de Accion de Gracias

THIS BLOG WAS WRITTEN IN NOVEMBER, 2014.

            Its Thanksgiving evening 2014 and the lights in the building have finally lowered. I’m watching as “Number 9,” the new guy in bed 9, throws his mattress over his shoulder. What the hell is he doing? I think. “Number 9” wasn’t there Wednesday night. Sometime after midnight – early Thursday morning – they moved him in. The bunk was open after “Cheesy Sidler” moved from “9” to “91.” “Cheesy Sidler,” college graduate, whiz on the computer, child sex fiend. I name everyone and “Cheesy Sidler” was no exception. We were standing around one morning waiting on breakfast and this guy sidles up to us. One minute he isn’t there, the next you can feel his breath on your neck. And, he has this big toothy “I just farted” grin … “Cheesy Sidler.”

            The Cheese is in on a sex crime with minors. He’s smart and, he’s in total denial. He has the arrogance of so many child sex offenders: “I’m innocent; I’m not like them.” I try not to emote anger around him but it’s tough. He looks like what I look like to the young black guys in here. Cheese was raised in Africa; his parents – Baptist missionaries. Fifty-eight years old, daughters, grandkids, a wife. They visit. He has become an Orthodox Jew. He goes to “7” building every morning to wear the small wooden box on his forehead and rock and pray. He’s Orthodox, but is he Godly? Can he atone in rhythmic chants for his perversion and crimes? It’s getting dark in the building and I wonder if that’s the real meaning of “grace,” coming to grips with your sins.

            Back to “Number 9,” he tells the CO, “I don’t like it here.” I crack up and ask my neighbor O if that works. Can I just say, “I don’t like it here,” and that’s that? 9 then gets all his stuff – a plastic trash bag of dirty, balled up clothing and his pillow – and drops it beside his mattress thrown down by the trash can in the day room. I’m exhausted but can’t go to sleep because I’m witness to a train wreck.

            “Look,” says the CO. “You can put your stuff back in your bunk area or go to the hole. It’s your choice.” Old 9, he ponders “option A” versus “option B” and chooses to return his things to his bunk … at least for the night. I climb in bed and read my verse from the morning one last time, pray, and then think about how pretty Thanksgiving sounds in Spanish, “de Accion de Gracias.”

            2008. I had lousy Thanksgivings before. There were times we thought we should split; I never told her I blamed her for losing my dreams. Maybe that’s wrong. I was willing to give every dream up just for one time hearing “I love you,” or “thank you,” or “I appreciate what you’ve sacrificed.” Instead it festered. But, pretend happiness works. So does turkey and good Scotch and oysters on the half-shell. Ah, food and drink and family and friends … an overstuffed table with wine glasses clinking. Not 2008. There were the letters; the newspaper article a week before said I stated “in open court in a clear voice ‘guilty,’” as each count was read. Counts – 1, 3, 6, it didn’t matter. I had highlighted the part where she said, “I’m praying you die in there.” Funny thing is, I prayed the same thing.

            Thanksgiving at the jail and they bring trays to the pod. It’s two-toned pressed turkey meat – low-cut, cold lunch meat, - instant mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie. I’m not even hungry; I’m nauseous, and worn, and depressed. “I don’t like it here.” I wish I thought of saying that back then. “In all things give thanks for this is the Lord’s will for you.” God, I was learning had on off-kilter sense of humor. “Thanks God for ruining my life!” That I remember. “de Accion de Gracias.”

            Thanksgiving 2014, my sixth here. I arrived a week before Thanksgiving 2009 and remember that first dinner, the heaping tray with real turkey and pork roast, and candied yams and real mashed potatoes with broccoli and greens and stuffing and rolls. There was sweet potato pie and cake with banana cream frosting. I had told myself I wanted out, wanted to die and now, one year later I’m smiling, enjoying Thanksgiving in prison. In prison! That’s crazy! But, the food, the smells, the conversation, I was ok. Was it like the quail during the forty years in the wilderness? The food “appeared” and the people were sated.

            This year we’d decided to keep out regular work-out schedule. So, big meal at 12:30 (4A ate first!), a nap – why not!?) – then outside at 3:45. For a day and a half it had rained. The track, the weight pile, nothing but mud. Five of us head out in 40° mist. “Go quick,” O says because we know dark is only forty-five minutes away. We’re running, slogging through puddles, and curling bars, then dead lifting. I’m out of my shirts, so is O and Moose and our heads are steaming. I never dead lifted 240 before; I’m on 210, then 225. “Screw it” I yell and squat and lift 240, 3 no 4, no 5 reps and drop the weight with a primal yell of success. I take off at full throttle through the puddles and I’m buoyed. I don’t know why, but I feel … free and alive. “de Accion de Gracias.” I get what Paul was telling those struggling church members in Philippi while he sat alone in prison. “Live above your circumstances,” Paul exhorts his fledgling flock. No matter what, He is in control of our circumstances. Maybe that’s the toughest lesson to learn: We want life our way, in our time, on our terms. And, we keep messing up.

