The patient evaluation concluded, the doctor initials my chart and hands it without a word to the orderly. He then retreats silently back to his office where I imagine he must spend the rest of the day counting the hours till he can go home.
The orderly then leads me back to my cell. Not that he need do so; I could just as easily find my own way by following the trail of dandruff.
As the cell door is closed behind me, the sprightly plinking of a piano comes through the loud speaker. A woman’s voice, full of verve, booms from the PA system: “Good morning everyone! Radio exercises! Let’s start with back stretches . . . Now, leg and arm exercises . . . For those of you standing, let’s really spread your legs . . . one, two, three, four.”
I don’t know if this is mandatory or not, so, to be on the safe side, I spread raise my arms.
“One, two, three, four.”
I can’t catch the next bit. Something about . . .
“Wind your arms around . . . Now do it in the opposite direction . . . Chest exercises . . . Diagonally and nice and wide . . . one, two, three, four.”
“What?”
“Do it slowly if you’re seated,” the woman instructs.
“Do what slowly?”
“Now bend all the way forward . . .”
Something pops in my back.
“Let the tension go . . .”
Yeah, right.
“Twisting exercises . . . one, two, three, four.”
Try as I might to follow along with the instructions, it’s hopeless. After a minute, I thrown in the towel and plop down on the rolled-up futon.
Judging by the grunts and slapping coming from my neighbors, it sounds as if all of them—gangsters, murderers, rapists, thieves, and hustlers, alike—are doing deep knee bends and jumping jacks.