Below is a link to a video talking about the college program at the prison. You will see Larry at 4:52 on the timer talking to the teacher in the front of the class (shaved head and black glasses).
http://www.southside.edu/news/2011/campus_within_walls.asp
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Monday, April 25, 2011
1200
I hit a milestone the other morning. I completed twelve hundred pages in my diary. As I’ve written before, shortly after my arrest I began keeping a daily journal of my experiences in here. Each page has approximately three hundred words. So many times during the past thirty-two months I’ve been asked by guys “what are you writing down?” A little bit of everything.
I recently completed Nelson Mandela’s newest bestseller based on his diary and personal correspondence written during his twenty-seven years of imprisonment. I was surprised by a good deal of the book. Perhaps it was my preconceived notion of what thoughts would cross a great man like Mandela’s mind. I just assumed everything would be deep and profound. But it wasn’t.
Mandela wrote about powerful topics such as maintaining your dignity in the face of a system bent on breaking you. He also wrote about his commissary order, and his vegetable garden, his love for his wife and children, his health. He wrote about everything.
In one letter to his young daughter, he wrote the following:
“Spiritual weapons can be dynamic and often have an impact difficult to appreciate except in the light of actual experience in given situations…To put it bluntly, it is only my flesh and blood that are shut up behind these tight walls…”
As I think about all the pages I’ve written, the mundane and profound, the boring and insightful? I understand what Mandela was saying. They can put a man behind bars, but they can’t take his freedom if he still has his mind, his experiences, his faith.
I write a good deal about the day to day happenings in here that are life in prison. A lot of those happenings are things I never knew occurred. I write about men and experiences that were far removed from my apparently sheltered life. I write about my family and friends. My ex and my kids make my entries almost daily. I’ve been told numerous times to “move on” and “close that chapter”. Ironically, shortly after his release from prison Mandela and his wife of thirty years separated. A few years later, they divorced. Mandela knew of his wife’s indiscretions while he was locked up. He also knew he was no saint. The divorce shattered him. As the notes in the book reflect, he could never speak publicly about her. Yet, even after his release, after the divorce, he wrote about her.
There is hope in writing. There is despair. Many mornings and nights I’ve written letters directly to God telling Him I’m not quite sure I can do this. Then, two days later I’m writing about receiving my commissary. The day after that I’ll be running and hurry in to record some self realization.
Twelve hundred pages. Following receipt of the divorce papers the court appointed a lawyer to serve as my “guardian ad litem” – an ironic twist of incarceration: no suit can proceed against an inmate without the court being assured the inmate understands the nature of the action.
I was called to a lawyer visitation room at the Henrico Jail and was met by a stunning, mid-thirties blond who introduced herself as my court appointed lawyer. We spent three hours together and during that time she asked about my life, my circumstances, my marriage. I told her the story, my story. Near the end, she looked at me and said “you need to write that down, for yourself, for your sons, for others.” She was the first person I told I kept a diary.
Everything about this experience is documented. I guess I do it because I don’t want to forget even a day of what this is like. I thought I knew so much before my arrest. I realized these past few years just how little I really knew. It may not matter to anyone else, but these pages represent the struggles and successes, the joys and heartaches I’ve been through. And, Mandela was right. No matter what happens to me, these pages represent my freedom.
I recently completed Nelson Mandela’s newest bestseller based on his diary and personal correspondence written during his twenty-seven years of imprisonment. I was surprised by a good deal of the book. Perhaps it was my preconceived notion of what thoughts would cross a great man like Mandela’s mind. I just assumed everything would be deep and profound. But it wasn’t.
Mandela wrote about powerful topics such as maintaining your dignity in the face of a system bent on breaking you. He also wrote about his commissary order, and his vegetable garden, his love for his wife and children, his health. He wrote about everything.
In one letter to his young daughter, he wrote the following:
“Spiritual weapons can be dynamic and often have an impact difficult to appreciate except in the light of actual experience in given situations…To put it bluntly, it is only my flesh and blood that are shut up behind these tight walls…”
As I think about all the pages I’ve written, the mundane and profound, the boring and insightful? I understand what Mandela was saying. They can put a man behind bars, but they can’t take his freedom if he still has his mind, his experiences, his faith.
I write a good deal about the day to day happenings in here that are life in prison. A lot of those happenings are things I never knew occurred. I write about men and experiences that were far removed from my apparently sheltered life. I write about my family and friends. My ex and my kids make my entries almost daily. I’ve been told numerous times to “move on” and “close that chapter”. Ironically, shortly after his release from prison Mandela and his wife of thirty years separated. A few years later, they divorced. Mandela knew of his wife’s indiscretions while he was locked up. He also knew he was no saint. The divorce shattered him. As the notes in the book reflect, he could never speak publicly about her. Yet, even after his release, after the divorce, he wrote about her.
There is hope in writing. There is despair. Many mornings and nights I’ve written letters directly to God telling Him I’m not quite sure I can do this. Then, two days later I’m writing about receiving my commissary. The day after that I’ll be running and hurry in to record some self realization.
Twelve hundred pages. Following receipt of the divorce papers the court appointed a lawyer to serve as my “guardian ad litem” – an ironic twist of incarceration: no suit can proceed against an inmate without the court being assured the inmate understands the nature of the action.
I was called to a lawyer visitation room at the Henrico Jail and was met by a stunning, mid-thirties blond who introduced herself as my court appointed lawyer. We spent three hours together and during that time she asked about my life, my circumstances, my marriage. I told her the story, my story. Near the end, she looked at me and said “you need to write that down, for yourself, for your sons, for others.” She was the first person I told I kept a diary.
Everything about this experience is documented. I guess I do it because I don’t want to forget even a day of what this is like. I thought I knew so much before my arrest. I realized these past few years just how little I really knew. It may not matter to anyone else, but these pages represent the struggles and successes, the joys and heartaches I’ve been through. And, Mandela was right. No matter what happens to me, these pages represent my freedom.
Bob Sold Out, Martin and Moses Didn't
I read an article this week about Bob Dylan taking his tour on the road all the way to China. In order for Dylan to perform there he had to agree to strict government censorship of his songs. He agreed to abstain from performing “Blowin’ in the Wind”, “The Times They Are A Changing”, “Chimes of Freedom”, “Desolation Row”, and “Hard Rains Gonna Fall”. For the opportunity to finally perform in the world’s most populated country, Bob sold out.
What’s left to believe in now that Bob gave up his message for a show? Like the little boy who ran into “Shoeless Joe” Jackson on the street shortly after his lifetime ban from baseball was announced by Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis, I want to run up to Bob and cry out “say it ain’t so Bob; say it ain’t so”.
Selling out is a funny human trait. We abhor it, yet we tolerate it, we expect it and worst of all, we do it. In here, selling out comes in a couple of different forms: being a snitch is one noticeable one. Buddying up to the officers, ratting out a fellow inmate to make your life easier is wrong. The job of the prison staff is to maintain order and discipline. The job of the inmate is to do their sentence. It is not the inmate’s job to police the compound.
Another sell out is the way guys react to this environment. You should never get comfortable in here. Too many men in her consider this place home. This is not home. This is a government imposed penalty; a court sanctioned “time out” in effect. Everything an inmate is given was fought for and eventually conceded to as a means of maintaining security, discipline and control.
Prisons are in place to house inmates. They aren’t places for treatment or rehabilitation, at least not as they are currently structured. It is the responsibility of the incarcerated to do their sentence and to challenge the status quo, the “that’s just the way things are done” attitude that permeates DOC when “the way things are done” is unjust.
This past week the English students were assigned Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s, “Letter from the Birmingham Jail”. Forty students; twenty-two African American, eighteen white and not one of them had ever been exposed to the letter before this week. As I’ve written before in this blog, there is perhaps no other single piece of writing by any American clergyman that as profoundly and persuasively spells out the moral obligation of Christians to challenge injustice.
To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: “An unjust law is a human law that is not rated in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.”
I broke the law. The Commonwealth of Virginia has the absolute right to set a just punishment for my law breaking. The Commonwealth doe not; however, have the right to operate an unjust sentencing apparatus and prison system. And, there can be no mistaking this simple fact: Virginia’s prison system degrades the men and women it holds. The system is unjust.
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
What does Dr. King mean by that? He means that everyone, especially people of faith, should care how a state punishes those who break the law. It is the moral responsibility of every person of faith to ensure that justice is done – even to those who break the law.
As I said earlier, guys in here sell out regularly. They feel hopeless. They see a system that not only has deprived them of their basic freedom, but then continues to break them down. They believe the system is rigged, that the poor, the uneducated, the nonwhite, receive harsher more frequent sentences.
And they see me and they are amazed of the harsh, unjust sentence I received and they wonder “what did you do to deserve being treated like us?” And they ask “how can you still have hope?” Simple, I tell them. Because in a dark, lonely cell God saved my life and told me He loved me. And my God is a God of justice and He is stronger than any prison, any prejudice, any predicament.
The Apostle Paul commanded believers to:
“Remember the prisoners, as though in prison with them, and those who are ill-treated, since you yourselves are also in the body.”
Remember the prisoners –
If the Commonwealth takes your freedom then they must provide an adequate, nutritious diet;
The Commonwealth must provide adequate, competent medical care for inmates;
The Commonwealth must provide adequate personal mental health, drug and alcohol treatment programs for those in prison;
The Commonwealth must provide meaningful access to rehabilitative programs and give inmates a just opportunity for early release and restoration of their rights as citizens.
Disparity in sentencing must be eliminated.
This past week my Old Testament lessons were from the Exodus. As I sat here each morning I pondered the story. We all know the ending, but the story itself, how Moses – a murderer – went to the leader of a powerful nation and delivered a simple message, “God says let my people go”. The Egyptians, under their “rule of law” had every right to hold the Israelites. They scoffed at Moses. The Bible even goes so far as to say “Pharaoh’s heart harden”. Over and over, God sent signs. Over and over, Moses repeated “let my people go”.
This coming week, the Jewish inmates here will celebrate the Passover as a reminder that God is a God of justice. He demands the same from us.
Bob sold out. Martin and Moses didn’t and there are 40,000 incarcerated people in Virginia that can rest assured that justice will be done.
Remember the prisoners. Remember the Exodus. Remember justice.
What’s left to believe in now that Bob gave up his message for a show? Like the little boy who ran into “Shoeless Joe” Jackson on the street shortly after his lifetime ban from baseball was announced by Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis, I want to run up to Bob and cry out “say it ain’t so Bob; say it ain’t so”.
Selling out is a funny human trait. We abhor it, yet we tolerate it, we expect it and worst of all, we do it. In here, selling out comes in a couple of different forms: being a snitch is one noticeable one. Buddying up to the officers, ratting out a fellow inmate to make your life easier is wrong. The job of the prison staff is to maintain order and discipline. The job of the inmate is to do their sentence. It is not the inmate’s job to police the compound.
Another sell out is the way guys react to this environment. You should never get comfortable in here. Too many men in her consider this place home. This is not home. This is a government imposed penalty; a court sanctioned “time out” in effect. Everything an inmate is given was fought for and eventually conceded to as a means of maintaining security, discipline and control.
Prisons are in place to house inmates. They aren’t places for treatment or rehabilitation, at least not as they are currently structured. It is the responsibility of the incarcerated to do their sentence and to challenge the status quo, the “that’s just the way things are done” attitude that permeates DOC when “the way things are done” is unjust.
This past week the English students were assigned Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s, “Letter from the Birmingham Jail”. Forty students; twenty-two African American, eighteen white and not one of them had ever been exposed to the letter before this week. As I’ve written before in this blog, there is perhaps no other single piece of writing by any American clergyman that as profoundly and persuasively spells out the moral obligation of Christians to challenge injustice.
To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: “An unjust law is a human law that is not rated in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.”
I broke the law. The Commonwealth of Virginia has the absolute right to set a just punishment for my law breaking. The Commonwealth doe not; however, have the right to operate an unjust sentencing apparatus and prison system. And, there can be no mistaking this simple fact: Virginia’s prison system degrades the men and women it holds. The system is unjust.
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
What does Dr. King mean by that? He means that everyone, especially people of faith, should care how a state punishes those who break the law. It is the moral responsibility of every person of faith to ensure that justice is done – even to those who break the law.
As I said earlier, guys in here sell out regularly. They feel hopeless. They see a system that not only has deprived them of their basic freedom, but then continues to break them down. They believe the system is rigged, that the poor, the uneducated, the nonwhite, receive harsher more frequent sentences.
And they see me and they are amazed of the harsh, unjust sentence I received and they wonder “what did you do to deserve being treated like us?” And they ask “how can you still have hope?” Simple, I tell them. Because in a dark, lonely cell God saved my life and told me He loved me. And my God is a God of justice and He is stronger than any prison, any prejudice, any predicament.
The Apostle Paul commanded believers to:
“Remember the prisoners, as though in prison with them, and those who are ill-treated, since you yourselves are also in the body.”
Remember the prisoners –
If the Commonwealth takes your freedom then they must provide an adequate, nutritious diet;
The Commonwealth must provide adequate, competent medical care for inmates;
The Commonwealth must provide adequate personal mental health, drug and alcohol treatment programs for those in prison;
The Commonwealth must provide meaningful access to rehabilitative programs and give inmates a just opportunity for early release and restoration of their rights as citizens.
Disparity in sentencing must be eliminated.
This past week my Old Testament lessons were from the Exodus. As I sat here each morning I pondered the story. We all know the ending, but the story itself, how Moses – a murderer – went to the leader of a powerful nation and delivered a simple message, “God says let my people go”. The Egyptians, under their “rule of law” had every right to hold the Israelites. They scoffed at Moses. The Bible even goes so far as to say “Pharaoh’s heart harden”. Over and over, God sent signs. Over and over, Moses repeated “let my people go”.