            Thirty-three years ago. I stood in a church and looked a beautiful girl in her eyes and recited vows. You know, looking back, I didn’t take all that seriously. I knew what I wanted and I wouldn’t let anything stop me. We chose Thanksgiving weekend because, well it fit right before my law school exams. At jail I dreaded Thanksgiving and the knowledge that I failed … and those dreams,

            “If dreams were lightning thunder was desire

            This old house would have burnt down a long time ago”

            Dreams. Vows. Weight lifted – real and imaginary. “de Accion de Gracias.” Cheesy Sidler, Number 9; I’m ok. I’m falling asleep thinking about what was, so long ago, and what will be.

            “Just give me one thing that I can hold onto

            To believe in just living is just a hard way to go”

            Live above your circumstances. I keep thinking about those four words in the meaning of “grace,” accept God’s forgiveness and be what He intends you to be. You can’t run from, or hide from, your past but you can overcome. Maybe Nike is right, “Just do it.” “de Accion de Gracias.” I like the sound of that.

Transitions

Nothing remains constant in here, least of all the population. It didn’t used to be that way. Years earlier, you went to a prison and you stayed there for years. You knew who was living around you. Every week just two or three would leave and two or three would take their place. Now, it’s a whole new world of corrections – which is odd because the Virginia state budget is such a mess, you would think they’d quit locking people up for stupid, short sentence stuff and then moving them from low custody facility to low custody facility. Transitions are part of life; in here you move, things change, just for the hell of it.

So last week, “Randy” left, He was supposed to have gone in February but he’s a “civil commitment” guy. You know, his sex crime was so severe, so abnormal, that he has to be civilly committed. Here’s the funny thing – he spent his entire time in low custody. I’ve met violent predatory sex offenders who have been at high security levels worked their way down here, who aren’t civilly committed. Meanwhile, this guy “Randy” spends his eight years here (that’s right, 8 years for sick child porn) then goes through a due process hearing for the last 6 months before heading to the “behavioral science” center.

Early in the morning last week (before 6:00 am count) they woke him up. “Get all your stuff. They’re coming for you at 6:30.” And that was it. Randy will be held in sex detention for a year. Then, they’ll be another hearing to determine if he’s “cured.” Can you ever be “cured” of aberrant sexual feelings?”

Transitions. They moved a gay guy into the building the other day. Change that. We’ve had gay guys in the building before. We’ve never had a guy who sits to urinate, plucks his eyebrows, and calls all the officers “sugar.” I’ve seen all this before, the flamboyance and exaggeration. Is it real? I’m not sure, but prison is a mass of guys wanting people to think you are something/someone other than who you really are. Guys aren’t just gay in prison, they’re “Bird Cage” over the top gay.

The whole building environment changed when he swished his way in. There’s an air of uncomfortableness. A few closeted fellows feel emboldened and become more gay; others more homophobic. The building is tense. Meanwhile, he sings show tunes in the shower.

Football season kicked off last weekend and with it, gambling tickets flew around the compound. One of our college guys runs back and is pretty good on his lines. Just on Saturday he took in over $500 in tickets. I watched him sweat out a few “10 pick” tickets late Saturday – they could have hurt him; instead, it was a profitable weekend; very profitable. 

Fall is always a transition time in here. Football keeps things moving. Forget New Years; the first Thursday night catches almost everyone’s attention. With football season you know fall lockdown is coming. After that, Thanksgiving and Christmas. So stamps thousands of them – change hands with tickets: 5 picks, 8 picks, parlays; gambling is back with a vengeance.

Every week, twenty to thirty new guys show up and the same number leave. DOC spends millions each year “transporting” – i.e. moving 3 or 4 guys at a time on old school busses to various prisons around the state. It’s a stupid system which makes perfect sense in a money wasting backward operation which is DOC. And yet, the “new” guys coming in aren’t new. So many are back for round “3” or “4.” The “system” hasn’t worked; it hasn’t rehabilitated them. They grease the wheels of the system; they keep DOC in business.

And the guys showing up are uneducated and ignorant; many are plain dumb. They have little – if any – hope of success outside. Prison time becomes just another season for them. They cycle in and out. They “remember” on their last bid that “chicken on the bone” was served every week. “They don’t feed us like they use to,” they moan. Maybe, you should stay out, you think.

