At the Mountain Brook jail, they brought me hot, crispy chicken fingers from the Piggly Wiggly in Crestline. Somebody had fried them with care. I could taste the care. It is possible I was also tasting my own tears, but the batter was excellent.
I had the place to myself. No cellmates sizing me up. No negotiations over cake. The first time I stayed one night. The second time, five. Five nights is long enough to get thoroughly acquainted with your own thoughts. My thoughts and I have a complicated history.
If jails had an online rating system, Mountain Brook would get four stars for the food alone. I would take off one star for the ambiance and the general sense of personal failure.
Then they transferred me to the Jefferson County Jail. That was a whole different ballgame, and I had not brought a glove.
My combat résumé was thin. I had wrestled in eighth grade and was, technically, a champion. This was gym class, and my opponents were mostly boys named Trent. I had survived pledgeship at Delta Kappa Epsilon at the University of Alabama. So I was not unfamiliar with intimidation. I had simply never been punched in the face.
That was different. And it scared me. One minute I was a man who had never been punched in the face. The next minute I knew exactly what it felt like. It is not just the sting. You start watching hands. You sleep lighter, if you sleep at all. Your body remembers even when your mind would prefer not to.
Then there was the food. There are easier ways to lose weight. You can join a gym or count calories on a phone app that judges you. Or you can spend almost two months in the Jefferson County Jail. The results were impressive. The customer service was terrible, and there was no way to cancel the membership.
I lost about fifty pounds, and my blood pressure came under control. Please do not ask me for the plan. There was no plan. There was bologna.
My cellmate Ray Ray told me he had worked in the kitchen and that the meat was stamped “not for human consumption.” I never saw the labels, and Ray Ray was a gifted storyteller. What I can say is that the bologna looked awful, the other meat looked worse, and I could not eat either. My mother raised me not to be picky. She did not anticipate this menu.
Breakfast was grits and a hard-boiled egg. Some mornings I ate the egg shell and all, because somebody told me the shell held the nutrients. That tells you I will believe almost anything said with enough authority before 6 a.m.
And every meal, one question rose above all others: You gonna eat your cake? It was the anthem of the place. Most of the time my answer was yes. The cake had the texture of packing material, but it was mine, and a man has to draw a line somewhere.
The highlight of the week was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Everybody looked forward to it the way children look forward to Christmas, delivered by a guard who did not seem to be in the Christmas spirit.
It is easy to make it funny now. It was not funny to be that hungry. Real hunger follows you to sleep and greets you when you wake up. A biscuit becomes currency. A cake becomes a negotiation.
I prayed a lot in those days, more than I had in years. I am not proud that it took a jail cell to get me back on my knees. Sometimes God lets us run out of options so we will finally remember Him. He had been waiting the whole time without once checking His watch.
I do not hold anything against the men I fought with. I have had time to see them as men, not monsters. Hurting people hurt people. I have been one of those people, usually with words, which leave fewer bruises and last longer.
Mountain Brook taught me that a hot meal is a small kindness, and small kindnesses leave a mark. Jefferson County taught me their absence does too. Jesus fed five thousand before He preached to them. He fed them first. Start with the plate.
These days I say grace like I mean it. I still order the Piggly Wiggly chicken fingers. I just pray a little longer. And if anybody offers me real cake with real frosting, I am going to eat it. I will not trade it.
“What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee.”
Psalm 56:3 (KJV)
— JC
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