Today, I received word my uncle had passed, and I was numb. I felt nothing. I even began to do something, and a thought came to mind, basically saying I should be in mourning instead of doing what I was in the act of doing. It was not until I began to move around that it hit me—the emotions, the feeling inside, deep, trying to come up and out. I told God, “It’s not that I don’t care. It’s not that I don’t care. It’s inside.” I pointed to my chest and told God, “It’s in here.”

I began to cry a little as I was speaking small words to God. Then it was gone, and I just kept on. But I had told myself that things had to change. I kept thinking of times when I was younger—my uncle, a picture of him holding me as a baby, living in Cherokee, North Carolina; his son Charlie losing his mother, and now his father. My uncle telling me to get into martial arts, him always laughing and joking, making stupid, nasty, sexual jokes, being goofy, funny at the same time, having fun and making us all laugh. He even had a goofy laugh.

Some of these memories came to mind as I was moving around, and the rest came as I was writing this—in thought of him, in memory of him. A therapeutic way of letting something out in some form. I stopped to look outside my cell door, and I felt it again—the tug deep inside, the pain trying to reach out and embrace my whole being. Instead, it gets pushed down, maybe as a defense mechanism so I will not feel pain. Maybe—I don’t know. I just don’t know.
All I know is I do care. I do feel the loss. I will miss him. I do care, and I do love him. I will always keep him close to my heart until I die.

Maybe if you look upon my face, you see the silence, the tattooed face, the stiff demeanor. You might guess I am heartless, cold. But inside, I beg to differ. Inside, there is so much more being held prisoner, begging for freedom, like I personally do—wishing upon my days in prison, regretting the decisions I have made. Inside, there is pain, loss, vulnerability, cries and mourning, dreams and regret, and fear—and so much more.

Inside, there is so much unspoken. But outside, there is nothing—a mask. Even my deepest, most painful issues do not surface. Thoughts even say, “I will not tell anyone.” So, it’s not that I do not care. It’s not that I do not feel. If you look past the facial tattoos, the mask held in place, there inside is so much more than what you see.