This coming week, the Jewish inmates here will celebrate the Passover as a reminder that God is a God of justice. He demands the same from us.
Bob sold out. Martin and Moses didn’t and there are 40,000 incarcerated people in Virginia that can rest assured that justice will be done.
Remember the prisoners. Remember the Exodus. Remember justice.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Revolving Door
Albert Einstein reportedly said “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.” I always thought Einstein was referring to my behavior. Since seeing the prison system up close, I now realize he was referring to Virginia’s corrections mentality.
This past week USA today reported on the results of a recent Pew Center Study that showed the number of inmates returning to state prisons within three years of release has remained steady for more than a decade “a strong indicator that prison systems are failing to deter criminals from re-offending.” The report further noted the lack of change “despite huge increases in prison spending….”
Virginia government officials immediately presented Virginia’s “results”: the Commonwealth’s recidivism rate was 28 percent (that’s slightly below the national average) thanks, in large part, to Virginia abolishing parole in 1995. Oh Albert, where art thou when we need you?
Virginia just proved Dr. Einstein’s quote and once again showed that “numbers don’t lie, but liars use numbers.” Yes, Virginia does have a recidivism rate below the national average. But, that rate has not changed in any statistically significant way since the abolition of parole. What has significantly changed is the rate of incarceration (Virginia now has one of the highest incarceration rates in the country), the overall number of inmates (quadrupled since parole was abolished) in DOC’s control and the cost to operate this unyielding bureaucracy (over $1.1 billion and the largest number of state employees: 13,000).
Abolishing parole, incarcerating at an abnormally high rate, warehousing inmates without adequate rehabilitative programs, has not made the public safer.
As the director of the Pew project noted, the national prisoner recidivism rate will likely remain at the same levels unless “state’s more deeply embrace programs to better prepare offenders for re-entry and reward corrections officials for finding alternatives to prison for many non-violent offenders.”
Are you listening Virginia? As I’ve written before, Governor McDonnell should be commended for placing emphasis on prisoner re-entry. But, without directing the same energy to early release, his program is doomed to fail. Virginia cannot afford the hard dollar costs necessitated by its draconian sentencing and incarceration methods. Those costs don’t even include the millions lost in tax revenues from 40,000 individuals who could be living as working, productive citizens. It doesn’t include the soft costs of children deprived of a parent, being raised in one parent or no-parent homes.
Simply put, there is no way to reduce prison costs without closing prisons and letting people go. As Marc Mauer, Executive Director of the Sentencing Project stated, “the only way you can really reduce spending is close prisons. “
This isn’t some “liberal, soft on crime” fantasy. It is fact. In 2005, Texas began implementing sentencing changes and poured money into drug treatment and probation programs. The results: the state’s incarceration rate dropped, since 2003 – there has been a 12.8 percent drop in violent crime, and the state has saved over $2 billion that was needed to build new prisons. That drastic change was spearheaded by Conservative Republican Governor Rick Perry.
Or, ask Republican Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi what he thinks. In 2008, Mississippi, with the highest incarceration rate in the country, implemented a bold initiative to allow inmates to earn significantly more good time credits toward early release. Included in that was the retroactive provision allowing all nonviolent offenders to be eligible for parole after serving just 25 percent of their sentence. Barbour, coincidentally, has been named as a possible candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.
Want to stop the revolving door of recidivism and gain significant financial savings Virginia? Urge Governor McDonnell to boldly implement early release programs as part of his re-entry initiative.
You don’t have to be an Einstein to know that’s the only solution that can succeed.
This past week USA today reported on the results of a recent Pew Center Study that showed the number of inmates returning to state prisons within three years of release has remained steady for more than a decade “a strong indicator that prison systems are failing to deter criminals from re-offending.” The report further noted the lack of change “despite huge increases in prison spending….”
Virginia government officials immediately presented Virginia’s “results”: the Commonwealth’s recidivism rate was 28 percent (that’s slightly below the national average) thanks, in large part, to Virginia abolishing parole in 1995. Oh Albert, where art thou when we need you?
Virginia just proved Dr. Einstein’s quote and once again showed that “numbers don’t lie, but liars use numbers.” Yes, Virginia does have a recidivism rate below the national average. But, that rate has not changed in any statistically significant way since the abolition of parole. What has significantly changed is the rate of incarceration (Virginia now has one of the highest incarceration rates in the country), the overall number of inmates (quadrupled since parole was abolished) in DOC’s control and the cost to operate this unyielding bureaucracy (over $1.1 billion and the largest number of state employees: 13,000).
Abolishing parole, incarcerating at an abnormally high rate, warehousing inmates without adequate rehabilitative programs, has not made the public safer.
As the director of the Pew project noted, the national prisoner recidivism rate will likely remain at the same levels unless “state’s more deeply embrace programs to better prepare offenders for re-entry and reward corrections officials for finding alternatives to prison for many non-violent offenders.”
Are you listening Virginia? As I’ve written before, Governor McDonnell should be commended for placing emphasis on prisoner re-entry. But, without directing the same energy to early release, his program is doomed to fail. Virginia cannot afford the hard dollar costs necessitated by its draconian sentencing and incarceration methods. Those costs don’t even include the millions lost in tax revenues from 40,000 individuals who could be living as working, productive citizens. It doesn’t include the soft costs of children deprived of a parent, being raised in one parent or no-parent homes.
Simply put, there is no way to reduce prison costs without closing prisons and letting people go. As Marc Mauer, Executive Director of the Sentencing Project stated, “the only way you can really reduce spending is close prisons. “
This isn’t some “liberal, soft on crime” fantasy. It is fact. In 2005, Texas began implementing sentencing changes and poured money into drug treatment and probation programs. The results: the state’s incarceration rate dropped, since 2003 – there has been a 12.8 percent drop in violent crime, and the state has saved over $2 billion that was needed to build new prisons. That drastic change was spearheaded by Conservative Republican Governor Rick Perry.
Or, ask Republican Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi what he thinks. In 2008, Mississippi, with the highest incarceration rate in the country, implemented a bold initiative to allow inmates to earn significantly more good time credits toward early release. Included in that was the retroactive provision allowing all nonviolent offenders to be eligible for parole after serving just 25 percent of their sentence. Barbour, coincidentally, has been named as a possible candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.
Want to stop the revolving door of recidivism and gain significant financial savings Virginia? Urge Governor McDonnell to boldly implement early release programs as part of his re-entry initiative.
You don’t have to be an Einstein to know that’s the only solution that can succeed.
Easter 2011
It is a week before Easter and I’ve been reflecting on what that really means. In my “other” life I never gave Easter much thought. I accepted on faith it was “the day”, but really it was more a chance to go to church as a family, make disapproving glances at the “twice a year” churchgoers, and have a nice meal. When the boys were small we’d hide eggs and put Easter baskets together. Family and friends would come over and we’d eat, we’d drink and we’d say a rote blessing thanking God for our “good” life.
In 2009, I spent my first Easter away from my family. I was struggling, just weeks removed from my sentencing, and I heard the judge’s pronouncement ringing in my head. I wondered if God had pulled a fast one on me when He convinced me not to take the “easy way out”.
What kept me going was a belief that I’d be the recipient of an Easter miracle. About two weeks before Easter, a friend came to the jail for a visit. He and his wife were part of our “circle of couples”, those three or four families that seemed to do everything together. I confided in my friend that I believed an Easter miracle was coming. “She’ll come see me. She’ll tell me she loves me and appreciates me signing everything over. She’ll tell me our marriage will endure this.” My friend looked at me and just smiled.
The Friday before Easter, I received a letter from her. It was not what I expected. “You told [insert name here] you expected an Easter miracle. You’re a f---ing idiot! I’ll never come see you. Why would I be interested in you? You have nothing; your credit is ruined; you owe millions; you’re a convicted felon. You’re not much of a catch”. And those were the nice parts of the letter!
“The tomb is empty.”
I remember spending the reminder of the weekend and the next week in a fog. Each night as I lay down, her words scrolled through my head. “Happy Easter”, I thought. God so loved me that He allowed me to be utterly destroyed. And, to make matters worse, He waited until after I promised to see it through before He really put the screws to me. Resurrection was just a word.
Everyone pretty much knows the rest of the story: An angel appeared and convinced me I was needed. My wife realized I was a good man and organized our friends to help me. I was leading a wonderful life. Wait a minute, that’s not what happened to me. That’s Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed in “It’s A Wonderful Life”.
No, my “Easter miracle” went from her “love” letter to having my motion to reconsider my sentence being denied. The Judge “misplaced” my paperwork for seven weeks leading me to foolishly conclude he was seriously considering my request. Instead, he lazily scribbled one sentence to my original sentencing order. Within two days of getting that “good news”, my wife, my soulmate, the love of my life, served divorce papers on me that reserved her right to later ask for alimony and child support (I guess she wanted to cover all the bases. When you get everything without asking you might as well ask for more). In one of my few displays of humor at the time, I told a friend at least she didn’t ask for organ donations or blood (as Bob Dylan said “I gave her my heart, but she wanted my soul”).
Yeah, Easter 2009 was, in my humble opinion, a crock. And, things continued on their downward spiral. I was transferred to DOC Receiving and learned my marriage of twenty-eight years was legally dissolved on the twenty-ninth anniversary of our first date. Of the few friends I had left, a couple of them dropped off the map. I apparently couldn’t be as much fun behind bars as I was when I was the life of the party on the outside. And, I would learn later, my newly declared ex-wife was so traumatized by the divorce and being a single parent that she was involved with a married Canadian before the divorce was even final. Yes, 2009 sucked.
“He liveth.”
I found myself re-assigned to Lunenburg and in early 2010 I began working as an academic aide. I’d also been writing the entire time since my arrest and felt a strange pull to teach a creative writing workshop. A teacher at the school shared my vision and we began teaching creative writing. I was in the classroom, she oversaw editing pieces. By Easter 2010 I had a crazy idea to start this blog.
Truth be told, 2010 was another lousy year: more heartache and pain from the divorce; no contact with my sons; a few more of my dwindling number of friends abandoning me. But, I held on. I remained for the most part, hopeful. I knew things couldn’t – theoretically – get any worse. And, people I came in contact with were actually thankful for my efforts.
I started 2011 convinced miracles were coming. Just like ’09, I was kicked in the teeth. All those feeling of utter despair and hopelessness came charging back to me just as they hit me at Easter 2009: my ex, my sons, my life, all gone never to come back. I was being drowned in a tidal wave of disappointment, abandonment and rejection. One thing, however, was different. This time I knew I wasn’t alone.
I thought about something Paul wrote in his second letter to the Corinthians. He said “we do not lose heart”. In Modern English it goes like this:
“So we’re not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without His unfolding grace.”
I thought about the Easter story. Palm Sunday, Jesus rode into Jerusalem as a hero, the Messiah come to save Israel. Within five days He was betrayed, abandoned and given over to the authorities. He was beaten mercilessly and publicly executed. His followers scattered fearful that they would know the same fate, ashamed that they sold him out.
There on the cross Jesus was executed with two criminals. Then one said to him “you don’t deserve this. I do. Remember me.” Jesus did.
Easter is about miracles. It may not be the miracle of brining my ex-wife and sons back to me; it may not get me released early; but I’m like the criminal on the cross. I made a mess of things but God still loved me enough to remember me and give me a new life.
Knowing that, I won’t ever give up hope. I won’t ever lose heart. Happy Easter!
In 2009, I spent my first Easter away from my family. I was struggling, just weeks removed from my sentencing, and I heard the judge’s pronouncement ringing in my head. I wondered if God had pulled a fast one on me when He convinced me not to take the “easy way out”.
What kept me going was a belief that I’d be the recipient of an Easter miracle. About two weeks before Easter, a friend came to the jail for a visit. He and his wife were part of our “circle of couples”, those three or four families that seemed to do everything together. I confided in my friend that I believed an Easter miracle was coming. “She’ll come see me. She’ll tell me she loves me and appreciates me signing everything over. She’ll tell me our marriage will endure this.” My friend looked at me and just smiled.
The Friday before Easter, I received a letter from her. It was not what I expected. “You told [insert name here] you expected an Easter miracle. You’re a f---ing idiot! I’ll never come see you. Why would I be interested in you? You have nothing; your credit is ruined; you owe millions; you’re a convicted felon. You’re not much of a catch”. And those were the nice parts of the letter!
“The tomb is empty.”
I remember spending the reminder of the weekend and the next week in a fog. Each night as I lay down, her words scrolled through my head. “Happy Easter”, I thought. God so loved me that He allowed me to be utterly destroyed. And, to make matters worse, He waited until after I promised to see it through before He really put the screws to me. Resurrection was just a word.
Everyone pretty much knows the rest of the story: An angel appeared and convinced me I was needed. My wife realized I was a good man and organized our friends to help me. I was leading a wonderful life. Wait a minute, that’s not what happened to me. That’s Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed in “It’s A Wonderful Life”.
No, my “Easter miracle” went from her “love” letter to having my motion to reconsider my sentence being denied. The Judge “misplaced” my paperwork for seven weeks leading me to foolishly conclude he was seriously considering my request. Instead, he lazily scribbled one sentence to my original sentencing order. Within two days of getting that “good news”, my wife, my soulmate, the love of my life, served divorce papers on me that reserved her right to later ask for alimony and child support (I guess she wanted to cover all the bases. When you get everything without asking you might as well ask for more). In one of my few displays of humor at the time, I told a friend at least she didn’t ask for organ donations or blood (as Bob Dylan said “I gave her my heart, but she wanted my soul”).
