Orange Is the New Black

coffee, hand-illustrated by my friend Peter; and a lot of photographs of other people’s cats. These were all of my riches and in fact my only valuable possessions.
    My uncle Winthrop Allen III wrote to me:
    Pipes,
    Your Web page was well received. I forwarded it to a few of my friends and acquaintances, so don’t be surprised to get bundles of old books from unknown sources.
    Enclosed is
Japanese Street Slang.
You never know when you’re going to need just the right insult.
Joe Orton
, he needs no introduction, but there is one in the front of the book, anyhow.
Parkinson
was an amusing old duffer, inventor of Parkinson’s Law, which I kinda forget. No, I remember now, it’s about tasks expanding to fill the available time. When you are finished getting your group therapy sessions, safe-sexlectures, and 12-step sermons, you may be able to test the hypothesis.
    The Prince
, Mach’s my all-time fave. Like you and me, he’s forever maligned.
    Gravity’s Rainbow
, all my literary friends consider this the greatest since
Under the Volcano.
I couldn’t finish either of ’em.
    I enclose a couple of posters so that you could get a start on decorating the digs before Martha shows up with all her bundles of frou-frou.
    Regards, Winthrop, the Worst Uncle
    I began to receive letters from a man named Joe Loya, a writer and a friend of a friend back in San Francisco. Joe explained that he had served over seven years in federal prison for bank robbery, that he knew what I was going through, and that he hoped I would write him back. He told me that the act of writing literally saved his life when he spent two years in solitary confinement. I was startled by the intimacy of his letters, but also touched, and it was reassuring to know that there was someone on the outside who understood something about the surreal world I now inhabited.
    Only the nun got more mail than me. On my first day in the Camp someone had helpfully informed me that there was a nun there—in my side-smacked daze, I vaguely assumed they meant a nun who had chosen to live among prisoners. I was correct, sort of. Sister Ardeth Platte was a political prisoner, one of several nuns who are peace activists and served long federal sentences for trespassing in a nonviolent protest at a Minuteman II missile silo in Colorado. Everyone respected Sister (as she was known to all), who was sixty-nine years old and one tough nun, an adorable, elfin, twinkling, and loving presence. Appropriately enough, Sister was Yoga Janet’s bunkie—she liked to be tucked into bed by Janet every night, with a hug and kiss on her soft, wrinkled forehead. The Italian-American prisoners were the most outraged by her predicament. “The fucking feds have nothing better to do than to lock up
nuns
?” they would spit, disgusted.Sister received copious amounts of mail from pacifists around the world.
    One day I got a new letter from my best friend, Kristen, whom I had met in our first week at Smith. In the envelope was a short note, penned on an airplane, and a newspaper clipping. I unfolded it to reveal Bill Cunningham’s “On the Street” fashion column from the Sunday
New York Times
, February 8. Covering the half-page were over a dozen photographs of women of every age, race, size, and shape, all clad in brilliant orange. “Oranginas Uncorked” was the headline, and Kristen had noted on a blue stickie, “NYers wear orange in solidarity w/ Piper’s plight! xo K.” I carefully stuck the clipping inside my locker door, where every time I opened it I was greeted by my dear friend’s handwriting, and the smiling faces of women with orange coats, hats, scarves, even baby carriages. Apparently, orange was the new black.

CHAPTER 5
Down the Rabbit Hole

    A fter two weeks I was getting much better at cleaning, as inspections took place twice a week and there was considerable social pressure not to fuck up—the winners of inspection got to eat first, and certain extra-tidy “honor cubes” were first among the first. It was amazing how many uses sanitary napkins had—they were our primary cleaning tools.
    There was tension in Room 6 over who cleaned and who did not. Miss Luz, who was in her seventies and sick with cancer, was not expected to clean. The Puerto Rican woman in one of the top bunks spoke no English, but she would silently help me and Annette dust and scrub. The bigoted Polish woman who occupied the bunk below me refused to clean, much to Annette’s fury. My tattooed