Hutchinson ? Christmas, for inmate No. 0030404, is just a day on the calendar.

It’s just another day, says Frank Fields, incarcerated at Hutchinson Correctional Facility, because if it became anything more, it would be too much to bear. “At Christmas, you sort of anesthetize yourself to old feelings, old concepts, old thoughts, old meanings,” said Fields, who’s been in and out of prison since 1979. “Over the years, it’s become Dec. 25 instead of Christmas.”

And so, on a day that’s preceded by a season of anticipation, a day that children are taught to look forward to months in advance, the men who call Hutchinson’s prison home see the holiday as a moment to hunker down, hide their feelings and wait for the day to pass.

Kevin Jackson, in prison for theft, forgery and drugs, said the Christmas season makes him think about the holidays of his youth, which makes him think about his family, which makes him think about life on the outside, and how much he misses living a normal life.

“After being here for a certain amount of time, it just becomes a routine,” Jackson said about his habit of playing down Christmas, the same way he plays down Thanksgiving or the Fourth of July.

“You think about your family, and how you’d like to be with them,” Jackson said. “But there’s nothing else you can do except wait.”

But even in the waiting, even in the outward denial of the Christmas spirit, the holiday manifests itself in small, but special, ways.

Robert Coppage, serving a sentence for possessing drugs, says Christmas to him has always meant food – turkey, mashed potatoes and all the fixings.

“But Aramark,” Coppage said referring to the prison’s contract food provider, “can never compare to mom.”

So the prisoners, in groups of two or 10, cook up a batch of penitentiary gumbo – an eclectic mix of canned soup, noodles, chilies and whatever else can be bought at the prison commissary.

And with the sharing of food, some inmates will share the greetings of the season, wishing each other “Merry Christmas” while maintaining an outward appearance of indifference.

“If you really start to think about it, it’s depressing,” Fields said. “It makes you want to cry. But you don’t do that; you cover it up with a facade. Because I’m a man, I have to portray a manly attitude, a manly demeanor. I have to laugh to keep from crying.”

But if Christmas brings a flood of emotions, emotions that have to be denied, it’s a suppression that is short-lived.

New Year’s Eve, inmates say, is the opposite of Christmas – a holiday celebrating the passage of time, in a place where time always passes too slowly.

“It means another year done,” Coppage said. “It means it’s time to flip the calendar, to start over.”

Jackson said prisoners see the start of a new year as a time of joy, a time to look forward to, a time not to reflect on where you are, but where you’re going.

“On New Year’s Eve you can think, ‘I’m going home this year’ or ‘Next year I’m going home,”‘ said Jackson, who became a grandfather last week at the age of 48. “You start thinking about getting out, and about putting your life in perspective, so you don’t come back.”