Seats at the Table

And the older sister came from the town to visit her younger sister in the country. This elder sister was married to a merchant and the younger to a peasant in the village. The two sisters sat down for a talk over a cup of tea and the elders started boasting about the superiority of town life, with all its comforts, the fine clothes her children wore, The exquisite food and drink, the skating parties, and visits to the theater. The younger sister resented this and in turn scoffed at the life of a merchant's wife and sang the praises of her own life as a peasant.

'I wouldn't care to change my life for yours', she said. 'I admit. Mine is dull but at least we have no worries. You live in a grander style but you must do a great deal of business or you'll be ruined.

You know the proverb, Loss is Gains elder brother. One day you are rich and the next you might find yourself out on the street. Here in the country, we don't have those ups and downs. A peasant's life may be poor but it's long. Although we may never be rich we'll always have enough to eat. I've always felt as though literature is something that can bond people.

You can go through your whole life, reading, but when you find that one book...opens your eyes, or really hits home. It'll change your life. (Instructor) Well I want to take you back to the eighteen nineties. I want to take you to South Africa where there was a village in South Africa a young man living.

He was searching for answers to questions about what he wanted to do with his life. How is he going to help make the world a better place? He was given a book to read. And the book was called "The Kingdom of God is Within You" By Leo Tolstoy.

And the Kingdom of God is Within You is is not only a devastating account of many of the injustices that exist in modern forms of government. But it's also an inspiring vision of the possibility of change. When you draw on something that Tolstoy called that divine spark that resides inside of every human being. And that message lit a fire inside this young man.

Because it was what he needed to hear at the time that he needed to hear it in his life. Eventually this fire that was lit in him would spread to tens of millions of Indians because the young man who read a Kingdom of God is Within You By Tolstoy at the age of twenty five was, as probably everyone in this room knows by now, the future Mahatma Gandhi. So why - why do I begin with a story like that? This story illustrates for me one of the core principles that this class is founded on.

And it's not something you hear a lot about today. And it's a simple idea that reading a powerful work of literature can change a person's life. Do you know what the stories that you're going to read are? Or have you not found out about those yet?

If you have an idea of an activity related to that week's reading that you think would be really interesting, let the students know and and they will definitely encourage you to do that. Students aren't teaching you. They're simply helping to generate the conversation and the questions, but your guys input is really important. And the other thing I'll just remind you of is students are not experts either.

I mean they dont, you know, they're not experts in Russian literature. so they're just figuring this stuff out. All I ask them to do is come prepared. But you know what I'm asking you guys to come prepared too.

I think one of the reasons I wanted to take this course is that it would be very outside of my comfort zone and something that I had never done and probably would never have the chance to do again. My hope is to work with incarcerated individuals. I really want to do like criminal justice reform stuff and I think that getting comfortable with that population is very important. I mean just the biggest thing about this experience for me is how radically different it is from anything I would have ever thought I would be doing in college as a physics and engineering science major.

My dad was incarcerated off and on throughout my life and my mom was a teen mom so he was like incarcerated at this time frame like in his age and so I thought it would be a really cool experience for me to get to interact with them and learn about the situations that they're in. So today is the one day that we have before we go to Beaumont that we have a chance to spend a full hour and 15 minutes just thinking and talking about this world that we're going to go into. So this is all I mean I think the philosophy behind it is amazing but how is that actually going to be in practice because there is a power dynamic. We have the freedom and privilege to go into their space.

They don't have the privilege to come to our classroom here. That there is something inherently more powerful about, us more free. How do we get beyond that? So, is it possible that we can make them subjects, full subjects instead of objects?

I don't want to answer that question I want - I want the group to think about this. Maddie? I guess it goes back to the question of like you know how do you - how do you serve others or how do you care about - how do you show them that that you care? Do you you know, do you give them something?

Or do you, like, let yourself open to what they can give you I guess. And what what you can like exchange with them? Just the nature of our circumstances. I don't feel like I'm more powerful going in just because I think that is a kind of nullifying force that we are constricted a little bit by fear.

In a way that they're Probably not. Gage? This is like I guess just a super obvious answer But like we're both also students of the literature. Like I don't feel like I've got a strong grasp on any of it.

It's like

classroom laughter

yeah. So I mean yeah we just go and we openly discuss and I mean we learn it together we learn each other's opinions. You get a fresh take on it. So in that regard too we're both on similar playing fields.

On a more personal note and Professor Kaufman and I talked about this, my mom is incarcerated though my mom and I have a weird relationship like I know my mom and I know she's a person and I know she has a good heart. And then to transport myself in her shoes and be like What is she experiencing like what is she going through? And I have a vague idea of it like I'm never going to fully understand. I'm really glad you share that too because this really gets at the heart of a books behind bars is about Ultimately we don't really know people.

Ultimately we see people from a certain perspective from our limited point of view from our own cultural biases etc. So much of what we're doing is trying to is is about what we do in any literature class which is trying to find common ground. How do, you how do you find a common ground of conversation about things that all human beings share in spite of the many many differences among people.

birds singing, wind

class chatter

Alright guys, we're here. Today the first thing I want to say is I want to thank the residents once again for being here. You guys were selected because the staff and your teachers at Beaumont believe in you and think that you'll not only benefit from this program but then you'll also make a valuable contribution to it. So even before we begin, Congratulations.

Let me also say that in 10 weeks when we're done with this program and you all know each other really well, everyone in this room, UVA students and Beaumont residents included, will be able to say that they have read - not just heard of but have actually read - that is if you do the reading

laughter

Some of the greatest works of Russian literature. And so that is - and those are also the greatest works of world literature. So that is an accomplishment that you will all enjoy in 10 weeks. Let me say a few quick words about Tolstoy.

He was about the age that he was in this picture when he wrote 'How Much Land Does a Man Need.' But there's another little detail about Tolstoy that you also probably will want to know because it's relevant to the story. He never felt successful. So this is a really extreme story. It's a quirky story but it gets at an issue that is at the heart of the story you read for today, it's an issue that I think every single person in this room can relate to.

And that is the question, how much is enough? How much money is enough money? How much success is enough success? How much fame is enough fame?

and Tolstoy's answer after all those years of struggle, is maybe a lot less than we thought we need. but that's a question for you guys to think about. And these are the kinds of things that we talk about in this program. We use literature as an opportunity to talk about life issues that are relevant to all of us that are universal.

Before I started I was like, I was thinking, I don't know how these people are going to see us, you know, we're in a Beaumont Correctional Center. A Correctional Center.... Thats the word that stands out when you hear it. Beaumont on the door don't stand out.

It's Correctional Center. So these guys are here for crimes, violent crimes, You know what I mean? So I came here with that mentality on. Let's see What's going to happen.

