After the first hour of the prisoner transport from Beaumont Texas to Huntsville – an hour of bone-shaking fear and the inability to think beyond the rapidly circulating, panicky, thought of, O God! What am I going to do?! What am I going to do? WHAT AM I GOING TO DO???!!! – a shackled man in the row in front of me, turned and scornfully, contemptuously, asked,

How you going to do that time, youngster?

You gonna get you a man to take care of you?

How you gonna do that time, boy?

     The questions were rapid and spoken with the gleeful undertone of a twisted man who already could visualize this young, scared, boy under him...

     In that instant, my heart turned to stone inside of my chest and all of my fear congealed into a hard, solid, all encompassing rage. My shaking and quaking instantly ceased; replaced with a calm but highly explosive, rage.

     I answered the questions in the manner and stance I would operate from until God renewed my mind and I could begin to see another way –– The way, The Truth, The Life, The Peace, The Love, that is found only in Jesus Christ.

     My answer was, I tell you how I am going to do my time, mister... I am going to do it killing anyone who F***S with me. Are you F*****G with me???

     The facial expressions and body-language of both myself and my antagonizer changed and abruptly so.

     Mine, the instant my all-encompassing and barely controlled fear congealed into a proportionate degree of rage; the antagonizer's, from a hungry wolf circling its prey, to the wariness of a wolf pack leader who finds himself, unexpectedly, in the presence of a lone wolf who is better left alone...

     The man’s answer was to turn around in his seat to face away from me, while muttering the first positive words I had heard in a long, long, time: You’ll be alright down here (meaning in maximum-security prisons).