Yeah, Easter 2009 was, in my humble opinion, a crock. And, things continued on their downward spiral. I was transferred to DOC Receiving and learned my marriage of twenty-eight years was legally dissolved on the twenty-ninth anniversary of our first date. Of the few friends I had left, a couple of them dropped off the map. I apparently couldn’t be as much fun behind bars as I was when I was the life of the party on the outside. And, I would learn later, my newly declared ex-wife was so traumatized by the divorce and being a single parent that she was involved with a married Canadian before the divorce was even final. Yes, 2009 sucked.
“He liveth.”
I found myself re-assigned to Lunenburg and in early 2010 I began working as an academic aide. I’d also been writing the entire time since my arrest and felt a strange pull to teach a creative writing workshop. A teacher at the school shared my vision and we began teaching creative writing. I was in the classroom, she oversaw editing pieces. By Easter 2010 I had a crazy idea to start this blog.
Truth be told, 2010 was another lousy year: more heartache and pain from the divorce; no contact with my sons; a few more of my dwindling number of friends abandoning me. But, I held on. I remained for the most part, hopeful. I knew things couldn’t – theoretically – get any worse. And, people I came in contact with were actually thankful for my efforts.
I started 2011 convinced miracles were coming. Just like ’09, I was kicked in the teeth. All those feeling of utter despair and hopelessness came charging back to me just as they hit me at Easter 2009: my ex, my sons, my life, all gone never to come back. I was being drowned in a tidal wave of disappointment, abandonment and rejection. One thing, however, was different. This time I knew I wasn’t alone.
I thought about something Paul wrote in his second letter to the Corinthians. He said “we do not lose heart”. In Modern English it goes like this:
“So we’re not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without His unfolding grace.”
I thought about the Easter story. Palm Sunday, Jesus rode into Jerusalem as a hero, the Messiah come to save Israel. Within five days He was betrayed, abandoned and given over to the authorities. He was beaten mercilessly and publicly executed. His followers scattered fearful that they would know the same fate, ashamed that they sold him out.
There on the cross Jesus was executed with two criminals. Then one said to him “you don’t deserve this. I do. Remember me.” Jesus did.
Easter is about miracles. It may not be the miracle of brining my ex-wife and sons back to me; it may not get me released early; but I’m like the criminal on the cross. I made a mess of things but God still loved me enough to remember me and give me a new life.
Knowing that, I won’t ever give up hope. I won’t ever lose heart. Happy Easter!
Leaven Causes Blindness
One blessing of being in this place is I’ve had to confront many of the prejudices I carried through my life as I interact with all types of men I frankly thought were beneath me. As I face these issues, I’ve come across numerous Bible stories that bring home the hypocrisy of my life. Ironically, the more I read, the more I realize we live lives that ignore what God sees. We see color, we see differences; we feel intellectually superior. God sees His children.
If anyone would have told me I’d learn life lessons from “convicts” I’d have thought they were crazy. Yet, as I watch these men deal day in and day out deal with disappointment, I learn patience. Character, I always believed, comes through in times of trial and crisis. If that’s true, I have seen more character exhibited in these past three years than in my entire life. The same goes for compassion. I have watched men with little share all they have.
In one of the Gospel stories Jesus, as he was accustomed to doing, warned his disciples against the leaven of the Pharisees. Leaven, yeast, the blowing up of our lives in hypocrisy and self-delusion. He was warning His followers that hypocrites put on a good show, but eventually all their sins will be revealed.
I ponder that lesson a good deal in here. I was one of the Pharisees in a manner of speaking. I was a “good” church elder, active in community service, a “good” employee – really a big fish in a little pond. I had, from outside appearances a perfect home life: attractive wife, two wonderful sons, big house, travel, money. And, it was easy to cast judgment on others. After all, I made it, why can’t they.
But, I had a dark side. I was stealing from my employer and boosting my own ego by throwing money at family and friends to get what I craved. And, like Jesus said, all my sins were revealed and the life I’d built was really a house of cards.
The “perfect” marriage; that disintegrated the day I was arrested. All my “soulmate” really wanted, really kept me around for, was the money and stuff. My side of the bed wasn’t even cold and she was filling out questionnaires on date sites (apparently there were some “out” clauses in our vows I overlooked). And my kids? In their eyes, I was replaceable. Everything I held up as evidence of my moral superiority and self-worth lay in ruin. The “loaf” that was my life had risen with bad yeast.
Then I came in to “the system” and I started meeting the “dregs” of society, the “bad guys”, the “failures”, all those people I looked down on. And a funny thing happened along the way. My eyes were suddenly opened to the decency of these “scumbags”, and the darkness in my “perfect” world.
I received a copy of a recent sermon delivered by a minister as part of his Lenten series (it wasn’t from my church family. They dropped me soon after my arrest. All those “good” church people delivered meals to my wife but only three ever bothered to visit or write. Not one ever spoke to my wife about God’s view of marriage). His sermon was about Jesus giving sight to a blind man.
His disciples asked if the man – blind since birth – was that way because of his parents’ sins. Funny how we equate bad circumstances as “Karma” – “he must have done something to deserve that.” Instead, Jesus turns things on their head and, in effect said, the reason he’s blind isn’t important. But, watch how God heals him. In a matter of minutes the man sees. God has made him whole.
But, his community rejected him. They rejected him because their perception of him was different than the reality of what God saw, and what God can do.
Many days I sit here in awe of the lessons I learn from these men. During these very difficult past few months as I struggled over the correspondence exchange with my ex, it was guys in here who came by with a kind word. My “friends” from home? They had to remain “neutral” and not appear to be giving any aid or comfort to me. After all, my ex has a new boyfriend who’s now part of the circle!
I received a card the other night from a friend. In it he told the story of a minister who asked members of his congregation to list on a piece of paper their top three hopes for their life. As the congregation finished writing, he told them to draw a line through their items because “none of them will happen”. As the crowd grew uneasy and sad he told them “Hope is what is left when all of the things we hoped for do not come true. Hope with a capital “H” is in you, and gives you life and the will to go on trusting God.”
I have a list and my list is in tatters. Everything I hoped for has been lined out. Yet, I see clearly now. I see people for what they are. The young inmate, back in prison for his second bid, covered in tattoos, yet he stops by to check on me or he shares a meal with someone worse off, he is closer to a Christ like man than I ever was. He sees what mercy, compassion and kindness are all about.
My family or my friends? They are so much like the community that pushed the man – with sight restored – away, their sins are still hidden.
I see now how my life really wasn’t that great. I see now that even those who look differently, act differently, have a capacity for love, forgiveness and mercy beyond what I ever experienced.
I see the danger of the leavening. None of us are really “good”. Oh, some may try harder than others, but as Mother Teresa admitted, we all sin. We all treat others in a way we wouldn’t want to be treated.
What I learned in here is, God can do anything. He can make the blind see – and a self-absorbed arrogant man learn humility, mercy and hope.
If anyone would have told me I’d learn life lessons from “convicts” I’d have thought they were crazy. Yet, as I watch these men deal day in and day out deal with disappointment, I learn patience. Character, I always believed, comes through in times of trial and crisis. If that’s true, I have seen more character exhibited in these past three years than in my entire life. The same goes for compassion. I have watched men with little share all they have.
In one of the Gospel stories Jesus, as he was accustomed to doing, warned his disciples against the leaven of the Pharisees. Leaven, yeast, the blowing up of our lives in hypocrisy and self-delusion. He was warning His followers that hypocrites put on a good show, but eventually all their sins will be revealed.
I ponder that lesson a good deal in here. I was one of the Pharisees in a manner of speaking. I was a “good” church elder, active in community service, a “good” employee – really a big fish in a little pond. I had, from outside appearances a perfect home life: attractive wife, two wonderful sons, big house, travel, money. And, it was easy to cast judgment on others. After all, I made it, why can’t they.
But, I had a dark side. I was stealing from my employer and boosting my own ego by throwing money at family and friends to get what I craved. And, like Jesus said, all my sins were revealed and the life I’d built was really a house of cards.
The “perfect” marriage; that disintegrated the day I was arrested. All my “soulmate” really wanted, really kept me around for, was the money and stuff. My side of the bed wasn’t even cold and she was filling out questionnaires on date sites (apparently there were some “out” clauses in our vows I overlooked). And my kids? In their eyes, I was replaceable. Everything I held up as evidence of my moral superiority and self-worth lay in ruin. The “loaf” that was my life had risen with bad yeast.
Then I came in to “the system” and I started meeting the “dregs” of society, the “bad guys”, the “failures”, all those people I looked down on. And a funny thing happened along the way. My eyes were suddenly opened to the decency of these “scumbags”, and the darkness in my “perfect” world.
I received a copy of a recent sermon delivered by a minister as part of his Lenten series (it wasn’t from my church family. They dropped me soon after my arrest. All those “good” church people delivered meals to my wife but only three ever bothered to visit or write. Not one ever spoke to my wife about God’s view of marriage). His sermon was about Jesus giving sight to a blind man.
His disciples asked if the man – blind since birth – was that way because of his parents’ sins. Funny how we equate bad circumstances as “Karma” – “he must have done something to deserve that.” Instead, Jesus turns things on their head and, in effect said, the reason he’s blind isn’t important. But, watch how God heals him. In a matter of minutes the man sees. God has made him whole.
But, his community rejected him. They rejected him because their perception of him was different than the reality of what God saw, and what God can do.
Many days I sit here in awe of the lessons I learn from these men. During these very difficult past few months as I struggled over the correspondence exchange with my ex, it was guys in here who came by with a kind word. My “friends” from home? They had to remain “neutral” and not appear to be giving any aid or comfort to me. After all, my ex has a new boyfriend who’s now part of the circle!
I received a card the other night from a friend. In it he told the story of a minister who asked members of his congregation to list on a piece of paper their top three hopes for their life. As the congregation finished writing, he told them to draw a line through their items because “none of them will happen”. As the crowd grew uneasy and sad he told them “Hope is what is left when all of the things we hoped for do not come true. Hope with a capital “H” is in you, and gives you life and the will to go on trusting God.”
I have a list and my list is in tatters. Everything I hoped for has been lined out. Yet, I see clearly now. I see people for what they are. The young inmate, back in prison for his second bid, covered in tattoos, yet he stops by to check on me or he shares a meal with someone worse off, he is closer to a Christ like man than I ever was. He sees what mercy, compassion and kindness are all about.
My family or my friends? They are so much like the community that pushed the man – with sight restored – away, their sins are still hidden.
I see now how my life really wasn’t that great. I see now that even those who look differently, act differently, have a capacity for love, forgiveness and mercy beyond what I ever experienced.
I see the danger of the leavening. None of us are really “good”. Oh, some may try harder than others, but as Mother Teresa admitted, we all sin. We all treat others in a way we wouldn’t want to be treated.
What I learned in here is, God can do anything. He can make the blind see – and a self-absorbed arrogant man learn humility, mercy and hope.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Priorities
As I write this, E is still in the hole (day 12). No one knows if he’s getting out today, tomorrow, or ten days from now (time in the hole past ten days usually goes in five day increments). His remaining prison time has been altered. He has lost educational opportunities, a chance at completing his degree while here, his employment, and probably some of his good time.
Last night, one of the guys pulled a charge on the way to English class. “Unique” is no stranger to run-ins with officers. He’s a “5 percenter” (a Nation of Islam offshoot) and isn’t averse to being verbally confrontational with the staff. I’ve repeatedly told him to “be smarter than the guards” but they clearly bait him and he takes the bait.
As I’ve written before, I spend a great deal of time talking to these guys. In the past, I’ve said over and over “Get your priorities straight! Your education, your future, is too important to waste.” As my frustration would build, Randy (the personal trainer) could always be counted on to remind me “Larry, they do have their priorities in order. You may think E doesn’t have his priorities in order, but he does. He wanted a tattoo more than anything else. Doesn’t make sense, but a lot of what we do doesn’t make sense.”
And that made me think about my own situation. Did I put things ahead of my wife and kids? Painfully, I must admit I did. I knew embezzling from my employer was wrong. I knew there were significant risks. Yet, as I weighed the potential risks (prison, divorce, public shame) I always downplayed the likelihood of any of these risks coming to pass. In other words, I rationalized my wants by trivializing my risks.
Confession time. I had a good number of reasons for doing what I did. Did they make sense? Not in hindsight. But, at the time, having serious questions about my spouse’s love and commitment toward me, I rationalized being everything to everybody made sense. I could, I thought, make her love me.
In 2005, during a trip to Las Vegas, I was having drinks with my friend. I had had way too much to drink by this point and, as alcohol usually does, I spoke candidly to him about my worries that my wife really didn’t love me. “She’ll leave me if anything bad happens, any setbacks, and f---ups.” I slurred out. “You’re nuts,” he replied. But, then I told him about the problem in Tennessee when she told me we were staying together because she had nowhere else to go with our infant sons. I told him how she had pawned her wedding ring once before when I’d gotten in trouble. I told him after our friends lost a child she said to me “if anything happens to the kids, I don’t think we’ll survive.”
He and I never spoke about this again, until after my arrest and the first of many letters I would receive from the woman I loved. She began almost each jail letter with “there is no us, hasn’t been for a long time.” He and I revisited Vegas sitting in the jail.
As I thought about E and Unique and all the guys who seem to make dumb decisions, I couldn’t help thinking about my life. It dawned on me one day that I was willing to steal and do really anything to win a bet I had with myself that my wife loved me no matter what. “I bet I can steal a million dollars and she’ll stay because she loves me,” I’d tell myself, then remember she really wouldn’t hang in there.