The first thing we asked was Would anyone want to give a summary of kind of what they thought the story was about. and Dakota immediately piped up and was like, "Yeah, I'll do it". and he gave gave a phenomenal summary that I was like immediately kind of blown away. And like this is not what I was expecting.

I was worried that you know it was gonna be us trying to be seen as like coming in and teaching them something. And I I don't think that's how it was at all. I mean they are much more comfortable in the space. And I think that we ended up talking about things that they knew more about.

They talked about their lives. We talked about like their experiences living in the facility, in their units all these like terms that I hadn't necessarily heard before that they were teaching me about what it's like to be, you know, living in these facilities. I was expecting them to come in here like be scared. Or look down on us like yeah they're criminals.

I expect a whole nother thing like they had to be like... Every time you say something or I didn't expect for us to be able to connect like our life is the same. Some, like in some ways. We have to struggle with the same problems so...

chatter

I think the car ride back for me was a little, a little different. I guess for me it was then that I started feeling more emotional about it and more I guess sad because it's like alright I'm going back to my life and they're still there, you know, like they might not be in that room anymore but they're still like behind those barbed wires. And I think that for me was, was really hard. So let's first get the name of the author right.

His name is Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy. Try that. Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy and the main character's name is Ivan Ilych Golovin Ivan Ilych Golovin. Tolstoy was forty five years old when he went through a major midlife crisis.

He went on this long search to try to figure out what in the world he was doing with his time on this Earth. And he framed the question this way. He said Is there any meaning to my life that will not be destroyed by my death? Is there any meaning in my life that will not be destroyed by my death?

He had done a lot of things he had written a lot of famous works. He was wealthy he had a thousand acres of land, but what he realized is none of those things he could take with him. So he came to the conclusion that if there is any meaning in his life that can't be destroyed by his death it's got to be in those things that death cannot destroy. In his relationships, in his connection to other human beings, in the seeds that he plants in others.

Those are the things that would survive him when he is gone and those are the things that Ivan Ilyich never thinks about except literally in the last few days of his own life. And I want you to think about your own lives as you're talking about the story and think about what are the things that you want to do in your futures? What are the relationships that you want to create, the seeds that you want to plant, the things that you want to create that will ensure that your life has meaning that will not be destroyed by your own death. So enjoy it, think about it, have a good discussion.

He spent his whole life trying to impress other people or be wanted. Or approved by other people. Like, Who tells us a big house is we really want? I mean we see somebody else with it - how do you know that's what you want?

You don't until you see somebody else. And he just try to be like higher officials and stuff like that, It's kind of ironic how the only person who really came to him to comfort him was his servant. Have you guys had similar experiences where you're doing something like Ivan because it's the right thing to do, not because you actually want to do it or like it's not making you happy but you feel like you should? Yeah this one was just like, I did so many things wrong and it was basically one thing wrong because all he did was want all this power (interrupting) but he really didnt do anything wrong.

Yeah. But think about it in your mind it's wrong. If you didn't want to do it it was wrong. So he did want it, he wanted that apartment.

He wanted that job. - But he did it all for other people's approval. At the time. Even if it was unintentional that's what he thought he wanted.

Yeah. And he thought he wanted it but at the end I think he realized I didnt need any of that. We made a tombstone for Ivan Ilych death by kidney failure slash Spiritual starvation and three things that would have been listed on his tombstone. So We are gonna do this for ourselves.

Design our own tombstone. 19 years old. Death by overdose, songwriter slash musician great father son and friend, author. I'm in the middle of writing a book.

You are? I swear to god I am. Thats awesome! It's not very good but it's awesome.

I dont know how that makes sense but it does. Survived by mother, father, three brothers, two sisters, daughter, and friends. I didnt know you had a daughter. Thank you for sharing that.

I don't talk about it very much. Beloved brother, uncle, and son. I think a lot about what my parents think of me, especially my father. Um, humble, outspoken.

Loved to play sports. Liked kids, traveling. I said successful businessman, I aint that yet (laughs) So I can take care of my kids and my family. Do what I gotta do.

You got that class going. Go ahead with that. Survived by parents, sisters, and loved ones. This is kind of weird.

I don't like, picture myself Because Ive got a sister, shes got Downs Syndrome so Ive Always looked out for her. Right. Take her to class, walk her everywhere I mean I do stuff all the time. Its like if I was to die today, who would be there to pick up my slack?

Its weird, but yeah. Pass it on I recently climbed Kilimanjaro, which is a Second (tallest). Yeah its one of the tallest mountains in the world I climbed it. But I actually don't really care that much about it.

You climbed it for real? yeah I climbed it. It was just like a cool thing to put on a tombstone but I look back and I'm like. Hey that's not like that indicative of Not meaningful to you?

I mean it was cool but it didn't really bring me like Joy. Y'all are some - yall do a lot of stuff Interesting people (laughs) Climbing mountains (cross talk) If I knew you guys on the street, like, I'd be like Yo let's go to the store get you some alcohol, youd be no let's go feed the homeless and go into a homeless shelter for dogs and go adopt a 10 puppies. Are you jealous or are you mad? No I'm just saying like Are you mad or not?

I dont do a lot. I wish I could do all that stuff. Thanks everyone for doing this. This is awesome.

Yeah. It's kind of draining emotionally like for me. I don't know. That's hard to do.

How did it feel Doing this after reading this story? I guess just not wanting to be in the same situation as him. Like not looking back and regretting how we lived. Wish we could have lived it a different way.

Maybe more like. Wishing I could be content in what I've done Instead of trying to fix it on my deathbed. This story and this talk especially has helped Make us, you know, like its something you dont talk about when you're 20 years old. You know no one wants to talk about it.

I think about death almost every day. I don't know why, I just do. Like your death or like other people's death? My death.

I talked about it with my dying godfather Jesse on his last day talking to him about death and It wouldn't bother me. He was ill and he was dying and I just talked to him like a regular person. When I first like got locked up and even before I got locked up like I was not happy with the way I'm living but I'm the slowly starting to understand like what life is all about. Like I thought life was all it was all a joke and I thought life was dumb and I just thought about like suicide and **** like that.

So I mean like but now I'm like I'm in the middle because like I mean like I am locked up but yeah I do have family that loves me and I never believed that until like I still have a hard time believing it but... So now I've got a family that loves me and I'm still doing my music even though I'm locked up. And that makes me happy. So.

Thats about it. Sometimes I just think that my life is just over. And then you know I just realize it's just a small step. It is not going to matter in seven years and what does it matter now.

So I think about it. And I'm like you know one day I plan to be just as successful as anybody in this room. And. I think that.

And when I die like you know Ivan died I think it'll be a happy death. Basically here it's the exact opposite of how we're in class sometimes it depends who you're around. I mean people keep their barriers up. They try not to open no doors in class.

