Still image from video filmed at Stringfellow Unit in Rosharon, Texas.
“Rehabilitating people assumes they were habilitated in the first place.”
A friend who had done time at Louisiana’s Angola Prison (the "Alcatraz of the South") told us that, and it stopped us cold. Because the idea of giving someone a "second chance" after prison assumes they had a "first chance" to begin with.
But what if no one taught them how to manage money, resolve conflict, or think long-term? What if the education system failed to prepare them for life? Then, they never really had a chance at all, did they?
When it came to people in prison, Red had always thought “Lock ’em up and throw away the key.” It wasn't until we were introduced to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s Chaplaincy Department that we realized the situation is more nuanced than that.
Black, ever the pragmatic, wanted to learn more. But couldn’t help but think that we all make mistakes. And told Red,
Just because someone makes a bad decision does not make them a bad person.
However, the last thing we ever expected was for our book "What I Learned About Life When My Husband Got Fired!" to be used in Texas prisons, with the men and women asking why these “lessons” (fundamental life skills, including financial literacy) weren’t taught in school. Red wonders that too, as she didn’t learn them until she was in her 40s.
Now, in honor of April being “Second Chance Month,” we want to ask you …
Don’t we all deserve a second chance … including the people in prison?
When they told us that this book was about finances, I thought, "Well, I do not have to read it." I thought that since I already know how to manage my money, then why should I waste my time reading a book that told me what I already "knew." When I read the first chapter, I knew I was wrong. There was more to finances than just how to "manage" my money.
Quick! If someone says "Julius Caesar," what comes to mind?
Almost everyone has heard of Julius Caesar, but how many of us really know much about him, or at least that's what Red starts to wonder when she receives the usual flippant, but still accurate, reply from her sister, after feeling very proud that she knew that July was named after the famous Roman.
Which is what got Red to realize, much to her surprise (shock, if truth be told), that even as a straight-A student with a love of history, that when it came to Julius Caesar, a famous historical figure and possibly one of the greatest generals and statesmen of all time, she couldn't tell you dates or battles or anything "historical" associated with him.
Even as a theater major in college, she never read Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar," although she knew just enough about the play to know that it was where the fortune teller warned Caesar to "Beware the Ides of March." Instead, her knowledge of Caesar came from her love of movies.
My first, and probably my most enduring, memory is of a brilliant general who not only commanded armies as he conquered lands far from home but was a great statesman who was also involved with one of the world's most beautiful women. And while he was Julius Caesar and the woman was Cleopatra, to me, they'll always be Rex Harrison and Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra, a movie almost as controversial as the general himself.
And Black? Besides knowing that Caesar Salad was invented by a different Caesar, she appreciates Julius Caesar's leadership skills and way with words,
There is much we can learn about leadership from Julius Caesar, whether on the battlefield, in politics, or in business (start small, take risks, communicate well), including what ultimately led to his death (always consider worst-case scenarios, never get complacent or arrogant). Many of his quotes speak (pun intended) to his powerful way with words, and the ability to not only deliver a message but to inspire (and story tell), with my favorite being, "I came, I saw, I conquered."
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