Ivié De Molina -

The Gift of Grace: Surveiled or More Incarceration?

I am Latina, born and bred in Brooklyn, East New York. I grew up in a chaotic household of drugs, alcohol and domestic violence, but there was a lot of love. I was then blessed with a stepfather at nine years old; he became daddy and my superman overnight.

By 19 years old, I became known as Ms. Day, for developing telemarketing departments for numerous Business/Trade schools throughout the five boroughs – in my efforts to help the city’s youth realize their own potential. As a student myself at MTI (Market Training Institute), I was intrigued with the change happening with me: I was 19 years old, and I went on the search of other young people to inspire them to do the same. I would recruit them in schools, malls, clubs and in the streets of the five boroughs. I would encourage them to participate in my “earn and learn” programs, where they would take a course at a school that would teach them valuable skills making them employable in the work field, thereby, getting them off the streets.

I was recruiting as many as 50 students a week, handling financial aide, admissions, telemarketing and job placement. I worked for: MTI, Blake Business School, The Royal Business School, SCS, and The NY Bartending School. By 21 years old, this generous act of love and compassion for others legally earned me six-figures-plus. At 25, I was on my way to opening up my own boutique with my own line of women’s fashion; I cut my first music-demo; and obtained my real estate agent’s license. At 26 years old, April 1993, I landed my dream job as the first female broker hired by Rosenkrantz down on Wall Street. A week after landing this job I came face to face with my abuser (my older half-brother), and recalled a childhood sexual abuse of six and seven years old. This moment marks the root that led to my darkness, stole my soul, broke me and my spirit, and devastated the lives of many. I wasn’t prepared for this.

Instead of chasing my chair at the NY Stock Exchange, l opted for a severe crack/drug/alcohol addiction; the sex trade; became a dominatrix; got involved in a domestic violence relationship; and 17 months later (Sept. 1994), | was arrestedfor involvement in the murder of two men.In the state of NY I went to trial and lost: I was sentenced 25to life for one man. In the state of New Jersey I was convincedto take a plea believing what I was told, that I could later get mysentences to run concurrent: I took a plea and was sentenced toa consecutive 30 years to life for the second man.

“To rise each day to fight a battle you know you can’t win, and do it with wits, grace and compassion for others, and even a sense of mission is, to face the absurd in a spirit of heroism” – Albert Camus

I am going on thirty years of incarceration in the state of New York, and I’m still facing a consecutive sentence of 30 years to life in the state of New Jersey. For almost 10 years now I have been trying to get in front of a judge hoping one would grant me the gift of grace. For five years now, l’ve been pushing Conditional Clemency. Conditional Clemency: a policy proposal to reinvigorate ‘clemency!’ For those that meet the criteria and are willing to live up to the sacrifices: to grant them clemency with an ankle bracelet and house arrest.

The person who was sent to prison in 1994 deserved to go to prison. Thirty years later, the person who is currently seeking grace deserves some. Who I am today, who l want to be tomorrow, and remembering who I was allows me to ask for a second chance because I was never an evil person. My unwavering beliefs of my character and change: not as an artist, musician, or a journalist/writer or poet, but rather as a human being who has come to the ownership that my actions devastated lives, and contributed greatly to the agonizing loss of loved ones. It keeps me remorseful of my past actions. I eternally suffer for the deceased and their families. The past is never dead, but I am the one responsible to learn to live with it.

My resolve stems from the lost and broken me, the real me and the sorry me. Today I can say that I forgive my younger self for her actions: my adult and mature self asks for a chance to prove herself. My burden was created by the shameless behavior imposed upon me as an Innocent child. By the hands of a monster I was transformed. Thirty years later, by learning to love myself again I have transformed. My Past: forever cemented, authoritatively, in my heart and soul. I seek empathy, for understanding the root that led to it all because I did not just wake up one day and decide to just throw my whole life away.

Something happened to me. I remembered something horrible from my childhood, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I turned to drugs, and a lifestyle of pure shame and insult to injury. I was never an evil person. What I am responsible for is heinous. There is nothing to excuse the enormity of it all. No one should have died. What happened to me thirty years ago I was not prepared for. I lost who l was. But I have learned to live with my past, as l continue to grow and heal with it. Being an artist and musician; with an A.A. & B.A. of the Arts through Marymount Manhattan; an MPS through NYTS (New York Theological Seminary; I’m seeking another Masters now in Social Work; and l’ve been a Suicide Prevention Peer Supporter (2020-todate), helps me utilize my gifts and talents in ways that benefit myself and others by keeping the gear on healing and progressing, while sharing my pain, my secrets and my story.

I was not wrongfully convicted, but I was wrongfully represented. Justice from the law is one thing I seek, akin to forgiveness. Forgiveness is never earned, but can be extended by the gift of grace. Can forgiveness lead to a road of extending grace?

Forgiveness:

is NOT a “Do it! Be the bigger person!” thing. It is not a “Do it!” because the bible says so, and so forth. It’s NOT a “Do it!” It’s a process; you’re living it. It’s a whole different way of being: how to shift in life; how am I in the world as this deepens? For me, it is a jewel on the other side. But when it comes to forgiveness, perhaps it’s not about reconciliation, but maybe it could be a way at looking at repentance. Why? Because people do change.

Like Nelson Mandela, the one man, whose legacy will forever be remembered for changing an entire country through love and forgiveness: I too had to come to prison and achieve the most difficult task in life, to change myself.

According to Dr. Brene Brown: (one of my favorite writers)

“Guilt becomes salvation…Guilt is good…guilt can even make us feel more positively about ourselves, because it points to the gap between what we did and who we are” – and thankfully, we can change what we do. When you know what you’re feeling and why, you can slow down, breathe, pray, ask for support – and make the choices that reflect who you are and what you believe.”

Please see me for the whole of who I am today, and not just as a part of who I was yesterday. I am authentically and true to myself and all I meet. The road to redemption never ends. The past is never dead, but I am once again the love I always was. I am me! And I am not that same person of thirty years ago.

“How ironic that we learn to live in a place where we were sent to die” (Chef C).

I Am Sorry! Will also forever live cemented, authoritatively – in my heart <3 Ivie, I See You! It is my hope, that you do too.

The best story is not written, it is seen: I’ll take being surveiled under house arrest for the next thirty years, over another thirty in prison any day. Want what you don’t have to fight for. The magnitude of this opportunity fuels my voice. A VOICE that I had lost four times: at six and seven years old (while being abused); at 26 (when | came face to face with my abuser); and at 28 (during my trial). Thank you for listening.

“Life is 10% what happens to you, and 90% is how you react to it!” – (author unknown).

You have a choice to either acquiesce or resist.

“I will flow, not censor or edit, but let the innermost part of me speak”. – Katie Canon

Please click the link to check out my song Breath Darling (Password for access BH) and other songs that I have written, feel free to drop a comment and let me know what you think.

Feel free to also check out my art at: @humansofsanquentin.org go to talents and then art – you will find my art work under IVIÉ gallery.