The fact that educated white women automatically assume that we have similar backgrounds annoys me. We don't. I feel like I'm in a certain kind of drag.

Prison experience puts distance between me and any person who hasn't been there, done that.

I felt compelled to blow the whistle on the penal system, under the delusion that doing so might result in some change, or at least save a few women from the same fate. Eternally naïve, that's me.

The fact that educated white women automatically assume that we have similar backgrounds annoys me. We don't. I feel like I'm in a certain kind of drag.

I don't believe anyone can go through the prison experience without being changed by it. The experience becomes part of your identity forever.

My friends in prison were mostly women more like myself: not historical figures who I did not relate to as peers, but hookers and addicts.

The loss of a sexual life is one of the worst things about getting really old. The worst thing.