No Fear?

I was recently asked whether the remnant Labour Party at and around County Hall in Durham was afraid of me. If they are not, then they cannot believe that I am guilty. Let's see them get out of that one.

It defeats me how anyone could find me remotely intimidating. But one of my cellmates, as they are not called in practice, did. I had a good half a dozen, because that seems to be how it works. I was older than all of them, and old enough to be the father of most, but that was only ever an issue once, with one of the several murderers (not what they were in for, but everyone knew).

"Don't speak to me like that, I'm old enough to be your father, you show some respect," I told a leading crack cocaine dealer who sent men with machetes to deal with his enemies, and with whom I was locked up for 23 hours of the day. He never spoke to me again, he tried to get me moved, and when the screws told him where to stick that, then he got himself moved because he was so frightened of me. Gosh.

But my favourite cellmate story is about the first one, whom the judge had ordered to write a letter of apology to a rival drug dealer whose crack house he had burned down, thereby sending the naked crack hoes screaming into the streets of one of the least salubrious districts of Newcastle. He could not spell, so I wrote it for him. I have no idea whether it ever arrived, but it was certainly sent. I enjoyed prison. I was well-liked and well-respected, and I did a small amount of good for several other people in there.

So if I strike fear into the last rusting cogs of the right-wing Labour machine in County Durham, then they should console themselves that I had had the same effect on the kind of person as whom they sometimes tried to dress. And if I do not, then they cannot believe that I am guilty. Let's see them get out of that one.