The man disappeared over a rise that is the summit of a long grade down to a junction with another road that leads out of the forest.  The sound of his engine grew more faint and finally disappeared altogether.  About five minutes later, perhaps even longer, I heard an engine again, faintly at first, coming closer and closer, and soon it was clear the vehicle was coming up that same long grade. Soon the same man on his ATV appeared at the top of the rise but stopped when he came abreast of where I was sitting.

“I drove all the way to the edge of the forest and I didn’t see any car. I couldn’t figure out where you came from.  Are you all right?  Did you need any help?”

“I’m fine,” I said.  “Just sitting, enjoying the sun and crisp air.”  There was a moment of silence while the man seemed to not know what to say.  Finally I said, “Haven’t you ever seen an 80-year-old woman miles from anywhere in the middle of the forest, sitting all by herself and having a perfectly swell time? But thank you for coming back to check.”  I was almost laughing as I said this but the man looked like he didn’t know what to make of it.  Finally he just smiled, turned his ATV around, and headed back from whence he came.

I’m 79, not 80, but I thought 80 was a better line.

If you’re wondering what I had done to land myself in ‘High Power’, I was convicted of “…failing to declare for the purpose of having import duty imposed, 6.5 ounces of uncut heroin.”  I’m not kidding; that’s what the indictment said.  In those days, 6.5 ounces of pure Mexican brown was considered a  large load, but it would be small by today’s standards.  I have wondered ever since whether, if I had declared the heroin at the border in Mexicali, I could have paid the duty and gone on my way.  And I never figured out why I was considered dangerous enough to be in ‘High Power’.

Lots of irony in all this, because none of these women were ‘dangerous’ by any standard other than the federal government’s.

Iva d’Aquino had the room next to mine, and at night, after lights out and everyone was locked in their rooms, I would hear footsteps coming down the hall, heard Iva’s door being unlocked and then closed, and then for various amounts of time I would hear voices through the wall although I couldn’t make out what they were saying.

The visitor had to be one of the guards, who the prisoners called “screws”, perhaps the one on duty at night, but it could have been someone else as well.

Unfortunately, Iva disliked me (I was pretty much a mental case at the time) and I never talked much with her.  But what is interesting is that the day I left on parole, I was standing the hall saying goodbye to other prisoners and Iva walked right by me and started down the stairs without so much as looking at me.  Unwilling to be snubbed, I called out to her, “Goodbye, Iva”, and still without looking at me, she said “There are no goodbyes in this world.”

Years later I published a book about my life on the street and in prison (Sing Soft, Sing Loud) and I found her address and sent her a copy.  She never acknowledged it.

To be continued…