Priorities. I made a commitment to a woman I loved. I took a vow and relied on that vow when I found myself wondering why this woman I adored wouldn’t eat and was depressed. At twenty-two, I realized when you loved someone it was for keeps, not just when things were good.
Priorities. I knew deep down I hadn’t been a priority in my wife’s life for years. That’s painful to write, but had I had the courage to say it years ago, I might not have ended up in here. Funny, she kept the house, the furniture, the artwork, everything we accumulated during our marriage, except me. The things were more important than the man.
Priorities. I received a blog response from “Anonymous” the other day suggesting I faced painful choices: close a chapter in my life and move on or hang on. In my mind I really don’t have a choice. Big S always says “you can’t make people be what they’re not and you can’t get disappointed when they are who they are.” What I want, what I needed all those years, was for the woman I loved to have said just once “I love you forever, no matter what we face.” But, she didn’t feel that for me. Why should I expect her to have an epiphany now and suddenly change?
Prison has given me a great deal of time for self-reflection and a chance to see the big picture. I watch the guys in here day in and day out, make self-destructive decisions and I realize it’s not any different from living “in the real world”. We all get our priorities out of whack at times. We all get desperate for something – a car, a house, recognition, love – and we minimize the risks and consequences of our reckless behavior.
For a long time I thought prison had radically changed me. That these experiences were making me into the loving, compassionate man God wants me to be. Then, I remembered that 22 year-old boy who was willing to hang in there out of a sense of love and commitment. That boy had his priorities in order. This 51 year old man is finally back to getting his right. So “Anonymous”, I wish I knew who you were. You really make me think. I don’t know what I’m going to do, but it will be the right thing though; I can assure you of that.
And E? He was just released from the hole as I write this and removed from the college program. He’s living in a different building; he’s lost his grant for college and will not be allowed back in. He can say “what the hell” and waste the rest of his time here or he can regroup, fight back and get his priorities in order. The choice is all up to him.
That’s the thing about priorities. They’re all up to us.
Last night, one of the guys pulled a charge on the way to English class. “Unique” is no stranger to run-ins with officers. He’s a “5 percenter” (a Nation of Islam offshoot) and isn’t averse to being verbally confrontational with the staff. I’ve repeatedly told him to “be smarter than the guards” but they clearly bait him and he takes the bait.
As I’ve written before, I spend a great deal of time talking to these guys. In the past, I’ve said over and over “Get your priorities straight! Your education, your future, is too important to waste.” As my frustration would build, Randy (the personal trainer) could always be counted on to remind me “Larry, they do have their priorities in order. You may think E doesn’t have his priorities in order, but he does. He wanted a tattoo more than anything else. Doesn’t make sense, but a lot of what we do doesn’t make sense.”
And that made me think about my own situation. Did I put things ahead of my wife and kids? Painfully, I must admit I did. I knew embezzling from my employer was wrong. I knew there were significant risks. Yet, as I weighed the potential risks (prison, divorce, public shame) I always downplayed the likelihood of any of these risks coming to pass. In other words, I rationalized my wants by trivializing my risks.
Confession time. I had a good number of reasons for doing what I did. Did they make sense? Not in hindsight. But, at the time, having serious questions about my spouse’s love and commitment toward me, I rationalized being everything to everybody made sense. I could, I thought, make her love me.
In 2005, during a trip to Las Vegas, I was having drinks with my friend. I had had way too much to drink by this point and, as alcohol usually does, I spoke candidly to him about my worries that my wife really didn’t love me. “She’ll leave me if anything bad happens, any setbacks, and f---ups.” I slurred out. “You’re nuts,” he replied. But, then I told him about the problem in Tennessee when she told me we were staying together because she had nowhere else to go with our infant sons. I told him how she had pawned her wedding ring once before when I’d gotten in trouble. I told him after our friends lost a child she said to me “if anything happens to the kids, I don’t think we’ll survive.”
He and I never spoke about this again, until after my arrest and the first of many letters I would receive from the woman I loved. She began almost each jail letter with “there is no us, hasn’t been for a long time.” He and I revisited Vegas sitting in the jail.
As I thought about E and Unique and all the guys who seem to make dumb decisions, I couldn’t help thinking about my life. It dawned on me one day that I was willing to steal and do really anything to win a bet I had with myself that my wife loved me no matter what. “I bet I can steal a million dollars and she’ll stay because she loves me,” I’d tell myself, then remember she really wouldn’t hang in there.
Priorities. I made a commitment to a woman I loved. I took a vow and relied on that vow when I found myself wondering why this woman I adored wouldn’t eat and was depressed. At twenty-two, I realized when you loved someone it was for keeps, not just when things were good.
Priorities. I knew deep down I hadn’t been a priority in my wife’s life for years. That’s painful to write, but had I had the courage to say it years ago, I might not have ended up in here. Funny, she kept the house, the furniture, the artwork, everything we accumulated during our marriage, except me. The things were more important than the man.
Priorities. I received a blog response from “Anonymous” the other day suggesting I faced painful choices: close a chapter in my life and move on or hang on. In my mind I really don’t have a choice. Big S always says “you can’t make people be what they’re not and you can’t get disappointed when they are who they are.” What I want, what I needed all those years, was for the woman I loved to have said just once “I love you forever, no matter what we face.” But, she didn’t feel that for me. Why should I expect her to have an epiphany now and suddenly change?
Prison has given me a great deal of time for self-reflection and a chance to see the big picture. I watch the guys in here day in and day out, make self-destructive decisions and I realize it’s not any different from living “in the real world”. We all get our priorities out of whack at times. We all get desperate for something – a car, a house, recognition, love – and we minimize the risks and consequences of our reckless behavior.
For a long time I thought prison had radically changed me. That these experiences were making me into the loving, compassionate man God wants me to be. Then, I remembered that 22 year-old boy who was willing to hang in there out of a sense of love and commitment. That boy had his priorities in order. This 51 year old man is finally back to getting his right. So “Anonymous”, I wish I knew who you were. You really make me think. I don’t know what I’m going to do, but it will be the right thing though; I can assure you of that.
And E? He was just released from the hole as I write this and removed from the college program. He’s living in a different building; he’s lost his grant for college and will not be allowed back in. He can say “what the hell” and waste the rest of his time here or he can regroup, fight back and get his priorities in order. The choice is all up to him.
That’s the thing about priorities. They’re all up to us.
Simon Says
I saw Simon Cowell interviewed the other night. With remarkable understatement, Cowell, when asked about his “comeback” from losing everything to being a multi-millionaire said the following: “you can get things and money back. People worry too much about losing everything.” Wow!
Thirteen years ago Cowell lost everything. He rode to his parents’ home with 5 pounds in his pocket. That was the sum total of his financial wealth. Yet, here he is today, one of the most successful television and music producers in the world.
I thought about the interview a good deal as I worked with students this week. Every day one of the guys will ask me “do you really think I can do this? Do you really think I can find a good job and make it?” I always tell them the same thing: “I believe you can.” Those aren’t just words. I do believe it.
The guys in the building all know my situation: 51; I owe over $1.5 million in restitution; I’ll never practice law again; I gave everything I owned to my wife – who promptly divorced me as soon as I signed the papers – which means I have nothing. Yet the guys always say “but you’ll be fine”. And, I believe I will. The point is, I believe. And, if they can believe in me, they can believe in themselves.
Simon Cowell is right. It’s not about things. Things – money, clothes, homes – can be replaced. I read Isaiah 46 this morning. In that chapter the prophet is noting the siege of Babylon. The city’s inhabitants are fleeing the city and their carts are loaded with the peoples’ idols. The animals strain to move the load. And then Isaiah says this to God’s children:
“Even to your old age, I am He, and even to gray hairs I will carry you.”
Those words ring in my head everyday: “I will carry you.” Every struggle I endure, every moment of loss I feel over my ex and my kids, I remember, “I will carry you.”
I wonder sometime why, in the midst of some of the worst days of my life, I have the most meaningful influence on these guys. It’s because I’m not doing this alone. I’m being carried. I believe in these guys because I know He believes in me.
For a long time I wondered why God chose Moses – a murderer – to lead his people from bondage. I wondered why He still blessed Abraham with a child after he pimpled out Sarah to Pharaoh; I wondered about Rebekah and Jacob lying to Isaac and David being an adulterer and liar and Peter’s betrayal. I finally realized He carries all of us. We just have to let Him by trusting Him and doing the same for others.
There’s a great explanation of it in Big S’s Modern Language Bible when Jesus said “anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat, I am. Don’t run from suffering, embrace it…What good would it do to get everything you want and lose the real you? What would you ever trade your soul for?”
Today, I helped over twenty-three guys write their second critical essay for English. I’m tired, but not exhausted. I got through another week without hearing what I want from my ex or my kids. But I made it through; I was carried the entire way.
Thirteen years ago Cowell lost everything. He rode to his parents’ home with 5 pounds in his pocket. That was the sum total of his financial wealth. Yet, here he is today, one of the most successful television and music producers in the world.
I thought about the interview a good deal as I worked with students this week. Every day one of the guys will ask me “do you really think I can do this? Do you really think I can find a good job and make it?” I always tell them the same thing: “I believe you can.” Those aren’t just words. I do believe it.
The guys in the building all know my situation: 51; I owe over $1.5 million in restitution; I’ll never practice law again; I gave everything I owned to my wife – who promptly divorced me as soon as I signed the papers – which means I have nothing. Yet the guys always say “but you’ll be fine”. And, I believe I will. The point is, I believe. And, if they can believe in me, they can believe in themselves.
Simon Cowell is right. It’s not about things. Things – money, clothes, homes – can be replaced. I read Isaiah 46 this morning. In that chapter the prophet is noting the siege of Babylon. The city’s inhabitants are fleeing the city and their carts are loaded with the peoples’ idols. The animals strain to move the load. And then Isaiah says this to God’s children:
“Even to your old age, I am He, and even to gray hairs I will carry you.”
Those words ring in my head everyday: “I will carry you.” Every struggle I endure, every moment of loss I feel over my ex and my kids, I remember, “I will carry you.”
I wonder sometime why, in the midst of some of the worst days of my life, I have the most meaningful influence on these guys. It’s because I’m not doing this alone. I’m being carried. I believe in these guys because I know He believes in me.
For a long time I wondered why God chose Moses – a murderer – to lead his people from bondage. I wondered why He still blessed Abraham with a child after he pimpled out Sarah to Pharaoh; I wondered about Rebekah and Jacob lying to Isaac and David being an adulterer and liar and Peter’s betrayal. I finally realized He carries all of us. We just have to let Him by trusting Him and doing the same for others.
There’s a great explanation of it in Big S’s Modern Language Bible when Jesus said “anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat, I am. Don’t run from suffering, embrace it…What good would it do to get everything you want and lose the real you? What would you ever trade your soul for?”
Today, I helped over twenty-three guys write their second critical essay for English. I’m tired, but not exhausted. I got through another week without hearing what I want from my ex or my kids. But I made it through; I was carried the entire way.
Sometimes the Truth
I struggle every week with what I disclose in these pages. It’s become a running joke among the guys. Anything that is said or happens around me is fair game for the blog. Still, on more than one occasion I have been asked by well meaning people to keep “something to myself”. “I’m not sure how [insert name here] will feel about that story.”
Two letters the past week and a couple of guys comments in here lead me to explain why I write what I do. Why do I tell everything, good and bad, that happens in here? Why do I spill my guts about my life and the emotions I’m going through with my broken relations? Two reasons: it’s the truth and like love, it matters.
The two letters. I have a relative who was a big part of my life growing up. But as adults sometimes do, we get hung up on our own lives and, feeling snug and self-righteous, we are quick to pass judgment when troubles arise in someone else’s life. This woman took me to Shea Stadium in 1968 and I saw the New York Mets play baseball for the first time. I fell in love with the Mets that day. As a ten year old I watched the ’69 Mets do the impossible. As a 27 year old I learned God was a Mets fan when I stood in my living room during game six of the 1986 World Series and knew, yes I knew, the Mets would win.
So this woman, who gave me my love of baseball, announced to the family one day she was divorcing her husband. My reaction? She was a failure. “Successful people” don’t quit relationships. We still communicated, but there was a distance.
Then I came to prison and out of the blue she wrote. Funny how things roll around. I thought I had the “perfect” wife who loved me, no matter what (if I really believed that, why was I constantly afraid she didn’t love me?), I had a “great” life (so great I thought I had to make people happy for them to accept me). Then I got arrested, got convicted and in short order my “perfect” wife announced (1) she hadn’t loved me for a long time (2) my kids broke off contact with me (3) my friends (some right away, others recently) abandoned me (4) my wife divorced me, then embarked on relationships with a couple of men, one of whom is now hanging out with my younger son at the house I gave my wife to protect her and our kids while I was trying to make this right. I said funny. That is really damn hilarious!
Anyway, my aunt began writing and it reminded me how cool it was when we talked about baseball and how wrong it was for me to have not even listened to her. The other day she wrote again. The letter was full of baseball stuff and this: “You are more honest in one blog than most people are in their lifetime.” I took those words to heart.
The other letter was from my older friend who provides me spiritual insight. During those terrible recent days I wrote her and a local friend asking for guidance as I dealt with still more turmoil involving my ex. My local friend never responded. She, however, did and she told me things about her life, her struggles, that floored me. After reading her letter and praying I knew what I had to do, how I needed to move forward.
