing series, Art and Social Change Weather Report on the cultural climate for activist artists in the Trump era. So please tune in next week. And please also don't forget to Click on the GoFundMe link that is in our show notes and consider making a contribution.

Change the Story, Change the World is a production of the center for the Study of Art and Community. Community, our theme and soundscape, spring forth from the head, heart and hands of the maestro Judy Munson.

Our text editing is by Andre Nebbe, our effects come from freesound.org and our inspiration comes from the ever present spirit of ook235. So until next time, stay well, do good, and spread the good word. And once again, please know that this episode has been 100% human.