Modern-Day Cave People

The Flintstones notwithstanding, I don't know where the term "caveman" came from. Although some might've taken shelter in occasional caves while hunting and gathering, our ancestors and the other early hominids—from Australopithecus to Neanderthal—tended to inhabit valleys, plains, and trees. So why do my neighbors, in this modern age, choose to live as troglodytes?

It's against prison policy to cover any window or overhead light. Still, the people next door to me do both. Lining the window with rolled-up towels, they keep their cell blacker than a starless night. Using contraband tape to hang manila folders over the fluorescent light fixture, they ensure that any light emitted will amount to no more than a dull glow. I doubt either of them have thought about the reasons behind these choices. If you asked, they'd simply say, "I like it dark."

And dark it is. I once had occasion to knock on their door. Let me tell you, that void was deep. Even light from the open door barely pierced the gloom. I'm baffled as to how they achieved such an effect. It's not like the canteen sells light-absorbing paint.

What I could see was a small clip-on lamp fitted with a cardboard sleeve, which functioned as a spotlight. Outside of its beam, my neighbor's face was nearly invisible. All you could see in the cell was the small circle of light on the desk where he pieced together a cardboard tractor—precision work that'd be so much easier if someone turned the damn light on.

They're hardly alone in practicing what I call the dark arts. Across the small stretch of grass visible from my cell window sits 2-House, ERDCC's administrative segregation unit. People confined there get "recreation" in wire cages like dog kennels three times a week. Otherwise, they're out of their cells virtually not at all. You'd think they'd want a little sunshine in their lives, but no.

Twenty-four windows of 2-House can be seen from my cell. More than half of them are completely covered with some kind of detritus. A couple have identifiable items hanging in them—shirts or sheets—to thwart the sun. Others are papered with what I assume are Health Service Request forms or pages torn from paperback novels that float around the Hole every so often. As questionable as those works of "literature" usually are, and as little love as I hold in my heart for direct sunlight, I just can't condone vandalizing a book.

The number of cells in ad-seg with covered windows far exceeds the number in general population. The number here in the honor dorm is even lower than that. Based on a quick, informal poll I took before starting this post, only about one in eight cells have some form of window covering. Most of those are temporary fixes—a shirt hung up in the afternoons, for example, when the sun casts a glare on someone's TV. The same held true at Crossroads, the prison where I spent the larger part of my sentence. There's no accounting for taste, but the consistency of these numbers between prisons doesn't seem like mere coincidence.

Are the prisoners who keep a dark cell trying to block out their surroundings? Is their pitch-black room an outward manifestation of depression? Is it merely a sleep aid? There are probably reasons I'm not even considering—some sort of superstition, maybe, about light.

Whatever reason these people have for living that way, I don't relate. Prison may be hard-edged, dirty, and visually unappealing, but I'd rather not have to fumble around blindly to find my coffee cup, my toothbrush, or my surface-dwelling humanity.