Like I say our comfort zone. Is the same for everyone I guess we all just fall into some type of synch. But otherwise if you're in here it's just like oh you get your three hots and a cot you know. You get your mail, your phone call but everybody's is either trying to go home or not trying to go home.

You fall into your own categories. Every day of the week besides Tuesday is a routine. I get up, Go to work in the morning in the kitchen. Come back, do my hygiene again.

Same thing over and over and over. Like we have a like set schedule like on Tuesday we have outside and that's the only thing we get to do other than go to school, then Wednesday we had like a half a day of school from 8 to 12. Then we have like little treatment teams like where we discuss our behavior. and our release plans.

And then Thursday we dont have nothing to Except go to school and Sit in the unit and watch TV. Friday the same thing, Saturday and Sunday we are all in the Unit all day. Your Unit like, is a big room. Depends on how many people it is.

I had 21 people but if you're lucky you get 15, 14. So it won't be too much going on around you and you can always just chill. I'm used to it like, I'm the vice president my unit. So I try to keep everything together whatever.

Its bad, don't get me wrong its bad but it's got good things like, like you be together like we got there we play together ball basketball or on a unit we play everything we do everything together but then it has moments, moments where like, people arguing, about to fight. It's depressing. Like when you go in your room all you see is like cinder block walls And a stainless steel toilet and stuff you have in your room. makes you want to think a lot.

Since all you have is like a 8 by 8 cell. 8 by 12, whatever it is. You walk into my cell what would you see? Im in a two-man room so I have a roomate.

Its got bunk beds. It's like cinder blocks. So going in is like you got, you got your clothes. You see pictures, we try to put a lot of pictures on the wall.

So you wouldn't think, like you wouldn't think, like, I'm locked up. And the worst thing the worst thing about being in a room. I had a roommate but when I was in a single man cell I was like Yo being here by myself and then we'd be in stand down. Or you hear The door closed you know like, Yo I gott wait til somebody come open this door.

That's like the worst. When you really think about it becasue you dont try to think about it, but then you in there and you aint got nothin to do and be like damn man Im stuck. What Im gonna do now? I mean what we call that is being institutionalized.

I mean you can't get your mind, you know, get incarcerated too, when you are incarcerated. You know hopefully that makes sense. So when youre in here, like the cycle you go through, like some people just get used to it. And I when you get on the outside you like, you probably end up brushing your teeth with your finger because you know, the toothbrush we got here Is really small (laughs) But the point is to not let your mind get like that.

Don't let your mind get incarcerated, just because you are incarcerated. You know what Im saying? Coming to classes like this gives us a chance to escape the unit when we're not, when we don't normally leave the unit So we're not stuck staring at a wall. We can interact with different people With the class You learn new things.

I learned (Inaudible). Get a new experience a new feeling. Every Class, new thoughts. Hmm.

Thats not routine. I look forward to that Class every Tuesday. Well. Let's start with what you guys found interesting.

To a Poet. To a Poet? Alright. I like that.

I think I like To a Poet better. Yeah. Yeah. To the point.

It is. My questions were Do you, do you live for you, or for someone else? Thats one question. Can Go around.

I I definitely think that praise motivates me. And so in that sense I'm not living for myself. Growing up I, I was raised to like, like forge my own identity and be this huge important person. And there is some merit to just like, being a functioning cog and serving a larger purpose.

I dont know. I want to do something that Is not life for him or you or her I want to do it for me. So what makes you happy? Playing basketball.

Honestly. Or writing. Its not bad. You should.

For real? Yeah. Totally. Totally.

crosstalk

I did one of them last night. Which one did you do last night? It was kind of like real life. I mean I couldn't go to sleep no.

I like this. That's awesome. That's really good. These are so good so talented.

I'm jealous. That's awesome. You write one every day. My new year's resolution was to write more.

Didn't happen. Wrote in my journal like three times, so... I cant - It's not like a day to day journal. You can't keep one?

Okay so, when I went to Europe we took I was like I'm going to keep a journal because my grandma told me to, which was so annoying, and by the end it was literally just like a food diary. Here's what I eat for breakfast. Here's what I For lunch, nothing about the experience. Just diary food.

It's really cool. When did you start writing? Uh, when I got locked up. For me like, I use letters a lot like to communicate with my mom.

Like. It's. Like my parents like my dad. Especially like when I was Diagnosed with M.S.

my first year in college and so I think it was really hard for my mom like she was there that day, but then had to leave me to go home and like that was really hard for her to like And so she wrote me a letter and like. We like kind of talked through that. And so like yeah I think just like any form of writing just makes it so much easier to like, get into what you want to say. I'm a lot more honest with my writing too than I feel that I could be in like a face to face.

Yeah absolutely. This is all my thoughts - I couldn't say this to anybody I had to put it out so you can hear it and feel it. Like. Words come to me as I go I don't get it.

I just, I can just be talking and just come to me. Like, I dont know. Think Im gonna get it right you know. Cause I'm always thinking about something.

Creative mind. I guess. The other night I tried to go to sleep but I had something like in my head like I had a title for a poem for like some words start off the poem already and I couldnt go to sleep until I finished the poem. I really couldn't...

I couldn't go to sleep peacefully without finishing I had to finish the poem before I could sleep. When I first started writing poetry I really couldn't write that much because I could'nt really think. But if I did sit down alone I can really like spill my head out and all my heart all my words I'm thinking. And just put it all together.

When I'm writing it. It hurts like sometime when I write deep stuff but once I get out it's all relieved. 18 18 years old and My rhymes keep me sane. 18 years old.

I see bullets and brains. 18 years old and my story has been told. Anything can happen when you're 18 years old. Dad went to the desert before I was born.

Gulf War fighter and a desert storm came back sick. Now he can't get paid. He used to love life. Now he loves hate.

I'm no poet, prophet, I'm just a kid. Right now what happens every day I live. Hoping things change but my days could be few. Mom would be sad if I made the news.

18 years old my rhymes keep me sane 18 years old I see bullets and brains 18 years old, has - has my story been told? Anything can happen when you're 18 years old.

applause

Ready one two not to. OK. Good. So good!

I did do one, two but not three For many years as a teacher of literature, I was trying to create a classroom which felt alive to me and authentic. So I tried out many different approaches. During this period, I happened to be invited to do a workshop in a prison. I'd never been to a prison before and it was one of the most powerful classroom experiences of my life.

So I thought why not create a class at UVA where my students would be put into a similar kind of environment? It doesn't matter if you're a 20 year old college student or a 20 year old youth in a correctional center you know what it feels like to lose someone you love. You know what it feels like to struggle with family situations. You know what it feels like to try to search to find your place in a world that doesn't always make that easy.

