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created is better than I could have ever

envisioned or hoped to achieve.

I have earned a bachelor’s and a master’s degree

in education and have been teaching for close to

a decade at this point. I have purposely sought

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out the most difficult and hard to reach children

to work with, and I have been extremely

successful and satisfied in my work. Working with

my kids keeps me grounded and allows me to use

the experiences of my life to help children who

live in a similar world. My experiences, positive

and negative, give me a perspective most people

do not have and knowledge that cannot be

obtained from a textbook or in a classroom.

What follows is an abbreviated account of my

formative years with alternating chapters

describing my professional life and the use of my

childhood traumas to change the lives of the

youth of today. It is raw and mean and not easy

to read, or write. But I must do it without

sympathy or sorrow. This is all true, and I know,

right now, similar experiences are happening to

some child somewhere. It is up to us to first

believe that this is true in our society and next to

take action.

16

I stepped onto the block without saying a word. It

was my first night in Juvenile Detention. It’d been

a long time since I’d been in a detention facility,

but this time I was working. I followed my

Corporal as he took me on a tour of the facility.

We stopped in front of the first cell, and a few

kids yelled out greetings and requests to the

Corporal. The stocky teenager in the first cell

spoke nervously.

“Yo, Tre man, what’d I do?”

“Hey man, no one said you did anything”

“Then why’s he here?” the young man asked,

pointing at me while backing away from the bars.

“He’s with me,” was the Corporal’s only reply.

“He new?”

“I told you, he’s with me.”

Then another child’s voice called, “Oh shit, that

looks like Mr. Love. Hey 15, don’t that look like

Mr. Love?” There was a face pressed against the

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bars in the next cell with the number 14 painted

above it. I stood looking into the cell in front of

me, cell 13, while the Corporal spoke with the

kids. Everyone wanted to know who I was, but

the Corporal wasn’t saying a word about me. I

was there to shadow. I had to complete 40 hours

of training before interacting with any detainees.

By the end of the short six-cell hallway the shouts

and warnings from the kids to each other got

louder and more ominous. We turned and made

our way back to where we had started. I marched

confidently behind the Corporal.

As we emerged from the top of the hall, known as

a block, the Corporal turned and smiled at me.

“These kids seem to know you already. That’s

good. Let’s get to the next block.”

“You let the kids call you by your first name?” I

asked quickly.

“You’ll see a lot of these kids again and again,

you’ll get to know them and they’ll get to know

you. The ones that know me call me Tre. It’s a

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comfort thing. You can have them call you

whatever you want. Whenever you feel like

talking.” He was a young man, obviously well

liked and respected by the kids. He smiled and

walked on, continuing the tour.

We turned a corner and then another, passed the

showers and onto the second six-cell block.

With ear piercing volume we were greeted with,

“Yo, 24, it IS Mr. Love, ya’ll better watch out,

he’s a mean mother-,” the Corporal gave the

child a look mid-sentence and the boy stopped,

back-peddled and started again, “yo, he’s a

badass. What’s up Mr. Love? You remember me

from school?” asked the tall skinny boy in the

dark cell. I looked at him sternly, nodded slightly,

and moved down the block, shadowing the

Corporal.

“Don’t fuck with Mr. Love, he’ll make you do

push-ups and shit. Man, I had him in class, he

was mean as hell.”

“Mr. Love cool though, he keep it real.”

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“Yo, why you aint talkin’?”

“Man, dude look crazy. He aint sayin shit and he

just be starin’. Yo man, dude IS crazy.”

All the way down the block the kids shouted to

each other and to the Corporal. I kept a stone

face and remained silent. I had been in the

building for less than an hour, and I didn’t know

the rules any better than a fish (inmate slang for a

new detainee) so I kept my mouth shut. No one

told me I couldn’t talk, but no one had told me

what I could say either. Playing it close to the

vest, I thought it best to keep my mouth closed

until I could make an assessment of the situation,

which would take some time. I knew I had five

eight-hour shifts before I had to do any real work.

I could take my time and let the kids talk about

who and what they thought I was.

We descended the stairs into the office area

below. Officers had brought in several more kids,

and as I scanned the scene I recognized one of

the juveniles. He looked at me with

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embarrassment in his eyes and quickly looked at

the floor.

“Yo, Love, this how you do a search.” The

Corporal was addressing me, and I took my eyes

from my former student.

“Go ahead take off your belt and put it on this

desk, man,” the Corporal commanded the new

detainee as he made a half turn to point out

where he wanted the belt placed. When the belt

was on the desk, he motioned to the young man.

“Turn around, put your hands on the door, then

take a step back.” The young man did as he was

told, his eyes trained on the ground.

Turning to me as he put on rubber gloves, the

Corporal began his instructions: “Start with the

hair, run your fingers through, feel around for

any bobby pins, rubber bands, or whatever might

be in the hair. If they got braids they gotta pull

‘em out if they’re gonna stay. Go around down to

the ears, make sure they’re not wearing any

earrings. Move down to the collar of the shirt,

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check the neck for any jewelry. If they’re wearing

more than one shirt, make ‘em strip down to the

last one and hang the rest up here.” He pointed

to the corner of an open door.

