Out-of-body experience. Went there because I've never been, and it's famous, and there are plans to make it into an energy regenerator, or an extra runway for LaGuardia airport, or affordable housing. (That one won't fly; nearby runways and whipping winds don't permit building higher than 150 feet.)
I hoped to stroll around the island, maybe volunteer to talk to a prisoner who needed someone to talk to. None of that happened and I didn't get past the registration desk. But the trip, and the mindset that got me there, made some kind of disquieting impression.
#60 bus bound for LaGuardia goes across 125th St. (It gets crowded.) Told the driver I was going to Rikers, he said I'd find a bus waiting at Lex. There it was, white, seedy and unmarked, with a couple of police cars. No one asked me anything and there was no fare. Bus full of young minority women, a few with small children almost all with speaker earplugs. Spanish music on the speakers, loud, fast, nonstop.
We get going, and enter a world outside the law, making an immediate left at an arrow showing NO LEFT TURN. Fine by me. (We don't take red lights too seriously either.) We head over the Triboro, essentially going to the airport, but just before it we make a little turn, into nowhere. A few quiet blocks of small homes, and a bridge with a big sign announcing where we are, subtitled: Home of New York City's Boldest.
Bridge very close to airstrips. You could walk to them, if you could get to the lighted wooden footbridge underneath the vehicle bridge, which goes there, but in the other direction, it just ends in the middle of the water.
We pull up in front of the entry building and several burly black-coated guards get onto the bus: "Be sure to take your ID with you. If you have any guns or other weapons, leave them on the bus, no questions asked. If you take them off the bus, you WILL be arrested."
We filed off the bus and lined up against the reception room wall. A big white guy came down the line with a drug-sniffing black-and-white German pointer. (The guy had actually watched that Westminster Kennel Club show where the fabulous pointer had blown away the competition.) Then he walked back, snapping his fingers here and there as the dog rechecked someone.
Then we moved toward the registration room and I stopped at the glass booth, where I was told I couldn't walk around the grounds. They were polite, but slightly wary, maybe trying to figure out if I was totally crazy: "Ma'am, this is a maximum security facility." I inquired if someone could walk with me, but that was out. "Ma'am, I'm sure there are people here who would enjoy talking to someone, but you must have a person's name in advance."
So back outside I went to wait for the Harlem bus, along with others waiting for the Q100 and the Q101. I could see the squat long buildings on the grounds, and miles of barbed wire. They told me I could wait behind the door if it was too cold for me. That helped. A Netflix crew rolled around on a truck, making a film. One of the guards told me Rikers would never shut down.
And back we went. Got out at the (only) stop and hurried down the block for the #60. That part was easy, but I feel drained. Maybe because the facility is so big and so close and all those young women were so silent and compliant.
I once taught in public school, and some of my boys later left high school to serve in Vietnam, and came back drug addicts, and did terrible time in Rikers. A couple of them gave me pointers on how not to get killed in a fight. Maybe I feel shame. Could have done more, known more.