The first time we visited San Francisco, as a family, we didn’t make it to the Alcatraz tour. The line went on for several blocks and none of us had the patience to wait around. We had too many other spots we wanted to see. But a few years ago when we returned to San Francisco, we did the Alcatraz tour. Yes, it’s a tourist landmark and an interesting place to visit. But San Francisco is filled with interesting places to visit. I used to work in a prison – as a librarian and Spanish teacher – and they aren’t my favorite spots. So why did I consent to 3 or 4 hours at one of the most depressing prisons on Earth?
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As our ferry draws within viewing distance of the rock, I’m thinking Clint Eastwood. Or was that Matt Damon? And then I realize I’m looking at a chunk of stone in the middle of San Francisco Bay that once housed criminals like Al Capone. It’s jarring. I feel unsettled, troubled, and yet if right that second someone asked what was bothering me, I wouldn’t even think to mention Alcatraz. In this sense, I consider the rock to be one of the ultimate tricksters – if, that is, a place can be a trickster.
The tour, I recall, was well organized. We were in groups where a guide explained the who, what, and where, then we could wander around the island. This was the most interesting part. We strolled past old, crumbling buildings, rusted fences, the vestiges of lives long gone. I began to feel strange. But it was more than strange. The rolling, but limited landscapes started to feel familiar.
I immediately distrust these feelings. I’m a fiction writer, I spin dramas in my head that won’t ever see the light of day. But the feeling persisted. It shadowed me. Later, we made our way back into the main building and came to this sign:
Here are the rules! One visit a month from immediate family. Food and drinks not permitted. Visiting hours spelled out. No smoking. No touching. Keep in mind that Alcatraz functioned as a prison from 1933 to March 21, 1963, nearly 30 years of occupation. Except for the visit restrictions, these rules look like those posted in middle school hallways when I taught Spanish to hormonal teens.
I wondered, for some reason, about the employees and their families who lived on the island. We passed some of their crumbling homes, their crumbling dancing hall, and I felt increasingly depressed. I just wanted to get the hell away from the island, back into the city.
By the time we returned to the main building, I wandered into the bookstore and gift shop and found a really sketchy history of Alcatraz. But there was a lot of information about the employees and their families who had lived on the island. Scanning the pages, looking at the photos, I suddenly experienced a kind of resonance I recognized. I had felt this on the streets of Edinburgh, in certain parts of Ecuador. Recognition. I began to piece together my emotions and started to wonder if I had been a young child on this island. I immediately dismissed it as my fiction writing self. Alcatraz and those kids would be a great premise for a story. But I’ve never quite been able to shake the feeling. And here’s why:
It was those three years I spent working in a prison. Life before writing. In retrospect, I have long since realized that those three years felt like an unsettled vestige of some other life, that I had something to repay. I hesitate to use the word karma, I hate the word, but it had that same, heavy and oppressive feeling to it. When we toured Alcatraz, the pieces seemed to slide together.
I’ve never explored this through regression, have no desire to. I’m in this life now and want no further details about that life then. But the unsettled feeling persists. The next time we visit San Francisco, I’m determined to spend more time communing with the seals.
