I have fallen from a violent howling paranoid mania. I am in the nadir of depression. The world is dark at the edges of my peripheral vision. I no longer hear voices. That strange humming sound when everything is very, very silent is loud, loud, louder. I am exhausted. There is a knock at the door.

The police are here. They want to come in. I ask to see the officer's identification. He shows it to me through the mail slot. I caution him to be careful of the broken glass piled on the floor just inside the front door. I force the door open and he comes in. He asks me to step outside. I follow him. I am dressed in my house clothes, in my stocking feet. My cell phone is in my pocket. But of these things I am not cognizant as I step into the glare of the afternoon.

I am gently turned around and face the patrol car. I am asked to lean against the patrol car. My arms are taken behind me and I am hand-cuffed. I am asked if I am hurt. I reply... I don't know. Paramedics examine my hand and bandage it. I am asked if I am on medication. I reply that the list is on my PDA in my pocket. The officers tell me I cannot retrieve it. I am asked if I will run away. I respond that I could not go very far while wearing handcuffs. The older officer laughs and says that I might be surprised. I tell him that in that case he may shoot me. He tells me that is my issue.

I ask the younger officer to please call animal control to retrieve my parrots. I ask him to please lock my apartment and get my keys. He asks me where the keys are. Incredibly, I remember and tell him. I wait in the burning sun. He returns with my keys and assures me that the apartment has been secured and that animal control is on its way.

The older policeman tells me that I am to follow him in the special car. I enter the back seat of what looks to me like an ordinary patrol car. We ride to the police station. He talks to me. I am not aware of what he says or how I respond. We arrive at the station where I am placed in an entirely metal waiting room. One handcuff is removed and fastened to a steel bar mounted in the wall. I sit on a metal bench. I struggle to stay awake.

A young man in the throes of some drug overdose or delusion is led in and fastened to the wall across from me. He speaks only Spanish - no English. He begs me for something but I cannot understand him. He howls in pain and confusion. Eventually he stands up and urinates all over the floor. I am unable to avoid it. It splashes up on me.

Other young men are led in and cuffed to the walls. A very old homeless person with almost no awareness of his surroundings is cuffed next to me. When there are six of us, we are collected into the back of a small, darkened van. We ride for several minutes until we reach the main jail. There we are unloaded. I am taken to a place where I remove all of my clothes and hand them over for storage. My eyeglasses are also taken from me. From this time on, I am barely able to see anything. I am examined for hidden weapons. I am given orange jail attire and slippers. I am given a meal in a brown paper bag. I enter full-blown mania where I stay for perhaps several days.

I am placed in a holding area. There are many men in the area, perhaps twenty. No one speaks. There insufficient space for everyone to sit. I lie on the floor and stare at the ceiling. I am taken from the holding area and interviewed at least twice, perhaps more. I am asked many questions. The only question I recall is whether or not I intend to commit suicide. I answer, "no." I meet an older black man in the holding area to whom I give my lunch. He later comes to befriend me and help me during my stay in jail.

We are finally led out, six at a time, chained at the ankles and wrists, to the place in the jail where we will stay. I am assigned to the top bunk in a cell that contains four bunks. The man from the holding area (let's call him "Benny") is assigned to the top bunk across from me. An even older, homeless man is assigned to the bottom bunk below him. At first, a young man is assigned to the bunk below me, but he moves out. A recovering alcoholic moves in. Let's call him "James."

Benny speaks across the jail floor to someone he knows, or perhaps to the other prisoners in general, I don't know. He announces with some amusement that I am a fifty-year-old "rookie" who has never been to jail and has no police record. I think the other prisoners find this incredible. I fancy that he has decided to protect me. I am uncertain why I think this.

Benny and I talk a lot, almost continuously. I am in total mania - I have no recollection of my conversations. I am terrified that Benny will rape me. It is a quaking, sweating, horror of a fear. I leave several times to rinse my face with cold water. I brace myself for the inevitable. At some point I think Benny comes to understand this. I think Benny knows that I am afraid. The sexual topics change to focus exclusively on the joys of fucking women. I do not share Benny's outlook on women. But I appreciate the change. I relax somewhat.

We are fed later that evening. Benny teaches me to eat. He tells me that I must eat or I will die. He says that I must not give them reason to think I am insane. They will take me away and put me in the special place with blue walls. There I will be strapped to a table and fed intravenously. It is therefore important that I eat. He teaches me how to trade food I don't like for food I prefer with the other prisoners. In this way I am to eliminate the things I cannot eat from my meals and replace them with those I can.

