VAGRANT VAGARIES & BEING POWERLESS

After the lions had returned to their cages, creeping angrily through the chutes, a little bunch of us drifted away and into an open doorway nearby, where we stood for a while in semidarkness, watching a big brown circus horse go harumping around the practice ring.
—E.B. White “The Ring of Time”

After one month of training at the DeMarse Academy in Lansing, Michigan—more appropriately known as the school for the blind, a place Stevie Wonder once attended—and after years of observation (otherwise known as “looking the other way”), I have learned the art of spin. Rule Number One (actually it’s the only rule): When an inmate complains about something, place the blame directly on his shoulders or let him talk until he’s tired of listening to himself.

Our former quartermaster knew all to well how to play this game:

A rather large inmate stretched a pair of thirty-two inch underwear across his waistline. “Do these look like they fit?” he asked.
“No they don’t,” the quartermaster answered.
“Then why are you giving them to me?”
“Look,” the quartermaster explained, “I only process and fill the orders. You wrote thirty-two’s on your form. Maybe you like wearing your underwear tight.”

Or the classic dialogue I’ve been known to use on the low-functioning inmates that bitch about my never scheduling them for the GED Exams:

“You better put me down this time or I’m going to the school principal to lodge a complaint.”
“You want me to put you down?” I ask.
“Yes,” I hear.
“Okay, you’re ugly.”

Or the inmate who discovers that I may have spun him one time too many:

“You tricked me,” he says.
“No I did not,” I reply. “If I wanted to trick you, I would’ve made you wear a wig and a butt-thong and had you prancing down Woodward Avenue.”

In our service-oriented McPrison industry, our customers are always complaining. They’ll say stuff like: “If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t have a job.” Little do they know, there are plenty of fools in the world ready to join the circus.

Speaking of complaints, after phoning Detroit Edison, they paid us a visit to look at our extremely low wires. They informed us that our telephone pole, erected in 1942, is leaning towards our house and may need to be replaced. Also, they said our neighbor’s trees will need to be cut down. Hopefully I won’t be powerless. Where would I be without it?