BREMERTON — After eight months in the Kitsap County Jail, Sally Birge could have taken a turn for the worse.
“The loud noise just about drove me nuts,” she said.
It was art, she said, that got her through.
“Without art I would have gone crazy,” said Birge, 39, of Bremerton.
She served eight months of a 12-month sentence for violating a no-contact order with her partner of 12 years and was released this spring. While inside the jail, she secretly drew more than 200 biblically themed bookmarks using a stubby jail-issue ballpoint pen and the wax paper that covers the adhesive backing on menstrual pads.
“You can be in jail, but it’s how you use the time,” she said. “God has a purpose for me.”
Although prison inmates may have art programs or supplies available, jail inmates don’t. And a researcher who reviewed dozens of art programs for inmates found numerous benefits for both the inmates and staff.