It’s a mind-numbing process. Like a hamster on a wheel, you move at break neck speed hoping to outrun this time. You try to ignore the predilections and violence of so many around you. You try to find humanity in your surroundings. You try and block out the guy who lies about his military status as he seeks to con a free education. You think “I can do this; I can get through this.” Like Andy Dufresne in “Shawshank Redemption” you try and hold on to beauty and joy and hope so you don’t transition into just another DOC number.

Transition may be the wrong word. It’s a conveyor belt in here. And for far too many, the belt runs into a wall. You have to be better than that.

Contra Mundum

You’ll have to pardon me some in this piece, but I’ve been thinking a great deal about all that’s taken place the last 5 ½ years; where I was, to where I am, to where I’m headed. And sometimes those thoughts have just rambled on their own, rushing over me with memories. I’ll sit there and think, “that really happened,” and look and see where I am now and wonder how did I not have the trust to believe.

            Believe. I used to roll my eyes when I’d hear someone at church ask to hear another worshiper’s “faith” story. It was always when we’d start with a new class of elders – good old Presbyterian bureaucracy – and I’d listen to someone thirty years my senior drone on about their parents’ church and their first Bible and I’d think “faith stories,” those don’t exist anymore. They ended with Joseph, and Daniel, and Paul. After all, I was master of my own future. Life was good – on the outside anyway – and appearances mattered.

            Early on at the jail, as my life was spinning out of control (as if my former life was ever really in control) I came across Charles Colson’s book, “Who Speaks for God.” Colson was one of the most powerful – and feared – members of Nixon’s inner Whitehouse circle. He was a brilliant lawyer. He was also ruthless, cunning, and not prone to tolerate dissent. Colson met his downfall in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal. He was convicted in Federal Court for his role in that scandal and sent to prison. Everything that he had worked for was stripped from him.

            I read Colson’s book feeling hopeless and lost. I was in the initial weeks of the total collapse of my life. I didn’t think I could survive a day, let alone the rest of my life, with the pain and guilt of the past and fear of the future overwhelming me in that dirty cell. And I tried to focus on something Colson wrote in that book, something – a little thread – to help me hang on. You see, Colson found God at his worst moment. God was never lost, he said. It was Colson who had been lost. He wrote these words:

            “I had spent my first 40 years seeking the whole world to the neglect of my soul. But what I couldn’t find in my quest for power and success – that is, true security and meaning – I discovered in prison where all worldly props had been stripped away. And by God’s grace, I lost my life in order that I might find true life in Christ.”

            I couldn’t believe what I was reading. There was no way Colson could mean what he wrote. It made no sense. I knew his story, knew how he left prison and founded “Prison Fellowship” and devoted the remainder of his life to spreading the message of God’s power and love in all circumstances, but there was no way he honestly believed what he wrote.

            A few quick stories. The lawyer.  I have a friend – that word doesn’t begin to describe him – who I called from the jail moments after my arrest. He’s a lawyer and jeopardized his own career by staying by me through those first difficult months. He came to the jail every day for the first three months and then four or five times a week thereafter just to check on me. He asked his minister to visit me at my worst when my own minister refused to “get involved.”

            The minister.  So an Episcopal minister shows up to meet with me and we’re talking through Plexiglas – that’s the way visits are at the jail. And I lose it. I’m a mess, sobbing, wishing I was dead but knowing I can’t be since I’d made a pact with God to “see this through” (whatever that meant. I really hadn’t given it much thought). He listened to me and then didn’t offer me any cookie-cutter prayer or syrupy words of encouragement. He just simply said “God is with you, Larry,” and he asked if he could return for more visits.

            That minister – a man I never would have even met but for my lawyer friend and my own church’s abandonment of me – has become a close friend. He visited me at the receiving center, he’s come out here, and he has led the charge to get me released early.

He is like family which brings me to ...

The relative. My cousin and her husband, a successful couple living in Northern Virginia learn I was arrested. Over Thanksgiving – my first and worst Thanksgiving while locked up – I received a simple “thinking of you” card from them. “We are here for you,” the note said. Two months later, I was called to the visitation room. There again, through the dirty Plexiglas, I saw them. I was as pale as you can be from a lack of sunlight in six months, and I was scared, and lonely, and frankly tired of it all. And yet, after that visit I wrote in my journal something I hadn’t written before that day; I wrote, “I think all this will work out.”

            Five and a half years. I’ve been let down by people in here and out there and I have seen horrendous violence and the waste of many lives. Yet, there are the other moments, like when the big, black kid at the jail bear-hugged me and kept saying over and over “we did it!” when he passed his high school equivalency test. There’s my friendship with DC, a man who forty years ago was as notorious as any inmate in the Virginia prison system. Today, he is one of the kindest, most decent men I’ve ever met. I trust DC. I don’t say that very often in here. And, I feel a kinship to him and a brotherly love I didn’t think possible in the confines of prison.