Sometimes what I write about is difficult to read. I’m sure there are some who wish I’d just not discuss “certain things”. But, it’s the truth and I don’t write anything out of anger or resentment. Fact is, I write what I do out of a sense of gratitude for God giving me this opportunity to see and endure this and because some of the people I write about I love more deeply now than I ever did.
The other reason I write what I do is because of the people I’ve met along the way. Every week guys ask me what I’m writing about. Every week guys will say “do you really think anybody cares?” I always tell them somebody does, in fact, care and it matters. Because the truth matters. What happens in these men’s lives matter.
Whether I write about her or not isn’t going to make my ex-wife suddenly remember what existed between us and make her come to see me or write me the kind of letter I long to receive. It won’t make my sons open up to me or my friends remember what friendship means. It won’t change DOC or make the Governor put his faith in action. Then again, maybe it will. Sometimes the truth can do miraculous things.
Two letters the past week and a couple of guys comments in here lead me to explain why I write what I do. Why do I tell everything, good and bad, that happens in here? Why do I spill my guts about my life and the emotions I’m going through with my broken relations? Two reasons: it’s the truth and like love, it matters.
The two letters. I have a relative who was a big part of my life growing up. But as adults sometimes do, we get hung up on our own lives and, feeling snug and self-righteous, we are quick to pass judgment when troubles arise in someone else’s life. This woman took me to Shea Stadium in 1968 and I saw the New York Mets play baseball for the first time. I fell in love with the Mets that day. As a ten year old I watched the ’69 Mets do the impossible. As a 27 year old I learned God was a Mets fan when I stood in my living room during game six of the 1986 World Series and knew, yes I knew, the Mets would win.
So this woman, who gave me my love of baseball, announced to the family one day she was divorcing her husband. My reaction? She was a failure. “Successful people” don’t quit relationships. We still communicated, but there was a distance.
Then I came to prison and out of the blue she wrote. Funny how things roll around. I thought I had the “perfect” wife who loved me, no matter what (if I really believed that, why was I constantly afraid she didn’t love me?), I had a “great” life (so great I thought I had to make people happy for them to accept me). Then I got arrested, got convicted and in short order my “perfect” wife announced (1) she hadn’t loved me for a long time (2) my kids broke off contact with me (3) my friends (some right away, others recently) abandoned me (4) my wife divorced me, then embarked on relationships with a couple of men, one of whom is now hanging out with my younger son at the house I gave my wife to protect her and our kids while I was trying to make this right. I said funny. That is really damn hilarious!
Anyway, my aunt began writing and it reminded me how cool it was when we talked about baseball and how wrong it was for me to have not even listened to her. The other day she wrote again. The letter was full of baseball stuff and this: “You are more honest in one blog than most people are in their lifetime.” I took those words to heart.
The other letter was from my older friend who provides me spiritual insight. During those terrible recent days I wrote her and a local friend asking for guidance as I dealt with still more turmoil involving my ex. My local friend never responded. She, however, did and she told me things about her life, her struggles, that floored me. After reading her letter and praying I knew what I had to do, how I needed to move forward.
Sometimes what I write about is difficult to read. I’m sure there are some who wish I’d just not discuss “certain things”. But, it’s the truth and I don’t write anything out of anger or resentment. Fact is, I write what I do out of a sense of gratitude for God giving me this opportunity to see and endure this and because some of the people I write about I love more deeply now than I ever did.
The other reason I write what I do is because of the people I’ve met along the way. Every week guys ask me what I’m writing about. Every week guys will say “do you really think anybody cares?” I always tell them somebody does, in fact, care and it matters. Because the truth matters. What happens in these men’s lives matter.
Whether I write about her or not isn’t going to make my ex-wife suddenly remember what existed between us and make her come to see me or write me the kind of letter I long to receive. It won’t make my sons open up to me or my friends remember what friendship means. It won’t change DOC or make the Governor put his faith in action. Then again, maybe it will. Sometimes the truth can do miraculous things.
Prison Time
Most inmates will tell you time just passes by when you’re “doin’ your bid.” Each day, a repeat of the prior one. You get up the same time, eat the same time, get rec the same time. Life, you will hear, “just is”. But, there is so much that actually does go on each day in here. Men’s lives are altered dramatically.
Wednesday afternoon Woo was called to the counselor’s office and told to “call home”. His elderly mother has been battling breast cancer for years. As I’ve gotten to know this fierce looking yet gentle man, I knew the prognosis for his mom wasn’t good. He has fourteen months remaining on his sentence. “I just want to get out and sit with her before she passes”, he told me.
His call home was brief. I could tell the news wasn’t good. “They’ve put her in hospice”, he told me with tears in his eyes. All I could say was “I’m sorry” and “I’m here to listen”. I gave him his space. Later, I went back to see him. I told him if he needed to miss English that evening I’d explain to the Professor. “I’m going. Mom’s proud of me for doing this. I can’t miss this class.”
E is still in the hole. They didn’t let him out Tuesday. The earliest he’ll be released is this coming Tuesday, after his hearing. That would be ten days in the hole.
He won’t come back to this building. He’s been thrown out of the college/IT program, suspended from college for ninety days, fired from his job and removed from his HVAC apprenticeship program. He won’t be able to finish his Associates Degree before he goes home. And going home? He’ll probably have some of his good time taken away.
Was it worth the back tattoo of a Chinese dragon in bamboo and orchids? “It would’ve cost me $3000 on the street,” he told one of the housemen who works over by the hole. “So instead you tossed away $20,000 in education? You’re a dumbass.” I love the way guys “keep it real” in here.
E didn’t deserve all the consequences he’s been handed. He’s been made a scapegoat by the prison administration to show they don’t want the college program to succeed (a number of officers have told me that). Why would E deserve a ten day term in the hole, but the tattoo artist, caught with the tattoo gun and ink, only gets a 200 level charge and $10.00 fine? Life isn’t fair and sometimes – as I have personally discovered - the consequences we suffer are significantly worse than the wrongdoing we commit. That becomes clearer every day in here.
Then there was the conversation I overheard by Will and my new bunkmate – IG. IG is a Crips leader. He took E’s bunk the other day; he’s a polite, young black kid working toward his associate’s degree.
Will – early 20’s black kid – was folding his laundry around 11:00 the other night and was talking to IG. I was having a tough time falling asleep and couldn’t help but focus in on what Will said.
“I talked to him tonight. He said ‘hi da da.’ She said she’s happy, but no other guy can love my boy like me.” I heard him choke up as he continued. “I want to be there. I want to raise my son. She doesn’t get the whole reason he’s acting like he likes my boy is to sleep with her.”
I felt for Will. I know what he’s going through. The same thoughts ran through my mind before as I’ve thought about the “boyfriend”; impress my son, score points with mom, make yourself at home.
Will dealt drugs, lots of drugs. He sold drugs to make money to give his high school sweetheart, his wife, a comfortable lifestyle. He bought a house; bought her a car, paid for her college and they had a baby. She told him she loved him. Then, he was arrested and sentenced to prison: three years. In less than a year, the woman who claimed she loved him “in sickness and in health, in good times and bad, forsaking all others” had divorced him. Apparently, those words were just something to say to get the gifts and the cake.
As I said, I felt for Will; as a father, as a husband, as a man. He’s trying to get his life straight, trying to do his sentence, get his education, and go home and make something of himself for his wife and his child. Problem is, his wife gave up on him. He’s trying. He’s working. He’s suffering. He’s praying.
The other day Opie came up to my cut with his CD player. “Listen to this,” he said and handed me his headphones. It was rapper Jim Jones singing “I Know”. It’s a song about guys doing time. Over and over Jones tells about the struggles in the street; the drugs, broken homes, broken dreams, and he says “I know, I know.” Then, real men come on speaking “I gave the penitentiary ten years of my life…and for what?” or “they locked me up in ’89 and I didn’t go home ‘til ’04. I didn’t recognize nothin.”
I understood the song. I understood the pain. I understood the time.
Wednesday afternoon Woo was called to the counselor’s office and told to “call home”. His elderly mother has been battling breast cancer for years. As I’ve gotten to know this fierce looking yet gentle man, I knew the prognosis for his mom wasn’t good. He has fourteen months remaining on his sentence. “I just want to get out and sit with her before she passes”, he told me.
His call home was brief. I could tell the news wasn’t good. “They’ve put her in hospice”, he told me with tears in his eyes. All I could say was “I’m sorry” and “I’m here to listen”. I gave him his space. Later, I went back to see him. I told him if he needed to miss English that evening I’d explain to the Professor. “I’m going. Mom’s proud of me for doing this. I can’t miss this class.”
E is still in the hole. They didn’t let him out Tuesday. The earliest he’ll be released is this coming Tuesday, after his hearing. That would be ten days in the hole.
He won’t come back to this building. He’s been thrown out of the college/IT program, suspended from college for ninety days, fired from his job and removed from his HVAC apprenticeship program. He won’t be able to finish his Associates Degree before he goes home. And going home? He’ll probably have some of his good time taken away.
Was it worth the back tattoo of a Chinese dragon in bamboo and orchids? “It would’ve cost me $3000 on the street,” he told one of the housemen who works over by the hole. “So instead you tossed away $20,000 in education? You’re a dumbass.” I love the way guys “keep it real” in here.
E didn’t deserve all the consequences he’s been handed. He’s been made a scapegoat by the prison administration to show they don’t want the college program to succeed (a number of officers have told me that). Why would E deserve a ten day term in the hole, but the tattoo artist, caught with the tattoo gun and ink, only gets a 200 level charge and $10.00 fine? Life isn’t fair and sometimes – as I have personally discovered - the consequences we suffer are significantly worse than the wrongdoing we commit. That becomes clearer every day in here.
Then there was the conversation I overheard by Will and my new bunkmate – IG. IG is a Crips leader. He took E’s bunk the other day; he’s a polite, young black kid working toward his associate’s degree.
Will – early 20’s black kid – was folding his laundry around 11:00 the other night and was talking to IG. I was having a tough time falling asleep and couldn’t help but focus in on what Will said.
“I talked to him tonight. He said ‘hi da da.’ She said she’s happy, but no other guy can love my boy like me.” I heard him choke up as he continued. “I want to be there. I want to raise my son. She doesn’t get the whole reason he’s acting like he likes my boy is to sleep with her.”
I felt for Will. I know what he’s going through. The same thoughts ran through my mind before as I’ve thought about the “boyfriend”; impress my son, score points with mom, make yourself at home.
Will dealt drugs, lots of drugs. He sold drugs to make money to give his high school sweetheart, his wife, a comfortable lifestyle. He bought a house; bought her a car, paid for her college and they had a baby. She told him she loved him. Then, he was arrested and sentenced to prison: three years. In less than a year, the woman who claimed she loved him “in sickness and in health, in good times and bad, forsaking all others” had divorced him. Apparently, those words were just something to say to get the gifts and the cake.
As I said, I felt for Will; as a father, as a husband, as a man. He’s trying to get his life straight, trying to do his sentence, get his education, and go home and make something of himself for his wife and his child. Problem is, his wife gave up on him. He’s trying. He’s working. He’s suffering. He’s praying.
The other day Opie came up to my cut with his CD player. “Listen to this,” he said and handed me his headphones. It was rapper Jim Jones singing “I Know”. It’s a song about guys doing time. Over and over Jones tells about the struggles in the street; the drugs, broken homes, broken dreams, and he says “I know, I know.” Then, real men come on speaking “I gave the penitentiary ten years of my life…and for what?” or “they locked me up in ’89 and I didn’t go home ‘til ’04. I didn’t recognize nothin.”
I understood the song. I understood the pain. I understood the time.
English Class
The guys had a long week in English 112. They were spoiled in the first half of English comp. The professor graded easily (no one received less than a “C”) and the papers were spread out with each assignment requiring two rewrites. Not so with this English class. Welcome to college fellas!
The instructor is a real English Professor. Dr. “Y” is a mid-sixties African American woman who has set a high bar for these guys. “You’re just like any other college students except you dress alike.”
Every class is devoted to complex reading material including essays by well-known writers and scholarly works by professors at prestigious universities. Each three hour class includes a quiz and at least two in-class writing assignments. Homework is extensive.
And then, there are the critical essays and research paper. Over the eight week class, each student is required to write three critical essays and write a seven to ten page research paper on a contemporary issue. Walking out the first week a number of guys remarked “this lady is crazy!”
Which led to essay one. Dr. Y assigned an article by two social scientists concerning the question “Does money buy happiness?” With data from a Dutch sociologist and a Yale political scientist, the writers’ premise was tough to decipher. I asked a number of guys for their “take” on the article and soon realized almost to a man they missed it. “Don’t you see they’re telling you material goods can’t take the place of what we really crave – relationships?” “Man, Larry, I’ll just write the paper and get a “B”.
Last Monday night the first essays were returned. As I anticipated, we’re not in English 111 anymore! Here was the grade distribution.
1 A
2 B’s
9 C’s
16 D’s
8 F’s
Suddenly guys fell apart. “I’m quit’n.” “This sucks.” “I don’t need this bullshit.” But, reality soon set in. Then came desperation. Essay two is due this Monday. Guys began to line up for help. I prepared a draft outline of the requirements for essay two. Saturday morning at 8:00 I held a session in the day room. Fourteen guys showed up. Since the session, I’ve read twenty-three papers. My red pen is almost out of ink! I didn’t leave the building Saturday and probably won’t today. I can run tomorrow.
At one point Dre asked me to read his essay. Dre’s an interesting guy. He was a big drug dealer in a small, rural, south side Virginia community. Still married and the father of four small children, Dre puts a great deal of effort into his studies. What he lacks in basic intellect, he makes up for in a desire to be the best husband and father he can be.
