Reintegration Into Society Essay, Research Paper

Reintegration into Society

After thirty years of imprisonment, the once known young adult is now a forty eight-year-

old man. He was an uneducated man, yet very experienced. His life in the prison was a

nightmare. This is because he was not guilty of any crime but rather unjustly imprisoned. At the

very beginning, he had a grudge against everyone except his family, but as years went by, that

feeling started to fade. It didn t exactly disappear as if it evaporated into the air. It was more of

being suppressed by another emotion over time. This emotion was his lost of hope and fear.

Being an innocent victim and wrongly accused, the feeling of his life going down the drain

clouded his mind. The years were difficult for him, and realizing his freedom has come did

brighten him up. For other criminals who were finally released was a day for celebration. For his

situation, it was like a dream come true. Today is the day and this bird is finally released from the

cage.

Missing out on the world and the everyday life of a normal human being, the man was

desperate to interact with the society again. However his view of society has altered. We see

pedestrians walking by and would not pay much attention to what they do or what they wear. In

his eyes, he sees so much more. In other words, this man became very observant. The slightest

details of the least noticed things would be clearly observed by him. In a sense, more like

examined by him. For example, he noticed the ants crawling, carrying bits of crumbs with them,

while walking down the sidewalk. When he inhaled that first deep breath of air out of prison, he

knew at the moment, the place was just as polluted as in the prison.

Walking down the street on the midday, he wasn t quite comfortable and preferred left

isolated from the rest of the crowd. As he continued to walk, all he see are eyes staring at him as

if the word criminal was branded on his forehead. He then took at quick glance at himself, at his

clothes. It wasn t much different from what others were wearing beside the fact that it was a little

filthy. Then, he stood in one spot and thought for a moment of where he can get a mirror and take

a good look at himself. Looking around, he finally knew where he was able to see a reflection of

himself. It was the Toyota across the street. The car windows were exactly what he need. With

just the right amount of light during the midday, the man was finally able to see himself after thirty

years of imprisonment. With some degree of hesitation, he could not resist any longer. He ran

across the street and for a minute, he could not recognize himself. He stared at himself and

slowly point his finger to his face, just to make sure that the mirror image was actually him in

there. He was shocked to see what a man he s grown into.

There was a calm side to him and also the paranoid side. His paranoia took over his ideal

image of the society. This side of him developed during his time in prison due to the excessive

abuse he was faced with by other criminals. Now that he finally escapes that once horrible dream,

facing reality was a challenge for him. He was so frightened that he felt a chill ran down his spine,

his eyes squinting at every heartbeat, his head nodding over and over with uncontrollable

flashbacks clouding his head of his past. Without realizing, his interaction with society has now

become a challenge.

He knew time is what he needed and overcoming his fear would be quite difficult. He

could not help himself in noticing little things and so observant with Mother Nature. When he went

to drink some water, he would carefully listen to the sound of the water going down his throat

rather than relieved from thirst. His mind was completely affected by what he went through in the

past.

He portrays the world as never reaching the point to Utopia. Everything surrounding him

has faults and impurities. Even the natural cry of a newborn gets him annoyed. He feels that the

newborn is distracting everyone and only desired the attention as he came into the world. He

feels that everyone will forever be selfish and greedy. People only care about themselves and

about the good. The world is like an orange in the eyes of this man. We eat the oranges and

throw away the peels. The orange itself is fruitful like the high class people and people with

authority, while the peels are like the minorities that are taken for granted. The man also felt that

the ice needs to be broken, and the only way to see the truth is to be observant.