Those are the issues of Russian literature, and those are universal. I have found that they connect with these themes at a visceral level. They know what it means to lose their freedom. That's not an abstract question to them Theyre incarcerated.

just a chance to talk to all the college people and stuff like that and just actually interact with people that are our age and, you know, they might not have lived our life you know the type of life you know because we're criminals and stuff like that but they might you know they might have the same feelings. You know what I mean? Because theyre still people you know. And this book, or all the books, kind of link even though they lead different lifestyles it links all of us together you know, and I would just say that it's really interesting just to see other people's points of view.

These stories come together over this, over this sort of static text something that was written hundreds, you know, 50 years ago. It's unchanging in a sense it can't be altered. And yet what can be altered what can be changed is the conversations that happen because of it. Things that are difficult to talk about things that you don't talk about in everyday conversation.

What does it mean to serve another person. What does it mean to enable another person? Um, what does it even mean to kill another person. You know that these things are so part of our lives that is part of our human experiences and we just don't talk about them ever.

We are we're reading Matryonas Home, or we're talking about Matryonas Home. It's about a sweet old lady who is like kind of taken for granted by everyone around her and it kind of details her relationship with the narrator. And to me they seem like a little odd couple but like they get along very well. Yeah.

Her general kind of goals is to talk about like empathy, family, hardship, and she's kind of like having respect and appreciation for the people in our life. That's kind of what we're going and we think that like all of them kind of tie in together because like you can look at the character of Matryona and think about how people are like either empathetic to her or grateful for her or appreciate her things like that and we're hoping to take like those like key themes and core ideas and try to think about them in our own lives and like who we're thankful or appreciative for Thinking about like our own like maternal or like motherly figures in our lives. like Who do you guys have anyone in your life that maybe not to this degree. But like reminds you of these like selfless, un-needing of payment values like this - is there anyone that this reminds you of in your own lives?

My grandmother was the same way. Yeah yeah. She was the same. She grew up in a little, she grew up not having much money so she kind of knew what it was like.

And then now she you know she got a decent house in a decent county so. Well I haven't really spoke to my grandpa's since he moved up to Maine Like eight years ago. Like when you were younger, Do you have any like. I mean if you didnt He always pushed me to do better.

But He's a veteran. So When the Fourth of July came around We always used to go to Maine He's always asked me if I want to be in a Fourth of July parade. So I used to be. Yeah.

He always wanted me to strive for my best. Not get into trouble. Yeah. But then I kind of let him down when I got locked up.

That's someone you Is that someone you would like want to try to get back in touch with? From what my mom said he friend me on Facebook, so... Nice. Grandpa's on Facebook.

Those are always fun. Once he once he heard I was doing good he friended me on Facebook. That's good. That's really great.

That's the only person I have memories like we used to have his recliner chair. So every time They used to run to the store I used to run and sit on his lap in a reclining chair. We flipped one time.

laughter

Just to like bring it back to the story, do you guys think that Matryona is properly appreciated? Not at all. No. Do you think anyone in this story really seems to appreciate her?

The Narrator. Yeah I feel like he realizes only after she's gone that he didn't come up to me did he. Yeah. How much for him and that he didn't properly appreciate it.

Yeah right. Yeah. It's hard though. Like when.

Once it's like pass the time where youre supposed to have thanked someone it's like it just seems fake when you're doing it almost like I'm thinking, this past fall my mother came - or my parents came to visit and Were out at lunch and she was just telling me to like do this this and this and I was like I don't want to do that. Like. And. I got angry with her and like I've got like kind of you know overstepped what I should have said probably.

And my mom is like usually very very strong, just like literally started crying and was like, I you like, don't appreciate what I do for you. I literally my whole life has been around like you and your siblings like making you happy and you never thank me for it. And she just like got up and left, like we're out at lunch she just got up and left and I was like There's nothing I could do after that. That would be as meaningful as if I had done it before.

I just felt like this emptiness like What the hell am I supposed to say here? I'm kind of afraid to go back and apologize to my grandpa. like he's like in his late 70s I'm afraid he'd have a heart attack from crying. I hope not.

I'm afraid. Crying about what? That I finally came around. Finally realized That I could do good.

So do you think that they would be happy tears then? Yeah. Yeah. In this last paragraph he says ignore any city in our homeland like this to me that's clearly like some impetus for him to like go forward and change his life and how he approaches people for the better.

So that's kind of like brings me back like what we've been talking about with the psych reservation of getting close to people or like difficulty getting close people as I like. I don't know to me there's something that can only be learned through that. I don't know if this even makes sense. it makes sense.

Like it's it's scary to get close to someone and be vulnerable to them but through that vulnerability and that like relationship you can learn a lot that you wouldn't have learned otherwise. Is that what youre saying? Yeah. What do you guys think about that?

I have a fear that that its going to turn around and like turn back against me. I aways have that feeling. Yeah it's happened in here several times I mean you tell people something Theyre like Oh we're not going to tell anybody else about you and they go the the whole campus. whole campus.

Yeah I find that too. very frustrating. This might be I mean like this it could easily be too personal and like no one has to answer. But like Where does this like reservation of getting to close people come from?

Like for each of us? I'm I'm kind of curious like is there some experience or some relationship that makes you wary of future relationships or is it just a general outlook that you can't really put your finger on? General outlook? And.

I think that. For me it's past like relationships. So like in terms of like boyfriend girlfriend things my ex boyfriend, and then in terms of like all my other reservations about getting to know people would be my mom because I can't remember the number of times that she got sober, we started to build a relationship again. She started drinking again.

It disintegrated. And so it's like a been reinforced in my mind that like. It's not going to work out so like why put in the effort. Is it just alcohol?

just alcohol. Yeah. But at least in The correctional facility you're forced to get sober. Yeah.

So at least she's safe and yeah she maintains sobriety well inside. No it's really good. It's just maintaining it on the outside. That's the tricky part for having her.

No- that went really really well. That was dope. What a day. Yeah.

was really good. I can't understand how they just go back and sit in their cells now. Residents consider themselves very reserved and don't like sharing and getting emotional And that's like they admitted that to us and so our goal has kind of been to try to break that down. I think today we actually got more personal anecdotes than we've gotten in the past.

I think it's no contact after the program and like maybe for like the next five years or something like that. So it's like if we wanted to you know like write them letters like we can't do that Which I personally find problematic like I understand their rationale behind it totally get it. Also. I'm not entirely sure if I agree with it.

Especially since like Wesley and Justin said they don't like opening up to people and now they're opening up to us and in a few short weeks Jack and I are gonna be gone. And maybe never hear from them again. You just kind of wonder like, what impact that will have. Just reinforcing the idea that people will leave you which isn't a good idea to have reinforced.