I edited his piece and returned it to him. But Dre wanted to talk. “J told me you convinced him to stay in the program.” That was true. J had met with the principal and told her he couldn’t do the work. He came back and sat down with me and asked me some very pointed questions about my life. After we talked he sent a letter to the principal telling her he was staying in school.
“Your wife of 28 years really divorced you? Your kids really don’t write you? You signed your house over to her? The judge gave you fifteen years?” I told Dre everything he just asked was true.
“How do you stay so positive? How do you keep going?”
I showed him an index card I keep handy. It has two short Bible verses on it.
Proverbs 24:10: “if you faint in the day of adversity your strength is small.”
Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
The fact is I’m not sure I’ll ever recover from the pain and emptiness I feel over the divorce. I hurt deeply, though I’ve come to accept and forgive my ex and my sons.
I put a great deal of effort into these guys. I’m not sure how many will make it, but if at least one guy gets out and stays out, it’s worth my effort.
English 112 is a very demanding class for the guys. But for me, with the pain I’m living with, it’s a blessing. My wife and kids didn’t need me, but these guys do. Every guy this weekend wrote their paper. More than one of them said “if you think I can do this, I’ll try.”
The instructor is a real English Professor. Dr. “Y” is a mid-sixties African American woman who has set a high bar for these guys. “You’re just like any other college students except you dress alike.”
Every class is devoted to complex reading material including essays by well-known writers and scholarly works by professors at prestigious universities. Each three hour class includes a quiz and at least two in-class writing assignments. Homework is extensive.
And then, there are the critical essays and research paper. Over the eight week class, each student is required to write three critical essays and write a seven to ten page research paper on a contemporary issue. Walking out the first week a number of guys remarked “this lady is crazy!”
Which led to essay one. Dr. Y assigned an article by two social scientists concerning the question “Does money buy happiness?” With data from a Dutch sociologist and a Yale political scientist, the writers’ premise was tough to decipher. I asked a number of guys for their “take” on the article and soon realized almost to a man they missed it. “Don’t you see they’re telling you material goods can’t take the place of what we really crave – relationships?” “Man, Larry, I’ll just write the paper and get a “B”.
Last Monday night the first essays were returned. As I anticipated, we’re not in English 111 anymore! Here was the grade distribution.
1 A
2 B’s
9 C’s
16 D’s
8 F’s
Suddenly guys fell apart. “I’m quit’n.” “This sucks.” “I don’t need this bullshit.” But, reality soon set in. Then came desperation. Essay two is due this Monday. Guys began to line up for help. I prepared a draft outline of the requirements for essay two. Saturday morning at 8:00 I held a session in the day room. Fourteen guys showed up. Since the session, I’ve read twenty-three papers. My red pen is almost out of ink! I didn’t leave the building Saturday and probably won’t today. I can run tomorrow.
At one point Dre asked me to read his essay. Dre’s an interesting guy. He was a big drug dealer in a small, rural, south side Virginia community. Still married and the father of four small children, Dre puts a great deal of effort into his studies. What he lacks in basic intellect, he makes up for in a desire to be the best husband and father he can be.
I edited his piece and returned it to him. But Dre wanted to talk. “J told me you convinced him to stay in the program.” That was true. J had met with the principal and told her he couldn’t do the work. He came back and sat down with me and asked me some very pointed questions about my life. After we talked he sent a letter to the principal telling her he was staying in school.
“Your wife of 28 years really divorced you? Your kids really don’t write you? You signed your house over to her? The judge gave you fifteen years?” I told Dre everything he just asked was true.
“How do you stay so positive? How do you keep going?”
I showed him an index card I keep handy. It has two short Bible verses on it.
Proverbs 24:10: “if you faint in the day of adversity your strength is small.”
Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
The fact is I’m not sure I’ll ever recover from the pain and emptiness I feel over the divorce. I hurt deeply, though I’ve come to accept and forgive my ex and my sons.
I put a great deal of effort into these guys. I’m not sure how many will make it, but if at least one guy gets out and stays out, it’s worth my effort.
English 112 is a very demanding class for the guys. But for me, with the pain I’m living with, it’s a blessing. My wife and kids didn’t need me, but these guys do. Every guy this weekend wrote their paper. More than one of them said “if you think I can do this, I’ll try.”
Friday, April 8, 2011
Prison Stories
A couple of recent newspaper and magazine pieces about the current state of “corrections” around the country jumped out at me. I recently read “Chicken Soup for the Prisoner’s Soul” and was deeply moved by so many of the stories represented there. But, I found the following cautionary quote each of us must consider when we approve of the status quo with incarceration:
“Does society understand what they create in the men they wear down by time? The whole concept of punishment seems to teach offenders how to effectively not be part of society, the unmaking of a man.”
Prisons do more to perpetuate crime than they do to rehabilitate. Money is spent on housing and holding instead of educating and rehabilitating.
Ohio recently began exploring an overhaul of its criminal justice system. As the Columbus Dispatch recently reported, Ohio’s 1996 enactment of “Truth in Sentencing Law” led to an exponential growth in the number of inmates and the cost to hold them. Ohio is now 33% over capacity and unable to sustain current prison funding requirements. In 2008, 10,000 convicted felons went to prison in Ohio on property and drug offenses at a cost of $189 million. “Few received rehabilitative treatment while in prison.” As the chief sponsor of a bill calling for sentence reform, Republican Bill Seitz said:
“You can’t fit 10 pounds in a 5 pound bag. That’s what we’ve been trying to do in Ohio. The time for talk is over. No more sticking our heads in the sand.”
Supporters of the change are as varied as Conservative Republican John Kasich and the ACLU.
Virginia, at 164% capacity according to DOC’s own spokesman (here’s a hint: if DOC finally admits to a capacity problem, it is probably higher than what they’ve admitted), has the same “Truth in Sentencing Law” as Ohio. Where is Virginia’s courageous conservative Republican Governor on this? Governor McDonnell talks a great deal about his faith. Perhaps now is the time for him to put his faith in action.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that California, in a move to close its $60 billion budget deficit, slashed rehabilitation programs for prisoners. The budget cuts included planned layoffs of 850 academic and vocational instructors in the prison system. At the same time, California continues to violate a court mandated release of inmates from its prisons due to the unconstitutional conditions inmates have been living under.
And, in another case involving California’s Corrections Department, it was reported corrections officers are the primary conduit for up to 10,000 cell phones finding their way into inmates’ hands. Even Charles Manson has had two cell phones in the last four years.
So, the people employed to watch the “criminals” are themselves lawbreakers, being paid up to $1000 by inmates for a phone. One officer made $150,000 in cash in one year transporting phones into the prison. His punishment? He was terminated from employment. California does not prosecute guards who bring phones in for a fee.
It was reported Governor McDonnell and the Virginia General Assembly failed to properly fund regional jails (coincidentally, it is by using the regional jails that DOC keeps 3800 inmates housed rather than further taxing its already overcrowded prisons by moving them to DOC facilities).
McDonnell assured Sheriffs who are facing staff layoffs themselves that the shortfall will be addressed. Governor McDonnell, in the words of the Ohio Representative, “you can’t fit 10 pounds in a 5 pound bag.”
And finally, Mike Vick visited a Florida prison the other day with his mentor, Tony Dungy, to speak with the inmates. While there he said one of the most profound things I’ve ever read:
“If I was standing outside a prison two years ago with what I know now, and you gave me the choice of going in and changing my life or staying out and continuing to live the life I was living, I’d go in…I needed the change. God gave me a timeout.”
I thought about Mike Vick’s words a great deal. Sometimes we don’t realize how blessed we are in our trials. It’s something I have to remind myself of every day. I’m not sure where I’d be right now if God hadn’t given me a timeout. The losses I’ve sustained have, at times, been unbearable. But learning to live righteously in this environment has been worth it. Mike Vick was right.
“Does society understand what they create in the men they wear down by time? The whole concept of punishment seems to teach offenders how to effectively not be part of society, the unmaking of a man.”
Prisons do more to perpetuate crime than they do to rehabilitate. Money is spent on housing and holding instead of educating and rehabilitating.
Ohio recently began exploring an overhaul of its criminal justice system. As the Columbus Dispatch recently reported, Ohio’s 1996 enactment of “Truth in Sentencing Law” led to an exponential growth in the number of inmates and the cost to hold them. Ohio is now 33% over capacity and unable to sustain current prison funding requirements. In 2008, 10,000 convicted felons went to prison in Ohio on property and drug offenses at a cost of $189 million. “Few received rehabilitative treatment while in prison.” As the chief sponsor of a bill calling for sentence reform, Republican Bill Seitz said:
“You can’t fit 10 pounds in a 5 pound bag. That’s what we’ve been trying to do in Ohio. The time for talk is over. No more sticking our heads in the sand.”
Supporters of the change are as varied as Conservative Republican John Kasich and the ACLU.
Virginia, at 164% capacity according to DOC’s own spokesman (here’s a hint: if DOC finally admits to a capacity problem, it is probably higher than what they’ve admitted), has the same “Truth in Sentencing Law” as Ohio. Where is Virginia’s courageous conservative Republican Governor on this? Governor McDonnell talks a great deal about his faith. Perhaps now is the time for him to put his faith in action.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that California, in a move to close its $60 billion budget deficit, slashed rehabilitation programs for prisoners. The budget cuts included planned layoffs of 850 academic and vocational instructors in the prison system. At the same time, California continues to violate a court mandated release of inmates from its prisons due to the unconstitutional conditions inmates have been living under.
And, in another case involving California’s Corrections Department, it was reported corrections officers are the primary conduit for up to 10,000 cell phones finding their way into inmates’ hands. Even Charles Manson has had two cell phones in the last four years.
So, the people employed to watch the “criminals” are themselves lawbreakers, being paid up to $1000 by inmates for a phone. One officer made $150,000 in cash in one year transporting phones into the prison. His punishment? He was terminated from employment. California does not prosecute guards who bring phones in for a fee.
It was reported Governor McDonnell and the Virginia General Assembly failed to properly fund regional jails (coincidentally, it is by using the regional jails that DOC keeps 3800 inmates housed rather than further taxing its already overcrowded prisons by moving them to DOC facilities).
McDonnell assured Sheriffs who are facing staff layoffs themselves that the shortfall will be addressed. Governor McDonnell, in the words of the Ohio Representative, “you can’t fit 10 pounds in a 5 pound bag.”
And finally, Mike Vick visited a Florida prison the other day with his mentor, Tony Dungy, to speak with the inmates. While there he said one of the most profound things I’ve ever read:
“If I was standing outside a prison two years ago with what I know now, and you gave me the choice of going in and changing my life or staying out and continuing to live the life I was living, I’d go in…I needed the change. God gave me a timeout.”
I thought about Mike Vick’s words a great deal. Sometimes we don’t realize how blessed we are in our trials. It’s something I have to remind myself of every day. I’m not sure where I’d be right now if God hadn’t given me a timeout. The losses I’ve sustained have, at times, been unbearable. But learning to live righteously in this environment has been worth it. Mike Vick was right.
Opening Day and More
Thursday was Opening Day for this year’s baseball season. It was also my older son’s 23rd birthday. Opening Day was always a big deal to my sons and me. I love baseball and turned them into fans. Every year on Opening Day, I’d pick my sons up early from school. We’d grill bratwurst, make burgers, popcorn, nachos, you name it and watch games on ESPN. At some point in the afternoon we’d head outside for a game of catch. During the late afternoon seventh inning stretch, we’d get up and stretch. My kids looked forward to Opening Day almost as much as I did.
I love baseball. I think on the seventh day when God rested, He actually planned the game out. It is a perfect game, mathematically precise, statistically in-depth, artistically beautiful. It is a game played by men who remember when they were boys. Opening Day symbolizes hope. It’s a new season and anyone can win.
Thursday, as the first pitch was being thrown out, Opie was called to medical. Two weeks ago he had been hospitalized for three days with a severe respiratory infection. He came back to the building about ten pounds lighter and weaker, but after a few days of rec and weights, he looked back to normal. Opie’s a big, muscular, healthy kid - 6’1” about 205 lbs. As I’ve written before, he was raised in prison. He’s been in and out of prison (including juvenile detention) since he was ten.
Anyway, he went down to medical not knowing why he’d been called (normally you get a pass the night before). Fifteen minutes later he was back. He had tears in his eyes. Opie is a product of prison. He knows you don’t show emotion in here. This was serious. This was something you don’t hold tears back.
Opie found out he has a serious illness. I’m not putting the disease out there, but it was enough for me to stop and pray for him. The doctor in this dump just told him. No counselor was available. Just, inmate ________, you have ________.
As I sat and prayed about Opie, I thought about my older son. He and Opie are the same age. My son lived a privileged life. He had everything handed to him. He had parents who loved him. He took part in every school opportunity. He saw the world and went to an exclusive four year college that cost close to $200,000.
Opie grew up with a crack addict father in housing projects in Milwaukee. He was the only white kid in his class and was regularly picked on and beaten up. He started committing crimes when he was seven. He’s had more fights than everyone I know on the outside combined.
But, Opie is a sweet kid. What little he has I’ve seen him share it all. I’ve seen this “incorrigible” felon give the last of his food away to a guy he barely knew who was hungry. I don’t know if I would do that. I’m not sure my sons would do that.
I’ve learned through knowing Opie that you can’t be too quick to judge someone else. When you least expect it, humanity is present.
I don’t understand God. Opie has had a lousy life. He doesn’t deserve this. As I said, I don’t understand God. But, I trust Him. Those of us close to him rallied around him. He called his grandmother. He went out in the sun.
