Greetings friends of The Beat Within! Welcome to yet another fabulous double issue, 26.0506. This latest issue is full of wonderful surprises. We love the loyalty you many contributors share in each issue, if you are writing us from the free world, during one of our weekly workshops, or simply reaching out with an unsolicited piece of writing and a desire to connect. You are truly appreciated.
With COVID still challenging us all to be cautious with our lives and to do things from a distance, yet, thanks to all our great colleagues and partners, The Beat Within goes on touching lives via the virtual world, or through the good people inside who are willing to support the work in our absence. A big thanks to all of our partners and probation staff.
We want to thank all our community members, who have embraced the chance to write their stories, share their commentaries and poetry with us all in The Beat Within. A big thanks to all you good people – teachers, artists, advocates, alumni, and long-time supporters.
We are also incredibly thankful to all you writers and artists, when you courageously take your words and art seriously, we all benefit. We all find inspiration! We all learn from each other and find ways to connect. It’s a win-win all the way around!
Speaking of winning, this past month our dear friend and long-time colleague, Ali Moss hosted a Zoom Birthday Yoga Fundraiser for The Beat Within with her over 40 members of family and friends. Our old friend, DJ Netwerk, also hosted an amazing fundraiser for The Beat, with DJs from all over the United States, as well as in the UK and Japan, spinning and scratching records for our cause for close to 12 hours! These two amazing friends are winners in our eyes. Their support means the world and having the chance to raise further awareness through their community is a win-win for The Beat Within. We appreciate every donation large and small but even more that the dollars raised, The Beat is so thrilled to expand our community of readers and share your stories with a new community, thank you Ali and DJ Netwerk.
Sending out our thanks is easy for us. We are forever grateful for all the support we have received from you – the writer, the reader, the facilitator, the typist, the editor, the collaborator, the financial supporter, to name a few… we could not do this work without all of you. The Beat Within is truly a team effort. It’s hard-work. It’s relentless, but we acknowledge our success is due to every single one of you playing your role. When we work together we have this beautiful one of a kind publication. Thank you. The “thanks” will continue throughout the year, as we continue to do this most important work, as we approach our 25th anniversary and beyond. Now, allow me to pass the keyboard to our dear friend, OT, who is working and reporting the latest from Managua, Nicaragua.
Well, for those of you who don’t know me, I consider myself a byproduct of The Beat Within. Allow me to share a few words of encouragement. Success is a slow progress, but if you work hard, it doesn’t have to take that long.
I am fortunate to read your writings in the magazine, and I tend to find a big difference between the people that are making changes in their lives against the people that don’t. It all starts with putting into practice everything that we learn in life. We all got problems in life. Some of us more than others, some maybe about the same amount, and some of us got greater problems than others, and other problems may be smaller but you may make it bigger than it is because you are not ready to face the consequences for the decisions you’ve made in your life.
I’m going to speak out of personal experience now, because I too, was once sitting in those same juvenile seats in San Mateo County. The system tried to send me to CYA (DJJ) and after fighting my case for months and months I ended up at the county ranch aka Camp Glenwood. At the time, I was sitting in my cell fighting multiple felony charges, but I kept thinking to myself how bad I wanted to get out. I was hoping I would beat my case and walk. I wasn’t thinking to myself of making any changes in my life. All I wanted to do was get out, and of course be with my family, but never did it occur to me that I wanted to completely leave the street life. I was a youngster on a time-out.
Nowadays, most of our young people have tablets, iPads, and cell phones, because it’s the technological era. When kids misbehave parents usually take their fancy toys away for a period of time, depending on what one did, it could be an hour, two hours, a day, maybe two days or a whole week. But what usually happens during that time is most kids are on their best behavior only to receive their phone, tablet or toy back and then misbehave again. Then the cycle starts all over again.
What’s my point here. That right now, you are that youngster. I would love for many of you to get out and turns things around, make that positive change in your life, make your family proud, but most importantly make yourself proud. But don’t wait to get out to make those changes. Make those changes now! Because if you get out and you are not committed to making those necessary changes in your life, the devil will be waiting for you around the corner and make you succumb to the temptations that the negative environments normally bring: Selling drugs, gang banging, violence, crime, robbing people, hitting licks using drugs and drinking alcohol will all still be options once you get out. Don’t fall into those temptations not even for one minute, because that’s all it takes to lose your life, or your freedom.
I used to sit on my bunk in juvenile hall talking to my cellie like damn, “I could go for a beer right now.” What a bad way to think people. I used to be on my bunk stirring a gumbo pot of thoughts, like “Is my girl gone be there for me?” “My mom needs help with the rent,” etc. Those are all real-life problems and they’re not that big, but some of you think like that because I read your writing. I know, because I was thinking the same thing at that age. You tend to add more problems on to yourself, instead of focusing on fixing the little problems that you, yourself may have.
You need to focus on yourself, and how to change the way you think into a more productive and positive way. Because once you set your sights on bettering yourself, that’s when your life actually starts to get better. I was glad that I ended up going to the Ranch, and I’m going to go out on a limb and tell you all that I’m glad I went to prison, because these institutions taught me, that if you don’t help yourself, then who will?
It taught me the power of education, knowledge, and sacrifice. When I speak about education, I’m talking about education of life in general and history. Yeah, geometry and calculus can be included, but people you have to read to really educate yourself. You have to sacrifice your time of leisure, and instead of playing video games, hanging out with your friends, doing TikTok videos you have read, read, and study. Study your history. Study the history of your heritage. Study other people’s heritage. Learn from history and all the mistakes that were made in the past.
Just look at the sacrifices that have been made by the people before you, so many of you all can enjoy the benefits and privileges, that at one point in our time in history, were thought impossible. Now, stop and look around at the people that are currently making sacrifices in their lives to help you out right now: like your parents, your grandparents, your teachers, counselors, your Beat facilitators, the pastor, your coach, or whatever adult advocate that’s currently in your life. You have support. You have tools. It’s time to start taking advantage of them ladies and gentlemen.
I want to take the time to give a big “thanks” to all the teachers, counselors, workshop facilitators in all the institutions that are affiliated with our program, and also the ones that are not affiliated with our writing community. They are there because they care about your future. And remember folks, history only repeats itself if you all make the same mistakes. OT is signing off with all the love and respect for all you. Remember, success is a slow progress, but if you work hard, it doesn’t have to take that long.