            Chuck Colson kept a diary of his time behind bars. He wrote the following insightful thoughts early in his incarceration:

            “This is no country club … It is a prison and the conditions are really worse than I expected … there is everything here from lifelong, hardened criminals to young drug offenders.

            The reason I am glad to be here, however, is the sudden realization of how many needs there are here … My heart has ached for so many while I am here; more important, when I leave I hope I can do something about the concept of rehabilitation and punishment. All its high sounding names – deterrence, rehabilitation – are untrue. If it is punishment, so be it; but maybe it is more humane to whip a man’s body than destroy his soul slowly.”

            He concluded with these words:

            “I have an obligation to try to improve the fate and circumstances of man in this plight … I am convinced the Lord has planned this for me and will use me for His purpose.”

            There is a simple story in John’s Gospel about Jesus healing a young, blind man. Prior to the healing, the discussion centers on the cause of the man’s blindness. “Is it the result of his parents’ sin or his?” the disciples ask. “Neither,” comes Jesus’s reply. “It was so the works of God might be displayed in him.” And with those words Jesus gave the young man his sight. Those in power didn’t understand who did this; how could it be, they wondered. And they questioned the man about the “healer.” His answer comes to me often: “All I know is once I was blind and now I see.”

            “Contra Mundum” – “against the world” – it was the great Latin rallying cry of the fourth century Christian theologian Athanasius. It means to stand for Christ against the powers of the world and to understand that God’s ways are different. I see now why God has so long spoken through the perspective of the powerless, why He makes special demands on His people to care for the oppressed, sick, and suffering. Justice does not devolve from human institutions and laws but in the righteousness of God and His Word.

            That may sound all fanciful and self-delusional, but it simply means it is wiser to take refuge in the Lord than any earthly prince.

            What does all that mean? It means even when we get off course, God is in control. It means at my worst, God was at His best. It means that there is a reason for all this. As Bob Dylan sang in “My Back Pages,” “I once was so much older then, I’m younger than that now.” The visits, the Bible coming from my friend Charlie, being befriended by an Episcopal minister, the cards from “Martha,” and even my divorce, they happened to put me where I am today in relation to my God. Or, as the young man told the Pharisees, “I was blind and now I see.”

            It is the season of Lent, preparation for Easter, and for the first time in six years I didn’t give up something like coffee or chips. Instead, I’m reading a treatise on the 91^st Psalm and a study of the Book of James. It is hard to fathom any sacrifice I could make worthy of what God has done for me.

            What does this have to do with prison? Probably nothing, but nothing happens by coincidence. I look back over these past 5 ½ years and see what Chuck Colson meant. Like Paul being blinded on the road to Damascus and the scales suddenly falling from his eyes and he saw, I see what it means. Or, as Mr. Colson so eloquently put it,

            “It is in God’s timing, not ours. And it is the result of His sovereign will, not of any magic wand we may think we wield.”

            This chapter of my life will someday come to an end and a new one will begin and the lessons of this chapter, the understanding of contra mundum will carry forward. And I don’t think the Circuit Court judge who sentenced me had any idea what God would do for me.

            

Thanksgiving 2012

I just “celebrated” my fifth Thanksgiving behind bars.  The fact that I can use the word “celebrate” to describe anything in here should tell you how far I’ve come since that first November at the Henrico County Jail.  “In all things, give thanks.”  I never felt at ease with the Apostle Paul’s admonition until this year.  Now, looking back, it makes perfect sense.

In November 2008, I was barely hanging on to my sanity and, quite candidly, my life.  I’d been in jail over three months by the time that first Thanksgiving rolled in.  I was pale.  My muscle tone had deteriorated and I’d lost almost thirty pounds.  The weight wasn’t an issue.  For the past year I’d binged on rich meals and booze in a state of guilt and depression knowing I’d inevitably lose everything.

But as Thanksgiving approached, I was in an alien place, with little or no control over even the most rudimentary aspects of life.  The week before, I’d appeared in court and plead guilty to all six counts presented against me.  A reporter from the local Richmond paper wrote about my appearance in court – as she did every other hearing – and once again I was big news.  Don’t believe the old adage “any publicity is good publicity”.  I was constantly hounded by other inmates begging for help with any and all issues.  And, to a man, none could honestly assess their lives, their problems, or their futures.

Friends by the dozens bailed on me.  My church neglected me.  My spouse wrote vindictive, hateful letters all the while demanding I give her everything.  I was embarrassed, ashamed, and defeated.  There was no hope.  And the worst part?  I’d done it all to myself.  I knew long ago what was coming.  But, I somehow thought it was easier to give in to everyone else’s dreams and ambitions.  Everyone would like me if I just delivered.  Who cares if I knew what I was doing was wrong?