I was worried when he first got the news how he’d handle it. I should have known better. As I said earlier, you can’t be too quick to judge.
This morning E decided to get his back tattoo done. A few days ago he went into the other building to get the outline done. Two nights ago another guy was busted in the wrong building getting his back tattoo.
E spent the morning in 4B getting his work done. After noon count, he went back. He got caught. They packed E up and sent him to the hole. He’ll be there a minimum of five days.
What did the tattoo cost? $325. It will also cost E his job as a maintenance employee. He may be thrown out of college (you can’t stay in college with a conviction).
Big S and I tried to warn him, but he wouldn’t listen. He has half a Chinese dragon on his back. He lost money. He’s probably lost his job and maybe lost his schooling.
I miss Opening Day with my boys. I’ll never forget the start of this baseball season.
I love baseball. I think on the seventh day when God rested, He actually planned the game out. It is a perfect game, mathematically precise, statistically in-depth, artistically beautiful. It is a game played by men who remember when they were boys. Opening Day symbolizes hope. It’s a new season and anyone can win.
Thursday, as the first pitch was being thrown out, Opie was called to medical. Two weeks ago he had been hospitalized for three days with a severe respiratory infection. He came back to the building about ten pounds lighter and weaker, but after a few days of rec and weights, he looked back to normal. Opie’s a big, muscular, healthy kid - 6’1” about 205 lbs. As I’ve written before, he was raised in prison. He’s been in and out of prison (including juvenile detention) since he was ten.
Anyway, he went down to medical not knowing why he’d been called (normally you get a pass the night before). Fifteen minutes later he was back. He had tears in his eyes. Opie is a product of prison. He knows you don’t show emotion in here. This was serious. This was something you don’t hold tears back.
Opie found out he has a serious illness. I’m not putting the disease out there, but it was enough for me to stop and pray for him. The doctor in this dump just told him. No counselor was available. Just, inmate ________, you have ________.
As I sat and prayed about Opie, I thought about my older son. He and Opie are the same age. My son lived a privileged life. He had everything handed to him. He had parents who loved him. He took part in every school opportunity. He saw the world and went to an exclusive four year college that cost close to $200,000.
Opie grew up with a crack addict father in housing projects in Milwaukee. He was the only white kid in his class and was regularly picked on and beaten up. He started committing crimes when he was seven. He’s had more fights than everyone I know on the outside combined.
But, Opie is a sweet kid. What little he has I’ve seen him share it all. I’ve seen this “incorrigible” felon give the last of his food away to a guy he barely knew who was hungry. I don’t know if I would do that. I’m not sure my sons would do that.
I’ve learned through knowing Opie that you can’t be too quick to judge someone else. When you least expect it, humanity is present.
I don’t understand God. Opie has had a lousy life. He doesn’t deserve this. As I said, I don’t understand God. But, I trust Him. Those of us close to him rallied around him. He called his grandmother. He went out in the sun.
I was worried when he first got the news how he’d handle it. I should have known better. As I said earlier, you can’t be too quick to judge.
This morning E decided to get his back tattoo done. A few days ago he went into the other building to get the outline done. Two nights ago another guy was busted in the wrong building getting his back tattoo.
E spent the morning in 4B getting his work done. After noon count, he went back. He got caught. They packed E up and sent him to the hole. He’ll be there a minimum of five days.
What did the tattoo cost? $325. It will also cost E his job as a maintenance employee. He may be thrown out of college (you can’t stay in college with a conviction).
Big S and I tried to warn him, but he wouldn’t listen. He has half a Chinese dragon on his back. He lost money. He’s probably lost his job and maybe lost his schooling.
I miss Opening Day with my boys. I’ll never forget the start of this baseball season.
Tattoos, and Pies, and Bunks, Oh My!
The new warden has gotten off to a lousy start. In only three weeks time, he’s managed to throw the compound in turmoil. Inmates and officers alike are “out of their square” (prison slang for “stressed”). Who would have thought a short, skinny, older white guy could cause such unease in so little time? He is, I concluded, like the Wizard in Dorothy’s travel to Oz. He is our Wizard of DOC.
“What has he done?” Two significant changes that are reverberating around the compound are being implemented on his watch. First, he has relocked the rec yards. For the past year inmates have enjoyed relatively easy movement from building ball courts to the large yards. On the eastside, guys moved freely between the ball courts on buildings 4, 5 and 6. You could come out on rec call, stretch on the ball court, head to the track or weight pile, get your workout in and then head back to your building. Or, if you lived in building 4 you could go to building 6 for a pick-up game of hoops.
The Wizard ended all that. Only building 4 guys can be on building 4’s court. Want to run? Head to the track and be locked out of the ball court until the next rec call when an officer has to come out and unlock the gate.
Why did he do this (and make movement more restricted than even at a higher level facility)? He’s short-staffed and the staff he has makes Saddam Hussein’s Revolutionary Guard look like Green Berets. The prison lacks sufficient staff to adequately patrol the rec yards. The yards (east and west side) are observed by one officer each sitting in a tower.
As I’ve written before, they don’t have sufficient staff to run the facility. Many days rec is called late because there aren’t enough officers to spare any for the towers. And the officers that do work here? They could film a season of “The Biggest Loser” with the present staff.
The vast (no pun intended) majority of officers on duty here are morbidly obese. We have one Sergeant (“Cheeseburger”) who is so large he can’t use the officers’ commodes. The staff is overweight, sloppy and dominated by African-American females who talk trash and have trash talked to them.
DOC sells the notion to the public that their prisons are highly secure. It is because the inmates themselves lack the motivation to react that keeps the lid on this place. This staff of officers are out of shape, unprofessional, poorly-trained, predominately female; they would lose control of this facility in a few moments if the inmates ever got angry enough.
Rec is the one bit of time guys feel some, albeit small, freedom of movement. The Wizard, in the words of one guy, “f’d” that up.
The Wizard also decided there’s way too much food leaving the chow hall and too many tattoos being done. Inmates are known to sneak fruit and vegetables out of chow. Technically, all food must be consumed in the chow hall. For a long time officers looked the other way when an inmate would grab an apple or an onion and put them in their pocket. The Wizard had other ideas. Officers are now patting down almost everyone leaving chow. Caught with food and you are written a series 100 charge. Series 100? Taking an apple is treated the same as murder or sexual assault (in the past, if a charge was issued, it was a series 200 charge).
Dozens of charges have been written, yet every night the smell of onions, peppers and apples goes through the day room.
Then there are the new middle row bunks. As I’ve written before, the buildings are overcrowded. Some bunks are actually in the fire escape route. And, there are insufficient numbers of officers to patrol the buildings. The Wizard’s solution – replace the middle rows of bunks with bunks from the recently closed James River Correction Center (the Wizard’s former prison).
The James River bunks are lower (the guy on the bottom bunk can’t sit up in bed and can barely roll over) and have no bookshelves. They are closer together meaning guys lose even more floor space (our facility already fails to comply with both federal law and American Corrections Association guidelines on minimum square feet for inmates). The bunks also have the lockers in the cut meaning inmates no longer have access through any bunk cut but must now proceed up and down the aisles.
Why’d he do this? He claims to cut down on the tattoo business prevalent in the buildings. Now, he claims the booth officer will be able to see the entire floor. No need to actually put an officer on the floor.
What the Wizard doesn’t want you to know is that under his watch at JRCC; drugs, tobacco, and cell phones were everywhere. That compound was off the chain. Heh Wiz, it’s not the bunks, it’s the staff!
What’s the result of the bunk switch? The tattoo artists are working like crazy and making a ton of money. Four guys in our building had full back tats done this week. Money ($300 to $500 for backs and arms) is pouring out of here and to the “artists” families. And, on a compound already riddled with Hepatitis C, the likelihood of new infected inmates grows each day.
So, in only three short weeks the Wiz has made his presence known. Which leads me to “Johnny Appleseed” a/k/a “Lil D”. Lil D is a great baker. Using crushed pineapple cream cookies and either apples or sweet potatoes from the kitchen he makes delicious home-made pies four nights a week. With about $10.00 of ingredients, he sells pies for $1.50. Most nights he makes $30.00.
The pies are amazing! The entire dayroom smells of apples and cinnamon. How does he get the apples or sweet potatoes? Right from the kitchen under the eyes of the staff (a number of whom have been known to eat one of his pies). Guys love Lil D’s pies because for the few moments you’re enjoying it, you’re not in this environment. You’re in a kitchen surrounded by family eating dessert.
In the “Wizard of Oz”, when Dorothy met the Wizard, she soon realizes he was just a little man. His entire rep was built with smoke and mirrors. It’s kind of the same thing with the people in charge at DOC.
“What has he done?” Two significant changes that are reverberating around the compound are being implemented on his watch. First, he has relocked the rec yards. For the past year inmates have enjoyed relatively easy movement from building ball courts to the large yards. On the eastside, guys moved freely between the ball courts on buildings 4, 5 and 6. You could come out on rec call, stretch on the ball court, head to the track or weight pile, get your workout in and then head back to your building. Or, if you lived in building 4 you could go to building 6 for a pick-up game of hoops.
The Wizard ended all that. Only building 4 guys can be on building 4’s court. Want to run? Head to the track and be locked out of the ball court until the next rec call when an officer has to come out and unlock the gate.
Why did he do this (and make movement more restricted than even at a higher level facility)? He’s short-staffed and the staff he has makes Saddam Hussein’s Revolutionary Guard look like Green Berets. The prison lacks sufficient staff to adequately patrol the rec yards. The yards (east and west side) are observed by one officer each sitting in a tower.
As I’ve written before, they don’t have sufficient staff to run the facility. Many days rec is called late because there aren’t enough officers to spare any for the towers. And the officers that do work here? They could film a season of “The Biggest Loser” with the present staff.
The vast (no pun intended) majority of officers on duty here are morbidly obese. We have one Sergeant (“Cheeseburger”) who is so large he can’t use the officers’ commodes. The staff is overweight, sloppy and dominated by African-American females who talk trash and have trash talked to them.
DOC sells the notion to the public that their prisons are highly secure. It is because the inmates themselves lack the motivation to react that keeps the lid on this place. This staff of officers are out of shape, unprofessional, poorly-trained, predominately female; they would lose control of this facility in a few moments if the inmates ever got angry enough.
Rec is the one bit of time guys feel some, albeit small, freedom of movement. The Wizard, in the words of one guy, “f’d” that up.
The Wizard also decided there’s way too much food leaving the chow hall and too many tattoos being done. Inmates are known to sneak fruit and vegetables out of chow. Technically, all food must be consumed in the chow hall. For a long time officers looked the other way when an inmate would grab an apple or an onion and put them in their pocket. The Wizard had other ideas. Officers are now patting down almost everyone leaving chow. Caught with food and you are written a series 100 charge. Series 100? Taking an apple is treated the same as murder or sexual assault (in the past, if a charge was issued, it was a series 200 charge).
Dozens of charges have been written, yet every night the smell of onions, peppers and apples goes through the day room.
Then there are the new middle row bunks. As I’ve written before, the buildings are overcrowded. Some bunks are actually in the fire escape route. And, there are insufficient numbers of officers to patrol the buildings. The Wizard’s solution – replace the middle rows of bunks with bunks from the recently closed James River Correction Center (the Wizard’s former prison).
The James River bunks are lower (the guy on the bottom bunk can’t sit up in bed and can barely roll over) and have no bookshelves. They are closer together meaning guys lose even more floor space (our facility already fails to comply with both federal law and American Corrections Association guidelines on minimum square feet for inmates). The bunks also have the lockers in the cut meaning inmates no longer have access through any bunk cut but must now proceed up and down the aisles.
Why’d he do this? He claims to cut down on the tattoo business prevalent in the buildings. Now, he claims the booth officer will be able to see the entire floor. No need to actually put an officer on the floor.
What the Wizard doesn’t want you to know is that under his watch at JRCC; drugs, tobacco, and cell phones were everywhere. That compound was off the chain. Heh Wiz, it’s not the bunks, it’s the staff!
What’s the result of the bunk switch? The tattoo artists are working like crazy and making a ton of money. Four guys in our building had full back tats done this week. Money ($300 to $500 for backs and arms) is pouring out of here and to the “artists” families. And, on a compound already riddled with Hepatitis C, the likelihood of new infected inmates grows each day.
So, in only three short weeks the Wiz has made his presence known. Which leads me to “Johnny Appleseed” a/k/a “Lil D”. Lil D is a great baker. Using crushed pineapple cream cookies and either apples or sweet potatoes from the kitchen he makes delicious home-made pies four nights a week. With about $10.00 of ingredients, he sells pies for $1.50. Most nights he makes $30.00.
The pies are amazing! The entire dayroom smells of apples and cinnamon. How does he get the apples or sweet potatoes? Right from the kitchen under the eyes of the staff (a number of whom have been known to eat one of his pies). Guys love Lil D’s pies because for the few moments you’re enjoying it, you’re not in this environment. You’re in a kitchen surrounded by family eating dessert.
In the “Wizard of Oz”, when Dorothy met the Wizard, she soon realizes he was just a little man. His entire rep was built with smoke and mirrors. It’s kind of the same thing with the people in charge at DOC.
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Danny's Song
This past week my older son celebrated his 23rd birthday. The last contact I had with him was three weeks after my arrest. He was entering his junior year of college and within days of flying overseas to spend a semester abroad. A dear friend came to the jail with my son. Through the Plexiglas, I looked out at my boy. Tears poured down my cheeks as I longed to hug him. As our visit ended he looked at me and said “we’re gonna be alright dad; I love you.”
