Talking to Walls: An interview with an ex-prisoner

[JD]

For those of you unfamiliar with the genre/technique, "Oral History" is a method of gathering stories through an interview. During the interview, the interviewer develops a close relationship with the interviewee by taking a life-history approach, asking him or her open-ended questions beginning with the person's upbringing, their parents, the neighborhood where they grew up, and so forth, in an attempt to elicit the most important events in that person's life. Oral History is not a way to turn the interviewee's experiences into "material", but a way to listen objectively and sincerely to the interviewee's story, guiding them from one story to another, all the way to the present. Sometimes, when listening to the many anecdotes of a person's life, a larger narrative begins to take shape; one that, on one level or another, represents every person in the interviewee's stories, and often the interviewer himself.

The following is an excerpt from an interview I did with an ex-prisoner in Manhattan while attending graduate school in NY. Only the person's name has been changed.

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Eric; My name is Eric Strand. I grew up in Manhattan, in Harlem 119th street. At 18 I had an argument with a friend, that argument ended with my friend dead and my life forever changed. 30 years in prison, it was hard, but God was with me and it turned out to be a good thing. Sometimes you start out life like a bum and end up like a champ. Sometimes you start out like a champ and end up like a bum. I took out my frustrations out on someone and I paid with my youth.

My mother and father were mentally ill. They grew up in the country. They got hit by whips, so they used electrical chords and thought they were going easy on us. I remember my mother once, she had the shower ready and had it prepared with oils and soaps that people pay a bunch of money for now, I used to get them for free. I haven’t taken a bath since I got out of prison. One time, I took a bath and after she remembered something I did last week that I’d forgot. She just happened to remember, and my skin was raw.. clean… sensitive. It was the worst beating I ever got even though the duration wasn’t so long. I cant even remember what it was about. I love baths, but didn’t take them when she was around.

My dad, used to smoke pallmalls in the dark, I used to see that red light go on and off because he was afraid of my mother too, and he’d have a little portable radio with him. My mother was crazy, she hated light so she’d install these 5 watt lightbulbs. She suffered from an extreme case of PMS. Sometimes she’d rip the telephone wires off the wall because someone called at the wrong hour. She tried to commit suicide once. I remember coming home once and my father told me she had tried to drown herself in the East River. My father was a little lost, my mother was in the psych ward. I knew they loved each other, but they fought like cats and dogs. I can remember good times too. We went on picnics; my parents version of middle class. We had a summer house a shack. My father would slaughter a pig, and we’d eat dinner on Sunday together. One minute things would be wonderful and nice, and the next I’d be very afraid. Fear was always something I felt.

I’ll tell you when I went to prison it was the first time I felt safe. That tells you how crazy it was in the house.

Me; can you tell me some early memories of your dad, what you did for fun?

Eric: Fun with my dad? (laughs) He was really my stepfather. He was oldworld, he wore suits all the time, he smoked pallmalls. I’m turning into him now. We all become our parents, to some degree. He was very standoffish. He’d hug us, kiss us on the cheek, but that was the extent of the relationship we had. He never said “I love you”, even though I knew he did. He thought children should be seen, not heard. For fun, we went to the beach, went to a picnic, I didn’t think it was that much fun cuz we had to carry stuff.

Me; can you tell me a story about your brothers?

I remember a particular story. They burnt the house down when I was kid. Children playing with matches. My big brother and little brother were behind the couch. My big brother was lighting a match and my little brother would use a glove and catch the fire. My older sister Maria, she was the only person who loved me without reservation...she was babysitting and the house burnt down. My mother said “tell the landlord it was the sparks in the light bulb”. Maria is dead now, but if she were alive she would say it was the light.

I remember seeing the couch catching fire, and my sister screamed from the top of the stairs, "If I have to come down there!!", but when she saw the flames she grabbed my brother and I and took us out. I remember thinking we probably coulda put out the fire if we’d used a glass of water, but it was too late by then. I remember we were outside on the street. I was wearing a shirt, my brothet was wearing his underwear. We were outside, watching the firemen try to put the fire out, and the Beatles “I Want To Hold Your Hand” was playing, it was playing while the house was burning down.

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