Restored Republic via a GCR Update as of April 6, 2024

Southern Illinois ’70s: I was in a cell with this big white guy. He was supposed to be some sort of protection for me.
I was sitting, back against the wall, trying to drown out the screaming. Both women and guys were screaming, as the Black inmates, tore them to pieces. Apparently, I had some kinda connection to the people who were dying horribly, but the door to the cell I was in, remained locked, I’m assuming ’cause of my young age.
I could hear the inmates running around, yelling. The people being murdered had done some horrific things to Black People, and when word got out, the authorities gave them over to the Black inmates to do as they pleased.
The screaming died down, and now I was the center of attention. They stood at my cell, screaming for the guard to open it. Then they told my “protection” to kill me. He kept saying, “I ain’t getting no murder charge!”. Then they told him that, tomorrow, after I was released, they were gonna kill him. He again said he wasn’t getting no murder charge.
Then they told him to push me up against the cell door. He said, “Sorry kid, I ain’t got no choice.”. Then he shoved me against the bars, where they began hitting me through the bars.
One of them told “tiny” to push my head through the bars. This too convinces me that I was still pretty young. Young enough that my head could fit through the bars.
I’d like to point out, that the bars weren’t the cylinder shaped kind. These were flat iron slats.
Again Tiny told me he was sorry, then pushed my face against the bars, while the Black guys held the back of my neck. Then my protection began hitting the back of my head until it went through.
As they were beating me half to death, I heard guards running in, shouting for the inmates to return to their cells. Apparently I wasn’t supposed to have been touched, I was there to watch.
After they had all been locked down, the guards came over, and tried to get my head back through, but had to stop. They got on their box and said they needed the captain or a lieutenant down there. Said they had a problem.
One of them showed up, assessed the situation, and advised control that they couldn’t proceed without me signing some kind of form stating that I give them approval, and nothing falls back on them.
So I had to wait about 15 minutes, beat to a pulp, before the proper forms arrived.
The guard had to kneel, and gave me a pen, told me where to sign, as drops of sweat and blood splattered the forms.
They tried pushing my head through, and kept messing around, until i had enough. I told the guard to put his knee against my head and puah hard, and I would pull hard as I could back.
He finally agreed, and it worked. They opened the cell, and amid shouts from the inmates, I glanced at the pieces of people, blood, guts. Then they got me in the hallway, where a gurney was waiting.
I guess it was the adrenaline, ’cause I didn’t feel any pain. Then I felt something trickle down my neck, and down the middle of my chest. I felt around on the left side of my head, and discovered my ears were hanging down on my cheeks.
Those iron slat bars had taken my ears off, and were dangling down each side of my head. I then understood why all the drama about pushing my head back through.
Skip ahead to around 2015, and I’m laying with my head in my girlfriend’s lap, ’cause sometimes she likes to pluck the hairs around my ears.
One night she’s got my ear bent over, and asked “What are these little holes in the back of your ears?” She checked the other ear, found the same thing. She said, “You got these little holes running down each ear where they connect to your head.”
I replied that I had no idea what they were.
Of course I knew what they were. Stitchmarks.