Days earlier I had received my only letter (to date) from him. My son, so much like me in his interests in history, politics, music, cooking; began his terse correspondence with these famous words from Thomas Paine: “These are the times that try men’s souls.” Ironically, the same day that he wrote his letter to me, I penned a letter to him. My last sentence in that letter: “These are the times that try men’s souls.”
There has not been a day in that young man’s life that I haven’t recalled the precise moment, when my wife, beaming, told me she was pregnant. I doted over her for nine months, refusing to even allow her to pick up a bag of groceries. I watched how her body transformed, each day as the miracle she carried within her developed. I remember the first time I heard my son’s heartbeat, the first time I felt him stretch and kick.
The day after my wife told me she was pregnant, I was out running. On my headset I heard the beginning notes to Loggins and Messina’s ballad “Danny’s Song”. I started mouthing the words. I soon began singing the song as I ran. At the reprise, tears welled up in my eyes.
“Even though we ain’t got money
I’m so in love with you honey
and every day will bring the chain of love.
In the morning when I rise
sweet tears of joy in my eyes
and tell me everything is gonna be alright.”
It’s a song about a man expressing to his wife the love he feels as he realizes he is a father of a beautiful son.
So much has changed in the past twenty-three years. Until my arrest, both my sons thought I was the best father around. They loved me and looked up to me as only a son can toward his father. I loved my sons deeply. The three of us were inseparable.
I watched as my older son graduated high school and was admitted to a prestigious college. I was full of pride at his intellect and his character. There was never a day when we were together that we didn’t hug and say “I love you”.
Six weeks ago, my ex-wife wrote me the first in a series of letters we’ve exchanged. The reason for her first letter in over seventeen months was to let me know she had met someone through an internet dating service (a twice married man). Included with that brief piece of news (which tore apart what remained of my damaged heart) was a snippet of news on our sons. My older son, my baby boy who I cradled moments after his birth and gently sang Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young” to, now refers to me as his “ex-father”.
A well meaning friend arrived for a visit shortly thereafter. “Worried” about me, he proceeded to tell me that my ex has been dating for a “long time”. She had had a long distance relationship with a Canadian band leader from a cruise she took before our divorce was final. That relationship, my friend confided, only ceased when my ex discovered the man was still in a “committed” relationship.
“Even though we ain’t got money
I’m so in love with you honey…”
So, the woman with whom I stood at the front of the church, whom exchanged vows with me, the woman I still love deeply, has been able to “move on” and close that almost thirty year chapter of her life. And my two precious sons, they go forward without a passing thought about the man just three short years ago they thought could never be replaced.
If you told me on that November afternoon in 1981 when we exchanged our vows, or that early March morning in 1988 when our older son was born, or that afternoon in July 1997 when our younger son joined our family; that those emotions we shared, those words we spoke to each other were nothing but fleeting thoughts that could be disregarded in times of crisis and distress, tribulation and disappointment, I would have told you you didn’t understand the bond we shared. There was, I thought, an unbreakable chain of love that would see our marriage, our family, through.
This past week the news reported that Leroy Hassell, Jr., son of the late Chief Judge of the Virginia Supreme Court (Chief Judge Hassell, Virginia’s first African-American Supreme Court jurist, died of cancer just two short months ago) was sentenced following his recent conviction for armed robbery. He was convicted of holding a young man at gun point in his apartment as he demanded money and drugs.
This was a violent crime. This was not his first conviction (he had prior convictions for marijuana possession and shoplifting). His sentence? 15 years will 11 years, 12 months suspended. In other words, Hassell has a two year sentence to fulfill for an armed robbery conviction. Two years is less than one-sixth the sentence I am required to serve.
In the past few weeks two anonymous readers have touched me with their words. Both readers urged me to find comfort in the Lord. I can assure you, if I wasn’t sustained by my faith, I wouldn’t be here right now. I have watched everything I worked for taken from me. I have seen the three most important people in my life utterly reject and abandon me. I have cried out to God more times than I can remember and have actually had more problems, more distress thrust on me.
I remarked to a friend the other day that I have absolutely no idea what God wants from me. I am doing everything in my power to live righteously in here. I turn no one down who seeks my help. I work tirelessly for these students in here. On more than one occasion, I have asked God “what more do you want from me?” I swear to Him I can’t go on, yet the next morning, I somehow jump off my top bunk at 4:00 am and start to pray.
One of the readers told me to “remember how blessed” I am during this trial. If I didn’t realize I was blessed, I wouldn’t be able to endure what’s become of my life.
I’m not a victim. I broke the law. I violated the trust my wife and children placed in me. But the consequences of my actions are significantly in excess of the actions themselves.
Still, I have faith. Still, I love those three. I pray each morning and evening for my ex to find a happy, loving committed relationship. It breaks my heart that she rejected me, but my love for her requires me to pray that someone can give her what I obviously can’t. I pray for my sons continually.
The simple fact is God has given me a “do over”. He has given me an opportunity to care for a great deal of men I would have never given a moment’s thought about. He has given me a chance to make a difference in the lives of many who need someone to just believe in them.
I am blessed. I’ve discovered a level of love, of forgiveness, of compassion and mercy I didn’t know I possessed. And, I have endured through some very dark, terribly lonely days.
Still, my son’s birthday was bittersweet. Like Valentine’s Day – the 30th anniversary of when I proposed to my ex-wife – I am filled with many wonderful memories and a deep sadness over our present circumstances.
I was running yesterday. As on most of my four mile runs around the track, I recited over and over the 23rd Psalm and Isaiah 40. Without realizing it, I began singing “Danny’s Song”. I thought back to that morning when she walked into my law office and said “I’m pregnant”. I thought back to holding my son in my arms, kissing his forehead and whispering “May God bless and keep you always, may your wishes all come true…”
I recently heard music by a new musical group, “Mumford & Sons”. They appeared on the Grammys and sang with Bob Dylan. In a Dylanesque song called “The Cave” the following lyrics appear:
It’s empty in the valley of our heart
The sun, it rises slowly as you walk
Away from all the fears
And all the faults you’ve left behind.
So make your siren’s call
And sing all you want
I will not hear what you have to say
Cause I need freedom now
And I need to know how
To live my life as it’s meant to be
And I will hold on hope
And I won’t let you choke
On the noose around your neck
And I’ll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I’ll know my name as it’s called again.
Each day another memory is brought into view: birthdays, celebrations, dinners, just a quiet night with my sons, or dancing on the deck with my wife. Memories can be a curse or sustain you. The blessing is in knowing the difference.
Two thoughts struck me as I thought about love and forgiveness.
Dostoyevsky stated “Compassion is the chief law of human existence”.
An anonymous person said: “Young love is when you love someone because of what they do right. Mature love is when you love someone in spite of what they do wrong.”
God has blessed me. At least when it comes to compassion and love He has allowed me to reach my golden years.
Days earlier I had received my only letter (to date) from him. My son, so much like me in his interests in history, politics, music, cooking; began his terse correspondence with these famous words from Thomas Paine: “These are the times that try men’s souls.” Ironically, the same day that he wrote his letter to me, I penned a letter to him. My last sentence in that letter: “These are the times that try men’s souls.”
There has not been a day in that young man’s life that I haven’t recalled the precise moment, when my wife, beaming, told me she was pregnant. I doted over her for nine months, refusing to even allow her to pick up a bag of groceries. I watched how her body transformed, each day as the miracle she carried within her developed. I remember the first time I heard my son’s heartbeat, the first time I felt him stretch and kick.
The day after my wife told me she was pregnant, I was out running. On my headset I heard the beginning notes to Loggins and Messina’s ballad “Danny’s Song”. I started mouthing the words. I soon began singing the song as I ran. At the reprise, tears welled up in my eyes.
“Even though we ain’t got money
I’m so in love with you honey
and every day will bring the chain of love.
In the morning when I rise
sweet tears of joy in my eyes
and tell me everything is gonna be alright.”
It’s a song about a man expressing to his wife the love he feels as he realizes he is a father of a beautiful son.
So much has changed in the past twenty-three years. Until my arrest, both my sons thought I was the best father around. They loved me and looked up to me as only a son can toward his father. I loved my sons deeply. The three of us were inseparable.
I watched as my older son graduated high school and was admitted to a prestigious college. I was full of pride at his intellect and his character. There was never a day when we were together that we didn’t hug and say “I love you”.
Six weeks ago, my ex-wife wrote me the first in a series of letters we’ve exchanged. The reason for her first letter in over seventeen months was to let me know she had met someone through an internet dating service (a twice married man). Included with that brief piece of news (which tore apart what remained of my damaged heart) was a snippet of news on our sons. My older son, my baby boy who I cradled moments after his birth and gently sang Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young” to, now refers to me as his “ex-father”.
A well meaning friend arrived for a visit shortly thereafter. “Worried” about me, he proceeded to tell me that my ex has been dating for a “long time”. She had had a long distance relationship with a Canadian band leader from a cruise she took before our divorce was final. That relationship, my friend confided, only ceased when my ex discovered the man was still in a “committed” relationship.
“Even though we ain’t got money
I’m so in love with you honey…”
So, the woman with whom I stood at the front of the church, whom exchanged vows with me, the woman I still love deeply, has been able to “move on” and close that almost thirty year chapter of her life. And my two precious sons, they go forward without a passing thought about the man just three short years ago they thought could never be replaced.
If you told me on that November afternoon in 1981 when we exchanged our vows, or that early March morning in 1988 when our older son was born, or that afternoon in July 1997 when our younger son joined our family; that those emotions we shared, those words we spoke to each other were nothing but fleeting thoughts that could be disregarded in times of crisis and distress, tribulation and disappointment, I would have told you you didn’t understand the bond we shared. There was, I thought, an unbreakable chain of love that would see our marriage, our family, through.
This past week the news reported that Leroy Hassell, Jr., son of the late Chief Judge of the Virginia Supreme Court (Chief Judge Hassell, Virginia’s first African-American Supreme Court jurist, died of cancer just two short months ago) was sentenced following his recent conviction for armed robbery. He was convicted of holding a young man at gun point in his apartment as he demanded money and drugs.
This was a violent crime. This was not his first conviction (he had prior convictions for marijuana possession and shoplifting). His sentence? 15 years will 11 years, 12 months suspended. In other words, Hassell has a two year sentence to fulfill for an armed robbery conviction. Two years is less than one-sixth the sentence I am required to serve.
In the past few weeks two anonymous readers have touched me with their words. Both readers urged me to find comfort in the Lord. I can assure you, if I wasn’t sustained by my faith, I wouldn’t be here right now. I have watched everything I worked for taken from me. I have seen the three most important people in my life utterly reject and abandon me. I have cried out to God more times than I can remember and have actually had more problems, more distress thrust on me.
I remarked to a friend the other day that I have absolutely no idea what God wants from me. I am doing everything in my power to live righteously in here. I turn no one down who seeks my help. I work tirelessly for these students in here. On more than one occasion, I have asked God “what more do you want from me?” I swear to Him I can’t go on, yet the next morning, I somehow jump off my top bunk at 4:00 am and start to pray.
One of the readers told me to “remember how blessed” I am during this trial. If I didn’t realize I was blessed, I wouldn’t be able to endure what’s become of my life.
I’m not a victim. I broke the law. I violated the trust my wife and children placed in me. But the consequences of my actions are significantly in excess of the actions themselves.
Still, I have faith. Still, I love those three. I pray each morning and evening for my ex to find a happy, loving committed relationship. It breaks my heart that she rejected me, but my love for her requires me to pray that someone can give her what I obviously can’t. I pray for my sons continually.
The simple fact is God has given me a “do over”. He has given me an opportunity to care for a great deal of men I would have never given a moment’s thought about. He has given me a chance to make a difference in the lives of many who need someone to just believe in them.
I am blessed. I’ve discovered a level of love, of forgiveness, of compassion and mercy I didn’t know I possessed. And, I have endured through some very dark, terribly lonely days.
Still, my son’s birthday was bittersweet. Like Valentine’s Day – the 30th anniversary of when I proposed to my ex-wife – I am filled with many wonderful memories and a deep sadness over our present circumstances.
I was running yesterday. As on most of my four mile runs around the track, I recited over and over the 23rd Psalm and Isaiah 40. Without realizing it, I began singing “Danny’s Song”. I thought back to that morning when she walked into my law office and said “I’m pregnant”. I thought back to holding my son in my arms, kissing his forehead and whispering “May God bless and keep you always, may your wishes all come true…”
I recently heard music by a new musical group, “Mumford & Sons”. They appeared on the Grammys and sang with Bob Dylan. In a Dylanesque song called “The Cave” the following lyrics appear:
It’s empty in the valley of our heart
The sun, it rises slowly as you walk
Away from all the fears
And all the faults you’ve left behind.
So make your siren’s call
And sing all you want
I will not hear what you have to say
Cause I need freedom now
And I need to know how
To live my life as it’s meant to be
And I will hold on hope
And I won’t let you choke
On the noose around your neck
And I’ll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I’ll know my name as it’s called again.
Each day another memory is brought into view: birthdays, celebrations, dinners, just a quiet night with my sons, or dancing on the deck with my wife. Memories can be a curse or sustain you. The blessing is in knowing the difference.
Two thoughts struck me as I thought about love and forgiveness.
Dostoyevsky stated “Compassion is the chief law of human existence”.
An anonymous person said: “Young love is when you love someone because of what they do right. Mature love is when you love someone in spite of what they do wrong.”
God has blessed me. At least when it comes to compassion and love He has allowed me to reach my golden years.
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