INSIDE HIS OFFICE SHE watches him close the door with a skillful backswing of his foot. He moves quickly to the window and pulls down the Venetian blinds, angles the slats so there is just enough natural light and privacy. She glances at the rows of books on the shelves behind his desk and grows excited by the names: Emerson. James. Frankl. Dickinson. Husserl. Frost. Whitehead. Nietzsche. And so many more. Someone has fed his mind well. The sparkling fringes of her electric blue and yellow skirt swish and glide to the music that has already begun to play in her head. He picks up a shoebox of cassette tapes, says, “How about a little Otis Redding?” She answers, “Excellent choice.” He inserts the tape, presses fast forward and stops before his favorite song, “Try a Little Tenderness.”
The horns begin and she imitates blowing a slide trombone. When her arm is fully extended, she curtsies like a little girl and closes in on him. He embraces her, his footwork is flawless, his hold on her firm and confident. Never mind the tinny tone of the speaker, they are dancing alone. She is floating inwardly, remembering other such joys. Boardwalks and stuffed tigers. Purple asters she left unpicked in her garden so others passing by could enjoy them too. Bicycle rides and spinning bottles. Breathing into the pocket of his shirt, she hears him whisper, “Here we go.” Just then the tempo of the song picks up and, hand in hand, they two-step, balance and twirl in perfect timing. A slow jitterbug. “You're fantastic,” she says, and winks. They are inward toward the other now, bound and joined by the sheer fun of it all, a knowing glance, a winking eye. This is what is beneath their private dance.
It's more than serendipity when a grown woman who has seen it all, had it all, finds leaf-sigh rapture in a private dance with a prisoner. Her sagacity tells her he is not in that class of shifty-eyed criminals depicted in novels, with cagey hearts and misanthropic motives, bent on assuaging their luckless existences by hook or crook. Nor does he seem to be one of those unfortunate casualties of fate who avoid complete self-annihilation just so they can taunt the memory of a missing father or a neglectful mother. She knows he is cut out for better things than this. He has so much to offer the world. Not merely a prisoner in prisoner's clothing, but a mind-free man in a drab brown uniform. Graceful. Tattooless. Refined. A gentleman in every way. And handsome to boot.
When the dance is over she says to herself what she has no need to say out loud. That I have made friends all over the world. Have touched lepers on a leper colony, bathed with strangers on a Greek island, eaten roots with a tribe of Zulu warriors. And now I have seen the bright promise of hope shining in the eyes of a condemned man. And, oh the way he dances! How close and loose he holds me, his fingers in my hair.
What she says out loud is how enjoyable that was and would he read his prize poem to her now. Goose pimpled, she sits cross-legged on his desk, blowing gently into her mug of hot herbal tea. She sucks at the cup rim, closes her eyes and sighs in pleasure. She can hear him breathing close to her as he begins to read: “And up/ with the sun/ comes/ two four six/ purple irises /swaying/ in the morning breeze./And there!/ one two three four five/sparrows singing/in the rain gutter/ high above/ the red gun tower.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to Judith Trustone, my editor for ten years, without whom the mentor-a-prisoner concept would not be the success it is today. Judith, you are so sagacious. I am eternally grateful to have worked so closely with you over the years. And to my typists and early readers, those lovely Swarthmore seniors, Satya, Melanie and Erika, I thoroughly appreciate all you did to make this book a better read.
Thank you to: Cheryl Simo, Donna Stewart, Kim Passione, Albert Benaglio, Theodore “Champ” Brown, Chuckie Redshaw, John Minarik, Robert Faruq Wideman, Billy Boy Murray, John Pace, Dave Myrick, George Halter, Michael Anwar Dukes, Earl Rahman Box, Anthony “Big Jake” Jacobs, Little Charlie Block, Vincent Sharif Boyd, Roger Button, Gary Gunn, John Mayfield, Tony Dunlap, Donnie Wilson, Theodore Anwar Moody, Luis “Suave” Gonzalez, Chris Reddinger, Wayne “Weezy” Kightlinger, Van, Doza, B.J. Withall and the entire Withall family.
