‘You’re in a relationship with the prison too’: Keeonna Harris on raising children with her incarcerated husband
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On the Shelf
Mainline Mama
By Keeonna Harris
Amistad Press: 224 pages, $27
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When Keeonna Harris was 15, her life swerved sharply off course.
Harris became pregnant. Then, before she could come to terms with the life-changing event, her boyfriend, Jason, was sentenced to 22 years in prison for a violent carjacking and shooting incident. Two years later, in 1998, she married Jason at Calipatria State Prison.
The Los Angeles born-and-raised author details her experience as a parent with an incarcerated partner in her memoir, “Mainline Mama” — out Feb. 11— a vulnerable and fierce look at prison reform and the women affected by imprisonment. It spares no personal and political questions and provocations, daring readers to challenge their prejudices around the role and nature of jails, and the stereotype of hard-boiled, dangerous prisoners.
Harris has received several honors, including fellowships with PEN America, Hedgebrook and Haymarket Books, as well as Tin House, Baldwin for the Arts and Edith Wharton residencies.
“Writing the book helped me heal a lot of these parts of myself, because the prison system has basically been like a family member to me, right?” Harris says. “It’s been in my life since I was a child, then [been] there for my [now] ex-husband and my family. It’s the third party always in your life, so it’s not just you and a loved one; you’re in a relationship with the prison too. I had to sit with those feelings during writing the book. And even though I’ve been through trying times, I’m resilient. I’m a product of Los Angeles, which showed me how to get up and dust myself off.”
Harris spoke with The Times on Jan. 13, when the city was beset by fires.
“Even though I’m currently in Seattle, all of my family is in California so it’s been gut-wrenching to watch my city burn like this. People say if you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere, but I think that about California.”
Harris says she’s found peace with the adulthood she’s lived, intertwined with the prison system. It has enabled her to meet people like herself, and she wants women to know that “prison doesn’t define you.”
That realization took time. As a pregnant teenager, Harris thought all the doors of opportunity would slam shut.
Her 15-year-old self would be delighted by the woman she has become, Harris says.
“It almost makes me start crying because everything I do in my life is for her,” she says. “When I advocate for myself, my family, my community, it’s all for her, and she’s smiling because she thought it was over for her.”
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Harris recalls being an overachiever as a child and aspiring to become an obstetrician. “I was on a roll all through elementary and junior high because my goal was to graduate from high school to 4.0 [GPA]. I wanted to go to Spelman College to become a doctor.
“When I got pregnant, I felt like my life was over. I immediately became an adult, so I didn’t think that becoming a doctor was my life anymore. I thought, ‘I’m gonna raise my son. I’m gonna get a regular job.’ I thought all my hard work was for nothing. I thought it was over for me.”
According to the Prison Policy Initiative, a criminal-justice public policy think tank, more than 1.9 million people are incarcerated in the U.S. on any given day, at a staggering cost of $182 billion per year, and many of those prisoners — especially in California, Texas and Florida — are Black, non-Hispanic men. According to the nonprofit, “California locks up a higher percentage of its people than almost any democratic country on Earth.”
Harris knows the ins and outs of the complicated U.S. prison system, both from an academic and a harrowingly personal perspective.
“Unfortunately, we’re in the age of mass incarceration,” she says. “That’s how our society deals with our social ills. I’m not an exception; I was not the only one there with a child, by far. There were thousands of us. It’s very jarring to see and understand. I’ve met many women, and even though it’s traumatizing on prison grounds and we’re often not treated well, it was so beautiful to watch us come together and mother each other, to help each other raise our children, and they became my second family since we saw them every weekend.”
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Harris credits therapy with helping her through her lowest points.
“There was a time when I felt like I was going to completely unravel, and that was after I decided to divorce Jason, which was finalized in December 2015,” she says. “After I decided to leave and work slowed down, I really reflected over my whole life, and I was really depressed. I felt I’d lost so much time, and I questioned myself and my decisions. Therapy gave me clarity and perspective, and it helped me to realize that all the shame I’d been carrying never belonged to me. It was imposed on me by other people or society, whether it was being shamed for being a teen mom or being shamed for marrying somebody in prison.”
Harris is unabashedly an abolitionist.
“I think this whole system is ridiculous. We have so many things that are making most folks go to prison, and things that we can change, which is education or putting money into after-school programs. … And most folks are not in jail for crazy things. Most folks are trying to survive, [and] we need to start really focusing on things that are the issue, which is class disparity, inequality, education and healthcare.”
There are no imminent signs of reform, she adds.
“I’ve been connected to many people in prison, and while they’re there, they’re not getting the help they need. They’re not getting therapy, and they’re not learning real skills that are transferable to society for when they come home. You’re basically setting folks up for failure.”
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Harris, who is currently working on her next nonfiction book, says “Mainline Mama” is “a love letter to Black and brown girls and women.”
“I wish I had that when I was growing up, to know I wasn’t by myself.”
Then, of course, there’s the most important people in Harris’ life: her five children, who range in age from 5 to 29.
“When I look at them, it’s a little unreal,” she said. “Especially with the older children, I realize I’ve been a mom longer than I haven’t been, and I think, ‘Where did the years go?’
“I’m looking forward to them reading this book and getting to know me for real. My prayer is that they really see why I’ve made some of the decisions that I have, and it was all for them. They’ve always been at the center of my life. They are the reason why I was dead set on surviving.”
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