There I was, Thanksgiving day, with a disgusting, mostly inedible meal, and I wished I was dead.  There is nothing worse than being alone, without hope.  “In all things, give thanks.”  Paul had no idea what he was saying.  He wasn’t me.

2009 brought even more difficulties.  I was sentenced.  The sentence shocked everyone who had come to court, a handful of friends and former coworkers.  The ink on the sentencing order wasn’t even dry and I was served with divorce papers.  I’d already signed everything over to my wife (our property settlement was a chief piece of my asset settlement agreement with my employer).  I was going to prison for thirteen years, divorced, penniless, and with the exception of a handful of family and friends, alone.

As bad as jail was, it didn’t equip me to handle DOC’s Receiving Unit.  For over four months I saw the worst in men:  stabbings, beatings, extortion.  That I moved in and around such utter violence and chaos unscathed never registered as a “blessing”.  I was just trying to survive.

Then, the Friday before Thanksgiving 2009, I left receiving and came here.  This facility wasn’t even on my “suggested” correction center list.  Two days after arrival I was hired as a teacher’s aide.  Two days after that I ate my first real turkey in over sixteen months.  The meal wasn’t “like home” but it was hot and tasty and filling.

I have eaten four Thanksgiving meals at this prison.  A few weeks ago I found myself wondering how it was that I came to a prison on the cusp of beginning a college program and I would discover a gift, that I could teach.  How was it that I moved so easily, so safely among so much violence and difficulty?

I remembered the words to the old Scottish Psalter, the Doxology, the “Old Hundred”.  It was a song of my childhood and comfort to me in difficult days.  I went for a run and found myself singing, “Know the Lord your God is good, His love for us is ever sure, we are his flock He doth us feed, age to age He shall endure.”

“In all things, give thanks.”  That doesn’t mean you have to jump for joy when your world is falling apart.  It does mean “have faith” God knows what He’s doing, even when we can’t figure out His ways.

Thanksgiving morning 2012, I ran in thirty degree weather in short sleeves.  And the words to the “Old Hundred” played through my head.  And, I thought of other Thanksgivings – good and bad.  Barefoot on the cold concrete, stretching, I thanked my Maker for this journey.  There really are blessings in trials.

Birthdays, College Acceptances and Homecoming

This was an interesting week.  A few milestones were met for a couple of guys.  Thanksgiving came and went.  It’s never easy celebrating a holiday in here.  You get used to it – at least you tell yourself that – and you spend your day keeping busy so you don’t get overwhelmed with memories.

Two of the guys I’m very close to celebrated birthdays on the same day.  Craig, one of the college aides, the guy we call “the Dean” (because he’s the inmate contact to the college) turned 40.  He’s spent seven birthdays locked up; he has five more to go.  He tried to keep it quiet, didn’t want anyone to know; big mistake.  Most days, after noon count when one of the guys is ticked at an officer a tradition has developed.  We’re standing silently as the COs confirm the number and the offended guy will yell out “4A, give it up for ____.”  The building erupts with everyone shouting “F--- ____!”  Laughter then ensues.

So we’re standing, waiting, and I yell out “4A, give it up for the dean’s 40^th birthday”.  And, well you know the response, followed by cheers and real birthday wishes.  Craig – beet red just looked at me and said “I’m gonna kill you!”

My young sidekick Mike turned 34 the same day.  Mike’s been in prison since he was fifteen; nineteen years incarcerated.  He comes up for parole every year and is denied (“serious nature of the crime”.  He stabbed a man to death).  Mike has an exemplary record as an inmate, but murder, well he probably won’t get out before his mandatory parole release date which, ironically, is 30 days before my own scheduled release date.  I always tell Mike I’m pulling for him to make early parole because I’m assured of getting out a month later!

I can’t imagine doing “this” at fifteen.  He was kept at a juvenile center until 17, then shipped to “real prison”.  Back then, DOC operated a facility called Southampton.  It was for young, violent offenders:  age 17 to 30.  And, it was a zoo.  A good number of the guys I know here who are mid-thirties to 40 and who’ve been “down” 15 to 20 years started at Southampton.  Southampton was known for stabbings, rapes and drugs.  Chaos ruled.  Somehow, this quiet, tall white kid avoided it all.  He stayed to himself, avoided being a victim, avoided the gang flare ups between the Aryans and the blacks, and he got his level lowered to Lunenburg. 