We're running around the houses are like chasing them around Theres a video and hes just like scampering he looks like a Little monkey or something.

laughter

So one of the reasons that we read these stories is because to talk about Russia without mentioning the Soviet prison camps would be kind of like talking about American history without mentioning the word slavery. It would just be dishonest. We can talk about like whatever story you guys want. So I'm curious to hear what your reactions were to them which ones you liked if you didn't like them.

Like that's fine too. You have thoughts. I can tell you're ready. Yeah I honestly, honestly my favorite story of all was My first tooth.

Yeah mine too. Why? Because. They teach me how to learn to forgive.

Which is one of the hardest things for me, like forgiving. I don't know why guess it's hard for me to do. I learned a lot because I mean when people do like bad things to you, you know something like this man, he got his tooth taken out by a man named

inaudible

Whatever that man's name is the Officer. And he had never forgiven the man away. You know what I mean? So I just wanted to like, I got into trouble in Columbia and I came to the United States and I suffer a lot.

I got a call from my mom and she was crying. She's crying and she was like I'm sorry for everything I put you through in Columbia As a little kid like I started crying too. I mean I started crying too. I was like, I forgive you.

I didnt know Id forgive anybody and I was just like yeah. Yeah ma I forgive you. For everything, everything we went through. So you know like I went through harsh times I mean.

I mean people are just the worst things you've ever imagined. They do bad things to you, you know what I mean? I need to know how to forgive. Thats why I liked that story.

What do you think compels people to go on and continue living and living in a way in which they are capable of forgiving people when they are faced with such overwhelming hardships? So be kind of an exception to the rule? Yeah I'm pretty sure you guys heard the word the phrase paying it forward? I feel like somebody forgives me then, why I never forgive about some other person.

So like, if I wanna listen To my dad's advice not hanging around the wrong people in school and so on, many things would be different. So my Dad forgive me for that. So I feel like. I have to forgive other people for that too.

So because your dad forgave you feel like you should forgive other people? Yeah. I didn't I didn't even honestly really think about that that much when I read this story. But like now you pointed out I see so much how the topic of forgiveness.

It's like all throughout this story. How have you people been to you guys about forgiving you? Like, what do you mean? Like, with the crimes youve committed, are people, have they've been forgiving?

My judge hasnt. Yeah. Well. I guess.

The first, that was my parents, my family. They were kind of sad about Disappointed. You know. I let let them down.

But they got around it. Just thinking like, Made a mistake. My story isn't over so. I just do.

Some pages left. I guess you could say. Definitely, youve got the whole book left! Yeah.

Its a lot of stuff. Forgiving? Yeah. People like It started with my parents and then.

I wouldn't say Then it went to me. Kind of. Forgiving yourself? Yeah.

I feel like I'm still having a hard time with that. I know I could have done better. But I mean. I had a choice but.

I dont know. Felt like it was right. I guess What about you - has forgiveness been hard? Like me forgiving people them forgiving me?

Either. I didn't expect anybody To forgive me. Except for my family but I'm not expecting the victim to forgive me hes a grown man so I dont know. If someone robbed me I wouldn't forgive them.

For me it's easy for me to forgive somebody. Life goes on. I can tell that. Life goes on.

crosstalk

Yeah. Like. If something happens if you do something to me I don't care. You come back.

You come back. It's just like my mom. Ill make my mom really angry but I come back 30 minutes later she's not angry no more. Thats just how I am.

You do something wrong to me. Come back an hour later So you would have forgiven this guard for kicking you in the teeth? Yeah? I mean yes and no.

It just depends. I don't know I didn't know the guard. I think Id forgive him. I'm not gonna forget about him.

Yeah Forgive and forget. That's what I do with it. You're not gonna live a happy life unless you can do it. You're not.

You're always you're always gonna be like. Looking for revenge on that person. Or always when that person comes around you. Oh howm I gonna get him back, how am I gonna get him back, I don't like him I don't like him, when you can just be like hey.

The past is past, whats up? Come chill. Let me ask you a question. OK.

You don't like The R word. Yeah. So lets say you get incarcerated. And there's somebody who is mentally ill.

You see an officer who calls this man names, making fun of him and doing all that stuff. What do you do in that case? Well you can't,you cant, you can't stand up for that person because if you do stand up you end up getting killed you said you'd do anything to save your life. You've got to turn your head on that one.

You've got to. You can't say nothing. Well I think it like for me that touches like such a personal chord. That like I wouldn't be doing that like analysis of what is going to happen if I intervene.

But at the end of the day if you step up and say something, If they kill you. What are they gonna do. They're going to do the same thing. They were just doing to that person.

Dont get me wrong, I feel sorry. I feel bad but like if I was going to die I think I value my life too much to I think too like in these stories like it obviously the point was not rehabilitation. And like that system of just like punishment and like trying to make Trying to degrade people trying to put people into these really terrible situations in which like other people have this tremendous power over them and they feel like they can't say anything - if that is still the system that we have now like something is wrong because clearly what's happening in these stories isnt right. And like if something hasn't changed, then thats not OK.

I don't think. Yeah. Personally I don't think being locked up helps anybody. You don't think what?

I don't think like being locked up helps anybody. Why do you think that? It's gonna make you worse. Like.

It's not rehabilitating. We're basically paying a debt to society because we did something wrong but we're doing it in a bad way. It's hurting it's hurting us more than it is helping us. Being away from your families at a young age is going to hurt you.

Last year when I was attacked and I fought that guy off, I really wanted him to be in jail forever. And I think when you think about jail there is there's no positive connotation which is not - not true. And I didn't know that. And I do know that now.

And I think it's hard to know that one you don't have any experience to go and you just know crimes as crimes and the people who did them. As opposed to the people who they are. Which has been very interesting for me. My Tuesdays man, I go home and watch a lotta rom-coms.

(laughter) What about you? I learned a lot From you guys. Well I was thinking, I've been thinking a lot more about my life recently. So.

I mean you help me realize that I need to go home and do the right thing. And get on with my life and I put my past behind me Yeah. That's the thing. Like I.

I get really upset. Like thinking about leaving you guys and. Not. Knowing.

Like. I want. I want the best for you. In life.

And I think you deserve a do-over, a restart, and to start clean. And I worry that It'll be hard and that you might end up back here. But I also know that You have the strength to not come back. Yeah.

Like. I believe 100 percent in you guys that you're stronger than this environment and that You want to do something with your life and you can. And you should and you deserve to. And.

Like you said you lost all this time but. You still have the whole book left. And It's not the end. I went into it really interested in what they did on the first day of class we had to write down like what do you most interested in the most nervous about etc etc.