Thank you to everyone at the University of Pittsburgh-Dr. Jean Winsand, without whom this book would not exist; Dr. Fiore Pugliano, Dr. Harry Sartain, Dr. Bob Marshall, Dr. Robert Sattler, Dr. Louis Pingel, Dr. Don McBurney, Dr. Alice Scales, Dr. Shirley Biggs, Dr. Ray Garris, Dr. Ogle Duff, Dr. Anthony Nitko, Dr. Maxine Roberts, Dr. Norman Graves, Dr. Janet Gibson, and Professor John Manear. I also owe a special debt of gratitude to Dr. Stanley Jacobs, my former boss at Villanova University, and that awesome red-headed professor, Kathy Blood, my “supervisor”, as well as to Mr. Rob Bender, my former DOC supervisor.
Thank you to everyone at Acer Hill Publishing and Amazon for their enthusiasm and dedication to this project. And many special thanks to the truly brilliant Swarthmore student, Christine Song, who created a spectacular website for this book and my other works: www.authorpatmiddleton.com
Finally, my deepest passion and thanks to my Marta, for everything.
READER'S GUIDE FOR EUREKA MAN
By Patrick Middleton
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Who was you favorite character? Why?
2. Why do you think Oliver killed Jimmy Six? Did he lose his temper or was there more to it than that?
3. Oliver's mother is a prime example of someone deeply flawed yet somewhat sympathetic. After her second marriage fails and her children are living with relatives, she ends up in a sanitarium for alcoholics. Yet she shows great resilience. She stops drinking, she remarries, and her life goes on. Do you think Oliver's mother is as sympathetic or unsympathetic character? Explain your answer.
4. Social scientists generally agree that a person's character is shaped to a large extent by the environment in which he or she is raised. To what extent do you think this is true for Oliver? Also, do you think Oliver's character is altered, or changed, by the environment he found at the training school?
5. Do you believe Champ is justified for his hatred of white people? Do you think racism is inherent or taught?
6. Many of the characters in the book are deeply flawed and at the same time sympathetic. Who is the least sympathetic character of all?
7. There are also strong characters in the story who possess both grace and wisdom. Who do you feel is the strongest character?
8. What do you think motivated Fat Daddy? Though he is a vicious rapist and abuser, he shows genuine loyalty and compassion to Handsome Johnny when Johnny returns to the prison after being locked away in a mental hospital for seven years. Do you think one can be a good friend and at the same time a deeply flawed person? Explain your answer.
9. Discuss the options Oliver may have had in dealing with the threat from Fat Daddy. Do you think he would have been justified in carrying out his preemptive strike? Explain.
10. In her keynote address to the graduates, Professor B.J. Dallet tells them the blues is an integral part of life, and “when it plays, it tests the quality and arrangement of our character.” Compare her words with musician Willie Dixon's definition of the blues: “The blues is truth. You can't make up the blues, you have to live it.” How does Professor Dallet respond to the blues in her life? And how does that blues reveal her character?
11. When the cell door closes on Oliver the first night he arrives in the training school, he settles his nerves and revives his hope when he remembers he only has nine months and a few days before he turns eighteen and is free again. In the final chapters of the story, he loses hope again when it appears his life as a scholar is over. Yet in the end, hope appears on the horizon and he is “as happy as he's ever been.” What do you think is the source of Oliver's resilience?
12. What stereotypes about prisoners does this story tend to support? Are there any the story dispels? When considering your answer, think of any preconceived notions you may have held about prisoners before reading this book.
13. What stereotypes about prison itself – the physical environment, setting, and mores – does the story uphold? Are there
any it dispels? Again think of your own preconceived notions.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Patrick Middleton was born in Washington, D.C., and grew up in La Plata, Maryland. He has been incarcerated in Pennsylvania since 1975.
From 1978 to 1990, Middleton was a full-time student at the University of Pittsburgh and the recipient of several distinguished fellowships and teaching awards. He graduated summa cum laude in 1983 and earned his master's degree in language communications. In 1990, Middleton became the first and only prisoner in America to earn a doctoral degree in a classroom setting.
Middleton was an adjunct faculty member at Villanova University from 2007 to 2010. His nonfiction books include two teaching manuals— Introduction to Experimental Psychology and Research Methods, a self-help book, Healing Our Imprisoned Minds, and a memoir, Incorrigible. Eureka Man, a semi-autobiographical work, is his first novel.
Connect with Patrick online! Find him at:
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Eureka Man: A Novel Page 26