The question of “So, how was your vac?” often comes up in hall after a vacation, always from those you didn’t have time to message over the break. “I spent it in prison” is perhaps not the expected response amidst stories of ski chalets and exam lock-ins. But we Oxford students take pleasure in over-burdening ourselves, and those of us who worked during the vacation have much better stories to tell than those who spent it cruising down a black run.
Over 150 hours of my Easter vac were spent inside the sturdy walls of one of His Majesty’s most secure men’s prisons – though fortunately I was able to go home at the end of the day. My job is a varied one: I help to facilitate daily family visit sessions by serving refreshments, supporting family work, and organising activities for children. Many of these children are told that their dad lives on an oil rig or that they’re visiting him at work, and my job is to make the whole establishment – with its search dogs, handcuffs, locked doors, cameras, and austere-looking guards – seem a less daunting place to visit. Wrapped up in a university that provides a college family in addition to my own real one, it is easy to forget that there are those who might only see their dad for two hours a month.
My favourite thing about work is our monthly Family Days, day-long visits where the men get to be dads again: they can get up and play with their children (rather than stay stuck in lines of dull grey chairs), they can eat lunch with their family, and they can finally spend some time relaxing. Seeing a little one yell “Daddy”, running across the visitor’s hall to be scooped up in her father’s arms brings a tear to my eye every time. I will always remember last Christmas, when Santa Claus (played by one of the officers) asked one of the older children what presents he wanted. He said: “I just want Dad to be at home again.”
Those are the highs, though, and I see the lows in equal measure: I see men who are high, unable to speak a coherent sentence. I see children coming to the play area because their parents are ignoring them. I see children who have had no male role model in their lives, children who have suffered. Just this past vacation, I was spat on, punched, kicked, and grabbed by children who know no better, whose parents sit, watch, and silently approve. Seeing this world – one so different from my own childhood – is just as unbearable to watch. Being but a cog in the machine, I can’t help but wonder whether they will grow up to imitate their dads. For the inmates’ loved ones, the worst part is the “second sentence”, the sentence that families have to bear through loss of income and community judgment. And the suffering that families have to bear makes it all the more likely that the cycle of addiction, violence, and neglect will continue.
Most days at work involve living a double life: to the officers, I am the diligent colleague who spends his breaks reading Beowulf (collections revision), but to the residents, I am just another part of the establishment. Not allowed to reveal any personal details (not even my surname), I am simply the “Sir” (or “Miss”, if they’re feeling cheeky) who serves the refreshments. For those who have been there long enough to remember me from the Christmas vacation, I do have to admit that I’ve been at university: “Yeah, I do maths at Bristol mate” is my normal response, dreading the day someone asks me my opinions on Fermat’s Last Theorem or expects me to solve a Sudoku.
But working with the men is the most interesting part. Speaking face-to-face with the people whose headshots have appeared on the news is an intimidating experience – dare I say worse than a one-on-one tutorial – but it does pop the Oxford bubble. From arguing with those who are adamant that university is a waste of money or “just for toffs” to having a serious conversation about a book they picked out from the prison library, I am (or at least I hope) able to have just a little impact on their road to rehabilitation. And though many are happy to have a roof over their head, three hot meals, and all the friends they could need, an equal number are desperate to get out and see their children grow up.
When I’m deep in an essay crisis during term or stressing about an upcoming exam, it is both helpful and humbling to have a reminder of the lives lived outside of Oxford. And, in the world which we inhabit, so full of hate and loneliness, I find some inspiration in my experiences in a prison: somewhere that should perhaps epitomise these emotions. One that sticks with me most is a card written by one of the eight-year-olds: “Dear Daddy, I know you’ve been a little bit naughty this year, but that will never stop me from loving you.”
