Chip and I played Scrabble every day at least twice a day for the four months or so that we were in jail together. She was the perfect Scrabble partner for me; a wonderful loser - all smiles, never pouted, genuinely happy for me when I got a seven letter word, rarely challenged anything I put on the board. She hardly ever won. She was content to let me bask in the glow of Scrabble Queen glory. You get the idea? Perfect! I am the total opposite. It's only after decades of practice that I can successfully mask the seething anger I feel toward anyone who beats me. It's sort of OK if the win is genuinely hard won. If someone has put all their sweat, blood and brain power into pulling off a last minute victory, well, then Bravo! But if the person is just naturally smarter, has a larger vocabulary or worse, can magically twist unrelated letters to pull out amazing feats of lexicology, I revert to a toddler having a temper tantrum. On the outside I smile and murmur the expected niceties and inside there is a civil war going on. This, I think shows a major, but basic flaw in my personality. There, now you know.
One odd thing about the guards and the dictionaries: They kept the dictionaries behind the officer's desk. You had to trade in your ID badge to borrow one. I don't know why, you'd think they were made of gold leaf when in fact there was not one complete dictionary just many parts of several books. If you complained that your book only went from A-L and asked if you could please get the rest, they just about had a conniption fit. They went all huffy and gave you a dirty look as if you'd ripped the book in half yourself. And it wasn't just one or two of them. They were all like that.
At night a competitive volley ball game went on in the rec. yard. All those delightfully sweaty twenty-somethings running around in the dark, chasing a ball and laughing their heads off. High-fiving every play, even the bad ones and genuinely having a good time while us old farts sat on the side lines cheering them on. Jail's not all bad.
One odd thing about the guards and the dictionaries: They kept the dictionaries behind the officer's desk. You had to trade in your ID badge to borrow one. I don't know why, you'd think they were made of gold leaf when in fact there was not one complete dictionary just many parts of several books. If you complained that your book only went from A-L and asked if you could please get the rest, they just about had a conniption fit. They went all huffy and gave you a dirty look as if you'd ripped the book in half yourself. And it wasn't just one or two of them. They were all like that.
At night a competitive volley ball game went on in the rec. yard. All those delightfully sweaty twenty-somethings running around in the dark, chasing a ball and laughing their heads off. High-fiving every play, even the bad ones and genuinely having a good time while us old farts sat on the side lines cheering them on. Jail's not all bad.
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