When I first met Mike he was painfully quiet.  Introverted was defined by “see Mike”.  But, Craig and I saw he was bright – very bright – and we convinced him to come work in my classroom.  And, as is my habit, I talked to him (I talk to everybody).  Mike started talking.  I’ve turned him into a regular chatterbox!  He’s a great tutor, well-read, a “Seinfeld” fan, and I can count on him to hit the occasional “that’s what she said”, when needed.  Nineteen birthdays in prison; nine more to go.  He came in a teenager; he’ll head out in his forties.

Two guys who I helped with college applications received letters admitting them.  “Mouse” was notified of acceptance beginning next fall at his local community college.  He’s halfway toward his associates degree which he’ll complete while working toward a degree in culinary arts.  Then there’s Todd.  Another mid-thirties guy.  Did 5 years in Tennessee prisons and another 5 here for dealing drugs.  Todd is one of my favorite students.  He puts his all into his studies and has maintained a 4.0 GPA.  This week he learned he will finish his studies at a four-year state university after his release early next year.  He was one of the few guys who passed the IT “A+ certification” exam.  He’s going to get his degree in information technology.

I’m waiting to hear about five more guys who’ve applied to colleges next year after their release.  Imagine, going to college in here and then being able to complete your studies in a real college setting.  A college education is the number one determiner in breaking the recidivism cycle.  That these guys have a shot is remarkable.

And then there’s Solo.  Our famous “porn king” heads home Monday.  Nine year bid coming to an end.  Solo’s going home to his wife, his two kids, a job (at his family’s restaurant) and college.  Solo looks like Buddha with a bowl haircut.  He was known – back when smoking was permitted – to slow jog around the track with a honeybun in one hand and a cigarette in the other.  Solo always has a smile on his face and hardcore porn in his pocket.  He’s completed his sentence – nine years for selling powder cocaine (the deal went bad, he was stabbed in the arm severing a major artery.  He was arrested at the hospital once the police realized he wasn’t going to bleed to death).  Solo will spend Christmas with his family.  His last prison holiday behind him.

And me on Thanksgiving?  I enjoyed my meal and watched football.  Later, I ate some ramen noodles and refried beans.  I drank a ginger ale, laughed with the guys in the building and tried not to think about Thanksgivings before.  As I paused and read my afternoon devotional the words from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians came to mind:

“Pray without ceasing; in everything give thanks….”

I realized it had been a very good, blessed week.

Thanksgiving

This week I will spend my fourth Thanksgiving behind bars.  For the first time during those four Thanksgivings I feel relatively happy and very blessed.  That may come as a surprise to some who know me.  Thanksgiving weekend this year would have marked my 30^th wedding anniversary.  My ex-wife and two sons remain in my daily prayers.  Perhaps the divorce was for the best.  Perhaps things are as they should be.  I only know I miss and love them but have reached a point of peace.

No, even in the loneliness, I’m thankful.  God, I’ve realized answers prayers and He’s with us every moment of every day.  The writer, William James said: 

“We stand on a mountain pass.  Be strong and of good courage.  Act for the best, hope for the best, and take what comes…” 

I think William James would understand my prison experience.

Nothing is ever hopeless.  No matter how bad things may appear, there is always hope.  As I ran the other morning, I couldn’t help but think of country singer Tim McGraw’s wonderful ballad “Carry On”.

“Carry on

What don’t kill us,
Makes us strong.
There ain’t no troubles we can’t rise above
With a handful of faith
And a heartful of love.”

I speak for the guys in here, building 4A, “the learning community” when I wish you Happy Thanksgiving.

Pieta

One of the world’s best known pieces of sculpture is the “Pieta”.  Latin for “pity” it depicts a weeping Virgin Mary holding the broken, dead body of her son, Jesus.  Christ is prone, across her lap, his arms hanging to the floor.  Mary looks with sadness and love, motherly love, at the body of her dear son.

That came to mind this week as I thought about mothers.  As I wrote a few weeks ago, my younger brother, my only sibling, passed away.  He lived a difficult life punctuated, I imagine, by moments of joy such as at the birth of his daughter.  My brother had a very difficult relationship with our mother.  He lashed out at her frequently.  He could be – and regularly was – verbally abusive.  For much of his adult life he was full of anger and self-pity.  He needed someone to blame and that fell on my mom.

My mom isn’t perfect.  She’s half Italian, half Irish and three-quarters worried what everyone thinks.   But, on her own she was her congregation’s visitation committee.  Birthdays, anniversaries, celebrations, tragedies, it’s my mom who gets cards and meals out.  She goes to hospitals and nursing homes every week.  She was able to reach and help so many, yet my brother was unreachable.  So many times in my life I remember her eyes welling up with tears as she’d whisper “he hates me”. 