And I wrote down I'm most interested to find out what my residents did. But I realized by like week four or five like that wasn't really important because I could see like who they are now and didn't really matter to me what they had done earlier. I mean I kind of knew that they're going to look at us and be like you know I wonder what you did you know because I would I would I would wonder what what I did. I would like look at them and just kind of base judgment on like what you look like you did you know and.

But I really didn't. I really didn't mind sharing about what I've what I've done. To me it wasn't like bad or anything I'm just here for stealing stuff. So I mean I mean it's bad but it just wasn't like you know You know crazy you know.

Many people come in here like thinking like somebody who's got some of these guys are criminals or someone's got a criminal attitude. Some of these guys were at the wrong place at the wrong time, you know what I mean? And they ended up making the wrong decision. But Chris said to me Today is one of the first days he said, you know this was a one time thing.

But I've been labeled with this forever. That this was you know that this was my one thing my one time I'm gonna I messed up and now I'm going to do my time and Im gonna get out and be different. Wesley had said one of the hardest decisions he had to make was Telling his mother that he was guilty you know because he originally was like let's fight it. I'm not guilty.

Of course I didn't do these things. He always left it very vague. And then when he finally had to tell his mom like, Yeah I did them we shouldn't appeal or you know spend all this money because I'm guilty. Was the hardest thing he's ever had to do I think like that notion of then having to deal with the people they love and who love them.

Like coming to terms with how it impacts their lives. I think it's something that I never really thought about in terms of like someone who's in jail but it's like a huge part of like what drives them while theyre there. One of the last things

name

actually decided to describe to us was just in detail his crime. I think to him his identity is almost at this point formed around the last six years of his life which he spent at Beaumont, around the crime that he committed as a 14 year old. And I asked him Is it a 14 year old like Are you still that 14 year old. He said no but its, he's had to carve his identity around the mistake that 14 year old made.

I think it was just important for him to let us know that you know this is this is what I did and this is what the last six years of my life have been in some ways about. I think I was taken off guard when Kyle asked us - he asked us what we thought of them being incarcerated and then I talked to them about how like I like love my dad and I know who he is as a person but like I also know that he's made mistakes and like I see them the same way I see them as like people who've made mistakes just like I have and I don't judge them for those mistakes but rather like they have kind of a clean slate in my eyes. You know I come home every every week from Beaumont I tell like tell my friends you just don't understand how amazing they are like they are. You know why are they in here I don't understand like they are incredible people like what is going on here?

But then there's the other side or it's like they they did do something. I don't know. You know I didn't I didn't know what those things were. But at the same time that's that's kind of weighed on you because you know especially coming from a family where something horrible happened to my mom, like, I can't you know, you want to protect the victim as well and I can't imagine how those families would feel for me to say like oh it doesn't matter what they did.

So in some senses I've you know I think all of us kind of pushed it off and say like we're going to kind of bench that but the longer our relationships progressed the more I've been thinking about it and the more I've been sort of puzzling over it like how do I hold these two people in my hands. This person I didn't know before maybe from years ago who messed up or who didn't just mess up and you know did something really horri- you you know I have no idea. And then also this incredible person that sitting across the table from me who is I believe can change the world you know like how do I hold those two people together? So Chekov, when he was writing this story he was dying of tuberculosis.

A message of his writing is that there is always an opportunity for human beings to make a difference in the lives of others and to make a difference in their own life. What was like, your first night here like? You know like, was it like the realities like eventually sinking on you or is it just like you just kinda Especially when, especially when it comes to like crime and stuff like that, because we all know we committed a crime so like we're sitting in our room and all we're thinking about is yo, am I gonna get off with this or am I going to get caught are they gonna prove me guilty like, So like it's not even like him. Like hes sittin there hes like yo, I'm so bored.

Like what. I'm pretty sure if y'all feel the same way like when I first got locked up like I sat there and all I could think about was court, all I could think about was my lawyers all I could think about was what evidence do they have. And stuff like that is all I could think about like I found what, I'd just like, stuff to occupy myself like I felt like the first night was an hour. Staff like keep knocking on the door that like when I first got there theyd be like you all right?

You're zoning out a little bit. And Im just like Im good, I'm good, Im just thinking. And Im sittin there thinking, thinking, thinking. Its crazy is like you think your mind blank. It's like you would think it's so much on your mind you wouldnt be able to sleep.

I had a normal nights sleep. Yeah I did too, Its weird. It's like your mind exhausted itself by thinking too much. Yeah I had a good night's sleep that day.

You think your mind blank and I had a good-ass dream. What was your dream? I was on a boat, and then the boat had a pool in in the boat. And I was in the pool.

laughter

Do you think that's really where your mind kinda wanted to be? Yeah. Thats interesting. It sounds like the - I mean like not totally but like a little bit of what the doctor saying like your mind like mind is like trying to go somewhere else you know?

I remember it clearly. Its like that one day, it felt like a dream. When I got locked up, cuz I came in at night. So it was already late.

everybody was locked down already. So I came in Me too. I came in at night too. and I came into this area and I'm like I just sat down like you know what am I doing here?

I'm trying to leave and then I just looked out the window I was looking around looking people shoes and I was like It was your first time? Yeah. My first night ever been locked up. This is your first time?

Yeah this is my first time being locked up. Same here. Yeah same here. Its really interesting to hear your perspective because like you guys have had that first night experience like you can understand this story better than we can in that way like Hearing yall talk about it it's like that first you know like trying to - yeah.

The Doctor, he sees himself... I mean like when you first get locked up you don't see yourself like similar to anybody in there at all. You're like oh they're all in here that I'm just. Here right now.

It's true. You know. Did that hit you at one point or was it like, a gradual thing? I guess it is like a gradual thing you fall in place and you look at the people that's coming in and thinking Do they think the same thing.

You kind of come in you don't categorize yourself with any other person. It's like You're right. It's like it's like it's like it's like you look at them like you they're institutionalized. I will never be like that.

I don't care if Im here for five years. I would never be like that then now looking back on it. I mean like like like you know jail lingo and like that you know it's like looking back on it like it's like Like I'm I'm institutionalized but I'm not like so institutionalized that if I go home I'm not gonna know what to do. You know but I mean like we are all institutionalized we know what to do.

Like if we were to ever get locked back up we would know what to do if we we got, got locked up. You know I think the Doctor looks at it like He's still normal and nothing's wrong with him and although he's surrounded by crazy people or something's not right. You look at yourself different before it hits you. Final question.

If you guys dont want to answer you dont have to. Why did he write the story when he's dying Of tuberculosis. Like why spend the time writing. You ask us this question every week in a different form and trying to act like its different?

It's a valid question! They're all dying. They're all Russian... they're all depressed.

