A Message from Jorge

I am so grateful for everyone who came to the virtual book launch for Letters From the Inside: Hope in the Journey Beyond Classroom and Cell. In conversation with author Mitali Perkins, also a friend of Jorge, my co-author, we had a conversation full of hope and promise.

If you missed it, you can watch the video.

Of course, there was a very important person missing from the celebration: Jorge, my co-author. He will be incarcerated for at least another eight years. He wrote this message to all of you:

Although I cannot physically be present to discuss this book and my life, I hope you all can understand a life of a boy who was traumatized, hurting, and craving love and affection from those who were around. Growing up in the environment I was raised in was not easy and until today it is not easy. It’s been told that people like “me” who were in the wrong path, are set to fail. Most children do not get a fair chance to succeed, often times they are judged. But before judging a struggling kid, I want you all to remember that there is a deeper issue beyond the bad grades and bad attitude.
Children of all ages, act a certain way because it’s their way of crying for help. Instead of abandoning a kid, or making them feel like they are any less than a straight A student, I ask you all to have patience and lend a helping hand to kids who is in the same position as I was. Kids need to feel motivated, believed in and most importantly that no matter what goes on in their neighborhood, they are still worth fighting for. I hope you all are able to see what it is to grow up in a low income neighborhood, where there is violence and lack of resources in schools. But most importantly how being in a dysfunctional family can have an impact on our actions that often times lead us into temptation. By reading my story and following up with some of the letters I write, I hope you all can learn some of the signs of a kid who is hurt deep down but is to afraid to speak up for himself/herself.
I ask that if you come in contact with one of those children or teens, do not look the other way. Please help them, because it only takes one person to uplift and be a positive role model in their life. Thank you for taking the time to follow my journey through these books and for listening to my life story. I hope you all love the book as much as I do. Thank you and be safe.

-Jorge Ramirez

Comments

A Loss

(I have been putting off finishing this blog post for months. You'll see why) Today, I was cleaning a bookshelf and I found the journal from one of my third-grade students, who I call Fred in my book , in 2001. I still had it because he didn't come to the last day of school to get his stuff this year and I guess it got put in a pile and somehow I've kept it with me. He didn't come to the last day of school, probably because his family was a mess: dad in prison, mom in an abusive relationship, all the kids (understandably) acting out violently. Fred was expelled from our school in second grade for hitting a teacher. Then he was expelled from the other school, I don't know why, at the end of second grade. He came back on the condition from the administration that he be in my class because I had him as a student in first grade and he listened to me and worked well with me. We had a really good relationship, although Fred was definitely not easy to have in class.

A New Prison, Part Two

Second very long part of the prison visit report. After we got all the paperwork filled out and went through the metal detector, we got visitation slips with the name of the inmate, and made our way over to the other building for visitation. This is not maximum security so thankfully you can just sit next to the inmates, and not be separated by glass or have to use a telephone to talk. First, you get a gate unlocked and go into a holding pen that is of course in direct sunlight (or rain if it's that season) and surrounded by fences topped with razor wire. You wait there until the gate at the other end is unlocked. This holding pen was a little bigger and less claustrophobic than the other prison (I do not have any claustrophobia and I came very close to a panic attack once at the other place) and they opened the other gate more quickly. Then you walk, again in blazing sunlight (or rain) to the visitation building. This one was less of a walk than the other prison but I still

A New Prison, Part 1

My former student, friend, and co-author was moved to a new prison during COVID. We (myself, Mitali, and his Abuela) have visited a couple of times via the video visit functionality they set up, but we've also been trying to visit in person, ever since in-person visits were allowed again. After four of them being canceled (sometimes we were told why, sometimes not), we finally got a visit. I was super nervous about this visit. (I felt better when Mitali mentioned that she was also, because she is an inherently positive and optimistic person!) I am not proud of this, but there was a large part of me that was hoping that the visit would be canceled, just like the previous four were. I felt a little better when someone I know messaged me privately to tell me that they had had very good experiences visiting a family member in that prison. But I still didn't sleep well at all that night, worrying about the guards, the many things that could go wrong, and the projected 111-degree hea

Bronwyn Harris, Author

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