“Search the sleeves all the way around, get as

high up as you can. You wanna make sure they

aint got nothing under their shirt. Feel down the

back, down the front. Get to the waist, run your

hand around the inside of the waistband of the

pants. Check for anything that doesn’t belong

there. Most o’ the time the pants are gonna be

sagging so you’ll find your own way to do it, but

you gotta keep their pants up while you search all

of the pockets. Make sure you check on the inside

of the waistband cuz a lot of these new pants have

pockets on the inside. Feel the crotch area, some

people have a problem with this part but you

gotta get over that cuz you gotta do it. This is

where they wanna hide most of their shit. Get

right up on it, don’t worry about makin them

uncomfortable, most of these dudes they been

22

here before, they know what’s up.” The Corporal

quit talking and patted the kid down quickly. He

demonstrated the rest of the search process and

together we cleared the room, escorting the kids

to a secure holding area.

“So, Mr. Love,” the Corporal said with a smirk,

“you’re a teacher, huh?” he asked.

“Yes Sir.” I replied.

“Yo, chill on that. You aint gotta call me ‘Sir’.

Tre, just Tre. You’re like, ten years older than me

anyway.” His smile and tone were genuine.

“Cool, I was just showing respect. Ya know? You

out-rank me, we just met, I didn’t wanna

disrespect you, man,” I threw up my arms, “you

know how it goes being the new guy. I’m just

easin’ into it.”

“It’s cool,” he assured me before turning to the

Sergeant. His smile got bigger when he declared,

“We needed this guy months ago.” He threw his

arm back and pointed at me. “We were upstairs

and every kid knows him and they’re all afraid of

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him. He never said a word. It was great.” The

Sergeant looked up at me from the desk.

“Why do all of the kids know you?” she asked

smugly.

“I’m a teacher. I teach in an alternative school

outside of Nashville, and before that I taught in

the alternative school here. I’ve taught most of

those kids up there and, the ones I haven’t taught

know who I am from the kids I have taught.”

“What are you doing here if you’re a teacher?”

“Student loans are killing me.”

“Yeah, but what are you doing HERE if you

teach all day? Why get a job at juvenile

detention? Why not get a job doing something

other than dealing with these fucked up kids

when you deal with fucked up kids all day?” her

tone was earnest, yet probing. The small office

area was filling up with other detention officers,

too many people I didn’t know. I considered the

question and the inquisitor. I let the question

hang and I stood up to introduce myself to the

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people in the room. Before there were any more

questions, or even time to answer the one waiting

for an answer, the door buzzer sounded, and

deputies could be seen waiting outside with more

kids.

Everyone in the office jumped into action. The

police were buzzed in, and the kids lined up.

Everyone was suddenly busy with machine-like

precision, asking questions of the police officers

and the kids, searching and prepping the kids for

booking. I was impressed with the speed and

orderliness of the operation. Everyone knew their

job and jumped to it. I stood in the corner of the

office observing the routine. The police left, and

the kids were hustled along. The rattle of the leg

shackles, the constant buzz from the camera

monitors, the natter of the kids, known as

detainees; in just a few hours all of these new

sounds quickly blended into the white noise of the

building. I kept myself to myself as I always tell

my students to do. I did as I was told and

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answered any questions the staff asked as

cryptically as possible. The night moved along

quickly as I tried to absorb the routine of my new

duties, the whole time shadowing Corporal Tre

Rubin. At midnight my shift was over, and I

stepped out the back door of the detention center

into the cool night air. An overwhelming sense of

anxiety slammed down on me, and it occurred to

me for the first time in a long time how good it

felt to be free.

I drove home with the radio off, enjoying the

silence. The ride home was short, but the entire

evening’s events played over in my mind. The

faces of the children pained my heart and

brought my own childhood horrors rushing

forward. I pulled into the garage and sat silently

in my Jeep, collecting my thoughts before going

inside. When I opened the door to the house, my

dog was wagging her tailless rear end in

excitement. I stooped down and pressed my face

into her and assured myself that I was really free.

26

I worked Friday and Saturday night and Sunday

morning. The weekend passed quickly. I

watched, listened, and learned. Kids tried to

speak with me, but I stared through them in

silence. Instead I chose to carefully observe the

rapport the other staff had with the detainees,

assessing the attitudes of both. For two nights I

shadowed Corporal Rubin closely. He didn’t

work Sundays so the Sergeant on duty trained

me. She was as curt as the other Sergeant had

been, but she knew her stuff, and she got the job

done. At four o’clock I was glad to walk out the

back door and breathe my freedom in deeply.

Working two jobs made the weekdays fly by.

School seemed like a blur the first week. When

Friday rolled around again, I pulled off my

sweater at the end of the school day and absent-

mindedly revealed my JDC uniform shirt. One of

my students noticed it immediately.

“Mr. Love, Sir, do you work at the Juvenile

Detention Center too?”

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“Yes Sir I do. I just started last weekend. I work

Friday and Saturday from four until midnight

and Sunday from 8 until 4 in the afternoon.”

The boy who had spoken looked around at the

other boys and they all broke out in uneasy

laughter. All of my students had been arrested at

one time or another, and most of them had spent

time locked up in the same detention center I was

heading to when the bell rang for dismissal. One

student spoke out, “Man, I aint ever getting

arrested again. I aint spending my weekends with

you too.”

“For real,” came the chorus from the rest of the