I think he wrote it so that me, you, and these other nice people at this table sit could here and have different opinions on it. It's so big of a book that it's hard to keep track. So are you going to read it though. Yes I am.

I'm about to check it out actually. Im gonna start reading it slowly. That's awesome. So you may love Tolstoy.

I do - Tolstoy is one of my favorite authors. I got until April in here. I'm hoping to finish up One of the things that has impressed me about the residents is how motivated they are to get out of Beaumont, to change their lives. They know that something is dysfunctional in their lives.

Nobody needs to point that out to them. They know that as painfully as clearly as anybody. But what I've been inspired by is how motivated these guys are to get off the path that they're on and they know at some level that they still have that opportunity. As all of you know today is our last day together.

This is the last day of the Russian literature program for the spring 2016 and it's a day for us to reflect on our work together it's a day to celebrate the work that we've done together and it's also a day for us to say goodbye. So we begin with Patrick.

applause

It's crazy. I want to start out by saying I appreciate all y'all students coming here because I don't know if I was out and on a Tuesday Id come here so I admire yall for that. I wrote a rap. Vladimir bring anything with Russian a bad name and excuse my language but that's a damn shame.

It would make you feel good to say you know a boy like this. And I'm still trying to figure out how much land I need on some Tolstoy ish. Doc finish now I feel the need to show it, this is my letter to a Poet purchase from the world. Got me feeling like I owe it or some I dont trust as far as I can throw it.

So I grew up. And they bomb me as a child. No wonder I grew up. Small issues turned in to a big problem, cuz they didnt know I was big enough to solve them so open up my heart.

requesting all the things brought in, thirsty for your love but for your attention that was starving like dead. Can you part yourself from all the things that is distracting you. And I swear I'll be there to help with all those naysayers attacking you. And that could be our quality time quality delivery from high quality mind, and you'll see how much I grew away from you that invest in my time live my destiny was done and you see a kid in his destiny sign.

I'll pick up a Russian literature story that I was destined to find is real. I'm at the point I'm doing things that I won't regret, and faking them out of doing things that they won't respect and show em dreams that I won't neglect. Its not so far fetched. And in doing that I'll put price tags and all my bare choices to say I'm paying for everything I did and I hoped and I'm not getting too deep but I'm building a mountain of my feelings and that is gettin too steep.

So I'mma ventin these conditions to my UVA peeps Get your scroll at the end of the week. So I'm playing for keeps, and Dr. Kaufmann I appreciate you doing this and I wanted the people to say that I'm a really benefit on everything you taught, and start using it and for my group lending a hand. You should definitely give Sam and Rochelle extra credit on their final exam

laughter and applause

I feel a mix of sadness and frustration with saying goodbye. It just comforts me that you know in an hour we'll be heading out here and my new friends will be saying goodbye frustrates me that I'm never gonna be able to talk to my new friends again after today. I'm mad that our relationships are only temporary and that they have to end. I guess I could be pretty pissed off but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world.

That's what this class has been to me. Beautiful. I first realized it when I leafed through Justin's notebook and read his poetry. I was overwhelmed by the emotion he conveyed and the language you use to describe life and love.

I saw beauty in Wesley's faith as he was always the first to empathize and forgive the very complicated characters that we read about in our stories. It was beautiful how Dakota would always be the most intrigued by the exact same passage that I was most interested in and would ask a great question about it. It's beautiful that I was able to talk so openly about my life, my fears, and my family with a new group of friends in a way that I can't do with many of my friends even at UVA. Although these relationships will not persist I know the memories of this course will stay with me forever.

I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment we've been able to share together, and I'm sad that I didn't get to know a lot of you as well as I could have. Thanks

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Forgiveness is one of the most important things that I experience with my table and I thank you for what you've taught me. Thank everybody for your time. Hope you enjoy The poems name is "forgive". Forgive the stars that didn't shine, though some did in my mind.

Forgive the wind for its nostalgic cries. Listen or that wind will pass you by. Forgive the clouds for their attack, and then my tears that cant hold back. Forgive the word for not loving enough, for were just learning how to trust.

Life does not intend to cause pain. Dont forget flowers bloom from all the rain. Stories will continue to come and pass, The sun will always shine and grow the grass. Forgive the moon for not letting us fly, and the beautiful stars that burn up and die.

Therefore, Forgive the world in which we live. Because I now know we'll only find peace if we forgive.

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Words and language, I believe have unique powers to transport us to different worlds - to the plains of Siberia, to the cells in a mental institution, to a ramshackle house in the middle of Russia. But there aren't any words that can bring us all together after this meeting, back to UVA. There are no words that I have for how unfair it feels that some can leave and some must stay. There aren't any words for what I know I will feel the second I walk out these doors in a little over half an hour.

So I turn instead to someone older and wiser, someone many might think we've heard enough from this semester, Leo Tolstoy for some language. He wrote, If then I were asked for the most important advice I could give that which I consider to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say in the name of god, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you. Look around you. I look around me and I see older brothers and younger sisters, I see fathers and friends and poets and piano players.

I look and I see cooks and scientists and uncles and artists and while I can't put words, into words, this community this strange magic that has happened over the course of the semester I feel very blessed to be here in this moment together. I was gonna start off by reading something that somebody just sent me in the mail when I told them I was doing Russian Lit. It says, uh, Leo Tolstoy, the great Russian writer tells of the time he was walking down the street and passed a beggar. Tolstoy reached into his pocket to give the beggar some money but his pocket was empty.

Tolstoy turned to the man and said Im sorry my brother but I have nothing to give. The beggar Bryden said you'd give me more than I'd ask for. You've called me brother. To the loved a word of affection is morsel, but to the love starved, a word of affection can be a feast. I just wanna elaborate Like he didnt look at the man as a beggar.

He looked him as like another human. I think that's how you came in here by not looking at our setting, but looking at who we are. The Russian literature class has been a great experience for me. I read some stories that I liked, some that just, sucked.

laughter

But what I liked most of each story was that I was able to take a theme out of it and apply it in my daily life. Growing up in Colombia I didn't really have much money. And went through a lot of struggles with my mom. My mom always told me to grow up go to college, be a professional, and always chasing money.

Be a Millionaire. That's what I grew up believing. But now I know that money don't bring happiness. Money is not everything.

I mean honestly how much land does a man really need? Another important lesson I learned was to forgive. All my life I was forgiven, but I never learned to forgive. I want to end by saying thank you all for coming and spending time with us and so, do svidaniya i udachi tebe.

That means goodbye and all the best of luck to yall.

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background chatter

The last meeting itself like in those last ten minutes you just felt so powerless. I've never had a relationship like, end in such a finite way. It's just hard to keep saying to them, this is like how much our time together has meant to me when you can't then say call me or e-mail me like I care about you I to know how you're doing. You don't want it to come this fast, like you be like, yo we still got like an hour, we still got an hour and 30 minutes.