Then a strange thing happened.  As my brother lay dying those last few difficult weeks it was my mother he called for.  Going in and out of lucidness he’d call “where’s mom?” and mom was always there.  My father, a stoic Korean War Veteran, couldn’t stay in the room and watch my brother’s life ebb.  He would walk out, go around the hospital halls.  Not my mom.  She took his laundry (t-shirts, pajama bottoms) each night and brought them back fresh the next morning.  When Mark lost his appetite, she made rice pudding (one of his favorites) and fed it to him.

The morning my brother died my mother had spent the night “I just had a sense,” she told me.  At 4:30 am she called my father at the house.  “You need to come back.”  My dad arrived just a few minutes before Mark took his last breath.  My mother never left his side.

A mother’s love.  I have seen grown men in here, men who have been stabbed, beaten, shot, kept in solitary for months, who have never shed a tear in their lives until their mothers passed.  And then?  I’ve seen them weep uncontrollably.  A guy I respect in here told me early on a piece of advice I’ve thought about these past few weeks.  He said “if his mother hasn’t given up on him, he’s still got a chance.”  For nine months after my arrest my father refused to speak to me.  My mom?  Multiple times each week she wrote. No matter what I did I knew my mom still believed I could overcome this.

Shortly after our second son was born, he developed a severe respiratory infection.  His oxygen level hovered, at times, in very dangerous levels.   Our family physician lived in our neighborhood.  He debated hospitalizing our young son but, knowing us and being willing to come by our house anytime we called, he allowed us to keep our son at home.  We were both exhausted.  At one point, late in the evening, I fell asleep on the couch.  When I awoke I looked across the room.  There, sitting in our recliner was my wife.  She held our son to her chest.  He slept soundly under her watchful gaze, his fist hours of restful sleep in days.

I looked at the two of them for the longest time trying to fathom the mystery of a mother’s love.  She would not close her eyes, she would not move while her child lay sleeping. 

Last Wednesday would have been my brother’s 49^th birthday.  I sent my folks a card and called Thursday.  My mother wept when she spoke to me.  “Yesterday was tough,” she told me.  I get that.  She carried that child.  She birthed that child.  She was there when her baby breathed his last.

Thanksgiving is here.   The past few months have given me a new perspective on life, a new sense of hope.   I am thankful for this experience.  More than anything, I’m thankful that my eyes have been opened about my mom.

Little Things

Thanksgiving 2010. My third Thanksgiving incarcerated. I went out early this morning, first rec call at 7:45, and walked, did calisthenics, and then ran. It was cold and crisp, overcast, a real November day. I ran in a tee shirt and shorts, with gloves and an orange knit cap to keep my hands and head warm. I’d run a sprint, 125 yards in 21 seconds, stop and catch my breath and run back. Twenty-one seconds down, twenty seconds rest, twenty-one back.



I felt great. I felt grateful. Here I was, three Thanksgivings locked up, but I was running, I was breathing, I was enduring. It was beautiful, the trees with the leaves orange and red, the fresh air. Life, even in here, can be beautiful.


A friend of mine left the other day. He’s been in prison eight years. We laughed a bit about the little things you take for granted “BP” (before prison).


“I’m gonna go in the bathroom and close the door and just sit (Privacy in the bathroom, privacy anywhere in prison, doesn’t exist).”


“I’m gonna turn lights on and off when I want, and sleep in the dark (lighting is automatic in here. It’s never completely dark, even at night).”


“I’m gonna go in and out of my house whenever I want. I’ll sit in a room, then move to another (all movement is regulated).”


“I’m gonna make love to my wife, then just listen to her sleep.”


Eight years is a long time to not turn a lamp on, open a garage door, use a knife, fork and spoon. Eight years is a long time for attempting to rob a pharmacy to support a prescription drug habit. The man is a Vietnam Vet; he served his country for twenty years (you’d be surprised how many inmates were in the service). Yet, he isn’t bitter for the years he lost “in the system”. He knows he put himself in here, put his life in the hands of a judge the moment he walked in the Walgreens with a gun and a note.


He’s reflective about his time behind these barbed wire fences.


“Wasn’t all bad. Met some good people. Learned a whole lot about myself and who my real friends are. Learned who really loved me. Just missed a lot of things.” Little things like kid’s birthdays, graduations, Christmases, and anniversaries. Little things like going to the beach and just gazing at the ocean and smelling the salt in the air.


I’ve thought a good deal this week about how radically different my life is from where I was on the day I was arrested. I sometimes think we get too hung up on the loss and don’t appreciate, don’t have gratitude, for what we’ve gained. As I ran, I realized I had a great deal to be grateful for.


I read devotion at 4:30 this morning that said:


“Did you ever consider thanking God for something that doesn’t seem like a blessing – such as a difficult circumstance you want changed or removed? A grateful heart is most precious to God when, from our human perspective, our situations don’t warrant giving thanks.”