I am unable to see visual clues from the deputies who run the jail. Benny explains that I can ask other prisoners for help. This is helpful because one must obtain permission to use the bathroom. Sometimes the deputy simply waves assent. The other prisoners quickly learn that I am, for all practical purposes, blind. I am able to find my way around, and not offend the deputies, with their assistance.

Later that evening, or perhaps in the evening of the following day, I come completely off my medication. We are sitting on the floor at the border of our cell and the common area. Prisoners are talking in hushed voices with one another. Most are sharing stories of petty crime. A man appears in my space - from the next cell? He asks me what I do. I tell him that I am, comparatively, a wimp. He asks me why. I tell him that unlike the tough exploits related by others, I work, I'm monogamously married, I believe in God, I don't take drugs, and I don't get into trouble. He looks at me and says, "That's not being a wimp. That's what being a man is." For the first time in my life I am not ashamed of who I am.

Later that evening I come to realize that I am insane. I realize that the drugs I have been taking have done something to me, broken me in some strange, inscrutable fashion. I recognize my mania. It is the old flight of my youth. I am falling. I have been falling all my life. I reached for the sun and flew too high. And now I am falling. I become insane with anger.

The other prisoners listen with fascination as I unravel the hellish failure of my life. These are people who think a credit card with a $1000 limit is a gold mine. Out like vomit it comes as it all floods back to me. The money, the success, the women, the hopes, the dreams, the delusions. All swirling around me like ghosts, like parodies of reality. Not for me. Always reaching. Never attaining. Laughter. Exclusion. I have been an outcast. And here, in this place, in this prison, it is confirmed. Here, among the waste of society, I am tossed for handling in triplicate.

Whoosh. Back into depression I go.

I am standing for hours at the edge of my cell staring into blurry space. Benny asks me what I'm thinking. I mutter, "Nothing." Benny says, "You got the blues, man." And indeed I do.

I ask Benny why she did this to me. He says, "Shit happens." I laugh uproariously. I will never hear the phrase the same way again.

Breakfast. I refuse the eat my "food." Benny says grace. Benny says, "Eat your breakfast." I refuse. James mutters angrily, "Eat it!" I become resentful. I eat my breakfast.

Inspection. Benny shows me how to make my bed. Benny explains that I must take a shower. I ask for permission to do so and it is granted. James gives me a bar of soap. It is a cold shower. I clean myself completely. It takes a long time. My wounds are bleeding. I have been clawing at myself. I am ill but I feel better after the shower.

I learn to follow the other prisoners. I am able to get my food and trade without assistance. I collect orange peels, from which I squeeze oil that I rub against my wounds. This helps alleviate the pain and, I hope, infection. I fall out of space and time.

Some of us are transferred to another place. Benny assures me that this is the best location in the jail, but he does not follow. I panic but I have enough confidence to manage on my own. I am quiet, reserved. I follow the other prisoners. I am again assigned to an upper bunk.

I meet with various people from the correctional system. Everyone wants to know if I plan to commit suicide. I assure them all that I do not. Privately, I wonder (1) Why the fascination with this particular question, and (2) with what would I kill myself? A police detective asks me if I wish to waive my fifth amendment rights and discuss what happened with him. In my madness I nevertheless understand that this is a trap. I politely decline. He warns me to stay away from my wife. I return to my bunk.

I meet with a public defender. He is flabbergasted that I have been arrested and held for so long. He offers to call my friends to arrange for my bail. I tell him that I have no friends or family and my wife is the person who put me here. I have, however, the means with which to bail myself out. He ruefully notes that it is not possible for a person to bail himself out. I return to my bunk.

My cell mate explains to me that it is important to identify my medical condition. If I am in need of continuous medical care, I will be retained in this relatively hospitable jail. Otherwise, I might be transferred to a less desirable location. I submit a medical examination request. Later that day I am taken to the infirmary where I am examined by a nurse practitioner. She confirms my near-sightedness and discovers my depression and Hepatitis C condition. She arranges to obtain my eyeglasses from storage and to obtain Interferon and the other drugs I am taking for my therapy. Later that evening my eyeglasses are returned to me and for the first time I can see my world.

The following day I am informed by my public defender that I can call a bail bondsman with whom he has spoken and who has agreed to allow me to post my own bail. I desperately figure out how to call the bondsman and explain my situation to him. Later that evening I am released on bail. I follow several other prisoners to a holding area where we wait until the deputies have finished their evening meal. I am led into a room where my possessions are returned to me. I change my clothes and leave the jail.

It takes me forty-five minutes to walk home in my stocking feet. I am in warp-speed mania the whole way and I stay there for at least several days.