And then you look up and now we got 20 minutes, so it's like damn what can I, what can I say Oh no. It was so fun and now its come to an end. No more Tuesdays in Russian Lit.

applause

In that last moment when I knew we had five minutes in class and I knew this was our opportunity to say goodbye, um, I felt like a father. Who was letting his kids go out into the world and I would have never understood that feeling More than three years ago before Ian was born. And - and it was sad to me but it was also very gratifying that I think I left them with something that they can take with them into the world. This is an opportunity for you to first kind of gather your own thoughts, to make sense of for yourself of what, what was really most important to you in this experience.

I don't think like I don't think I realized like how much I needed this course. Coming into it I like um I don't know I had a bad experience in the fall that I don't know kind of hit my first rough patch and just really struggled a little bit and I don't know this class like kind of restored my faith a little bit in humanity, I wanna say, um. it made me like feel alive. I think for me growing up was really easy to put the criminal in a little box labeled like bad and wrong.

And then coming into this experience too after having had a crime committed against me, and also one against my brother, I I mean it's like they're people to me now? Which they weren't before. It's sad when something that you've put in a box to stay safe from is made vulnerable I guess. Yeah exactly.

So George Bernard Shaw once said you have learned something. It always feels at first as if you have lost something. So when I hear what you just say it makes me think of that quote you've learned something and it always feels at first as if you have lost something. I mean what you just described is part of learning, is when our, is expectation failure - is when our assumptions and our paradigms that we comfortably attached ourselves to no longer work.

Whatever those paradigms may be and that's scary. Part of Ivan Illychs suffering is precisely that he had boxed himself his entire life into this, he was living in a box in a very narrow vision of what life is about and all of a sudden he had to confront that life is much bigger and more complicated than he ever thought. And that for him was the most terrifying thing of all. Even more as much as the physical pain I mean in some ways for those of you who whose assumptions were challenged or certain paradigms have been challenged in this class, in a way that's part of that's been part of the experience.

Learning involves a certain loss and then a rebirth of something else. Some new insights some new discovery. For me the thing you said you'd lose something like. I guess what I'm like losing in the process of losing is just like my confidence that how I came into this course was like what made me happy and what I wanted to be doing with my time in college and beyond.

And then just like the lesson is more just like I'm questioning that and I don't have the answer. But like I'm definitely in the process of like losing that conviction that you know this is what makes me happy and this is what I want to do. Here I am at the end of four years like I'm about to graduate and maybe starting UVA I would be doing it differently. You know, if I started again.

I've really been struggling with how to handle knowing that like Kyle and Justin like were in there for drug charges and like they're in there like a similar time when like my dad struggled and like wanting to be hopeful that like they won't relapse when they go back out and that they have been equipped to be successful. And so like, its, I want them to be successful but I also know how hard it's gonna be for them and I didn't know how to like be real with them and I don't think I was real with them, and so like in reflecting on that thinking about like oh what could I have said to them how could I have shared this experience, maybe in a way that was like more formative. Any other follow ups? There were times where like I would talk about my mom and they would ask me follow up questions like Oh well do you go visit her or like do you talk to her?

And like the answers for both of those are no. And so I was always concerned that I would come across as like hypocritical for me to like be here and like have these like feelings and opinions I hold and then like I don't really have a relationship with my own mother. Tolstoy said that - another quote - quote alert - man is flowing in him there are all possibilities. One minute he was evil.

The next he's good, one minute he's stupid the next he's smart and the other way around. And this is the greatness of man. Man is flowing in him there are all possibilities. And so what I'm hearing from you guys now through this really authentic reflection - poignant reflection - you're doing right now is that this is part of what what you're grappling with how to look at the relation - the people with whom you've built these relationships as people who are flowing who have good and bad and evil.

And, like all of us. In some ways that's one of the deepest messages of Russian literature. How can you look at people truthfully as people with all of their flaws and all of their strengths with all their shortcomings and all the virtues at the same time. How can you hold both of those in your consciousness at the same time?

Part of what you guys are grappling with right now is just that so you don't have to leave this experience just thinking about the guys as all good nor do you have to leave the experience just thinking about them as all bad. You think about them as people. Now its kind of strange, because every Tuesday, I got so used to routine like coming in come into class you know? Today, Today when I woke up I told my roommate yeah I gotta get ready for Russian literature.

And he talked to me. He's like I thought you finished that class. Im like - right. I finished that class right.

I forgot. Yeah. So I got so used like coming to the class you know getting ready for the Class. I just wanted it to keep going, you know?

It just took me out of this setting like when I walked into that building every Tuesday afternoon. It's like I wasn't locked up is like for the next three hours I can live. I can do me. I can be myself.

I can open up and I mean just a chance to open up. Makes you feel better cause you to get out of locking yourself down all the time. a lot of these stories really have helped me realize you know a lot of inner issues that I've been dealing with my whole life. I really couldn't quite piece together in words until I heard it in the story and then it would say it and I'll be like that kind of reminds me of myself you know?

And I'll think about it and then I'll start thinking I need you to work on that and now work on it. And then it'll just get better and then eventually it's just not even a problem anymore. To be able to say on my Tuesday I'm in college but I come to I come to a prison, or a juvenile place and spend my time. So like now I didn't know like this connection would happen, but still I went.

And then as I spent my Tuesdays on this and when I can be partying or studying, I did something. So I think that's really outgoing and outstanding that people did that. I feel feel pretty good about it. I was glad to be a part of it.

Kind of lucky. But. It was beautiful. I dont know.

Opened my eyes to a lot. Just, theres not really a lot of words to explain how I feel about it, honestly. My biggest hope is that they continue to have conversations like we had and to build friendships like we built in this course. You know I want I want Chris Hill to spend time with his sister who he just adores.

I want to see him be an artist. He's an amazing, amazing artist and I would love to see his drawings on a wall somewhere - just walk by one day and just see his name on the wall next to an art piece. I mean that would be pretty magical for me to just kind of, I wouldnt even have to see him just to see his art hanging up somewhere. One thing I want them to know is that like This is something I'm going to carry with me for the rest of my life.

Like I like I think it's easy for them to think we're just going to go back to our lives here and forget about them and not think about them but I'm going to think about them all the time and just like always be hoping they're OK. And I know they will be, but I wrote this right after the last class. Its called Anonymous. Its free verse.

I just want to talk to you again. Just being able to make you laugh and see that smile again. That smile will haunt dreams. Probably forever.

If we meet again. I won't let you go. But if I somehow do when we hug we'll swap souls so that the both of us will have a piece of each other no matter what. And that's when Ill never have to let you go.