Gemeinschaft Residents Dazzle Local Audience

It's not often that Gemeinschaft Home for transitioning ex-offenders and  JMU's Forbes Center for the Performing Arts appear in the same sentence. But last night an entire evening at the Forbes Center was devoted to music groups performing songs composed by GH residents, interspersed with some of the stories behind their compositions. 

The results were stunning, and especially rewarding to supporters of the Home, along with the dedicated students and staff from JMU's music and social work departments who had conducted song writing workshops at Gemeinschaft each Monday evening over the past number of months.

Here are the lyrics to Joseph Dudash's piece, "Half Way In and Half Way Out" just as he wrote them:

I’m Half way in,

I’m Half way out,

I’m Half way in, and 

I’m Half way out

As I gaze upon the western skies

I feel my voice gain strength and rise

No longer am I stuck in a cage

My freedom yet to take center stage

Feels like I’m stuck in the crosshairs

Always in the pitfalls of society’s snares

Like quicksand, I sink down

The harder I fight, the faster I lose sight

Forever reaching for solid ground

Once my life was sweet harmony 

Working overtime, never short on money

Wife, yard, and kid on the way

Got hurt shutin’ down a riot—What can I say?

Uncle Sam and Big Blue turned their backs on me that day

What was once my profession

Has been twisted into an obsession

That rush of fluid succession

Only one thing that I can be

Now that I’m sentenced with that felony

One more chance they’ve given me

Change your ways or you will see

Your only ties to family

Will be from the outside lookin’ in

Two-inch-thick glass divider for your sin

Judge’s order finally sound

Pack your shit, you movin’ on

Country road, outskirts of town

Your one LAST for solid ground

Transport’s leavin’, you’re Gemeinschaft bound

Disjointed memories from behind the line

Nothing to show for the lost time

No friends I call mine

Family won’t answer or write in kind

A house of felons trying to unwind

Pick yourself up, and brush yourself off, they shout

The world can be yours now that you are out

The cycle is broken

The dirty old ring of addiction

Now to stay clean is your redemption

Transitioning and traversing the storm they call life

A new way to live cuts like a knife

Tools to grow

United against all this strife

Only you can reap what you sow

Like a boy scout I’m prepared

All of my demons better beware

One day at a time, one step at a time

Armored from head to toe like a knight

I’m finally committed to winning this fight

I’m Half way in,

I’m Half way out,

I’m Half way in, and 
I’m Half way out