I’ve learned over the past three Thanksgivings to believe and trust in God. I know there is a purpose in my struggle, my incarceration. I trust His promise that “all things work” for our good. I hate the circumstances I find myself in, but I trust God and I know I have the strength to endure this.


Each day I pray for certain things to happen, particular people to forgive me, be restored to me, my sentence to be shortened. But each day I also say “it’s in Your hands. Whatever comes my way, I believe in You. You have a plan and you will see me through.”


Maybe I’m naïve. Maybe I’m fooling myself, but I can endure the little things in here because I have hope. And, in the end, hope is a big thing, and not just in prison.

Counting Blessings

This week, USA Today columnist Craig Wilson wrote an interesting essay about middle class Americans becoming so whiny. He wrote about passengers on the disabled Carnival Cruise ship remarking that they’d “been through hell”. Hell? They were “forced” to eat Pop Tarts and canned crabmeat. Their toilets wouldn’t flush for half a day.



Wilson pointed out that in Haiti; millions are still homeless from last January’s earthquake. Thousands more are suffering from cholera.


People in America, he concluded, have forgotten how good we have it. He’s right, you know. Even here I prison, I find myself so fortunate for my current circumstances. In my advanced writing class yesterday, one of my students – Ty – said the following:


“Young guys here who bitch don’t know how good they have it. At the real penitentiary you see stabbings and rapes every week, thefts and guys getting beat up every day. This place is comfortable.”


I’ve thought a good deal about Mr. Wilson’s and Ty’s comments. I realized how fortunate I really am – even in here. I just need to remind myself about all the blessings I receive, even in prison.


So, here’s my first ever “Thanksgiving in prison” list, a list of those things I’m truly thankful for.


I’m thankful that the three people who matter most to me, my two sons and my ex-wife, are healthy and doing well. As much as I pray for a miracle reconciliation, I pray more for their care, their health, their security, and their peace.


I’m thankful for my cousin and her husband. They have done more to sustain me these past two years than anyone else in my life. Prior to my arrest, I had only limited involvement with them. Yet, they found space in their heart for me. They listen, counsel, care and support me. I candidly must admit I couldn’t have gotten to this point in my prison experience without them.


I’m thankful for the friendships I’ve made. Big S is part son, part best friend. I have met men during this experience: Ty, Black, Jerry Lee, Powers, Briscoe and DC to name a few, who have taught me much about dignity and patience in the face of adversity.


Even as my friends from home fade away, friends who said “I’ll write” or “I’ll be out to see you soon”, fail to carry through, I’ve learned the real meaning of friendship and brotherhood.


I’m thankful I have my health, mentally, physically and spiritually. This compound has hundreds of inmates suffering from Hepatitis C, AIDS, diabetes, high blood pressure, and they, for the most part, are significantly younger than me. I turned 51 this past July. I have perfect blood pressure, perfect cholesterol, excellent sugar. My dental hygiene is perfect. I’ve kept my weight between 168 and 170. I run, I pray, I do yoga and meditate. I’ve been removed from medication. I am psychologically sound and mentally and spiritually more alive than I’ve been in years. Even in the midst of loneliness, this negative environment, this isolation and loss of so much, I have found hope and purpose.


I’m thankful that I know, finally, who I am. I understand why I made the decisions I did. I know I’m a good, kind man. I’ve made mistakes. I broke the law. I hurt deeply three people more important to me than life itself. But, I know the final chapter in my life has not yet been written. I have so much to give, so much to do. I wouldn’t have found that without this prison experience, and dealing with the pain of losing the love of my life and ultimately learning to forgive and understand my capacity to love and endure in spite of being hurt so deeply.


I have so much to be thankful for. I will always have my memories of marrying my wife, how I felt watching her walk down the aisle, how wonderful it felt the first time and so many other times when we made love. I will always see in my mind’s eye the birth of both of my sons, how I cradled them in my arms and softly sang to them.


I am so thankful that at my lowest, when all seemed lost, I decided to go on just one more day. God really does work in mysterious ways. So many people I’ve met along this path, so many eye opening, soul changing experiences would have been missed had I given up.


I’m not sure what the future holds. Each day I doubt more and more that my ex will ever speak to me, ever tell me she really did love me. Each day the likelihood of seeing, of hugging, my sons seems more distant. Yet, somehow I believe. I believe things will get better. I believe love and goodness do win out in the end.


It’s strange really to think of yourself as blessed while you’re sitting in a prison dormitory divorced, separated from your children, no home, no retirement, no one to say “I love you”. Yet, twice a day in prayer I say that. Truth is, I have more than so many others. I have, even in here, a blessed life.