If Only

Yesterday, another group of men were conferred degrees and certificates by our sponsoring community college.  As it was on prior occasions, the ceremony was joyful and uplifting with the graduates mingling with faculty and family just like graduates in the “real world”.  And, as with other college graduations I’ve attended in here, there were moments for me of bittersweet memories as my mind ran through “If only, Larry”.  More on that later.

The other weekend I was at visitation with my folks.  Every month, they make the ninety mile drive from their home in North Carolina up here.  They are both healthy, late-seventies people, and that gives me hope for a lot of years post prison.  Our conversations run the gamut of what’s going on with whom, and where people are.  Invariably, my mom will make an aside about my former church and the minister there.  At my worst, as I sat in the Henrico County Jail trying to find any reason to go on, he refused to come see me.

For a long time that treatment – by people I worshiped with and helped – gnawed at me.  How can my own minister turn his back on me?  2012 was an epiphanal year in my life.  And a fair number of issues and emotional baggage I’d been carting around slowly began to go away.  Things that had seemed to hurt me so deeply didn’t really matter too much.  In fact, I began to appreciate the pain they caused.  Call it rationalization, or maturity, or salvation, but I began to understand what the Apostle Paul meant when during his imprisonment he wrote “And in all things God works for the good of those who love Him according to His purposes.”

Paul was a heck of a writer and his words struck at the mystery that is faith in times of deep trouble.  Those words – I recited that verse literally dozens of times on my worst days as I tried to will myself into believing nothing was happening that God in His infinite power and grace couldn’t work out for my benefit.

I have a dear friend, an Episcopal minister, who regularly visited me at the jail and the receiving unit.  He has provided counsel, and support – even getting his congregation involved in my circumstances, and has listened during my Job-like periods when nothing made sense.  He stayed in touch, writing and visiting me even while undergoing chemotherapy.  His friendship is a true blessing in my life.  Here’s the irony.  I never would have met Gary had it not been for my own minister’s snub.  Another friend, one of Gary’s parishioners, asked him to come see me after my own church rejected me.  “If only”.  Somehow, I think Paul is smiling and saying, “Larry finally gets it.”

Back to college graduation – I sat there and watched our students march in and I remembered I missed my older son’s college graduation.  A wave of emotion – sadness, guilt, loneliness – hit me.  “If only”, I thought, and I felt myself growing back into the guy who struggled so long in here. I started thinking about Paul’s words.

The ceremony ended and I was eating with a few friends and two college faculty members when one of our graduates came up.  “Larry, my parents want to meet you.”  I walked over with him and said hello.  An elderly black woman with a cane stepped up, then threw her arms around me.  “Thank you”, she said.  “You helped our son so much.  You answered our prayers.”

Funny thing, that same reaction happened eight or nine times after that as grad after grad got me and introduced me to parents, grandparents, spouses, children.  “This is the guy who got me through my academic classes.”

I thought about Joseph in Egypt.  Sold into slavery, sent to prison, forgotten and then saves Egypt during a terrible drought.  Through divine intervention he is reunited with his brothers who fear for their lives.  Joseph, in one of the Bible’s great lines of mercy forgives his brothers.  “You meant to harm me, but God meant it for good.”

“If only.”  Sometimes we focus too much on the regret and not on the blessing.  I couldn’t help but think about Paul, and our graduates and their families, and my prison journey.  “In all things God works for the good….”  Even in embezzlement convictions, incarceration, and divorce that message applies.

 

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.

Summer Break

Dear Blog Readers:

It’s summer, that period of time between Memorial Day and Labor Day when folks feel the natural tug to slow down and recharge their batteries.  Friends came out to see me last weekend and I lived vicariously through their travels:  one already returned from Florida with wife and children in tow, the other just weeks from heading to his summer beach house.  Summer is a great season.

Life is different in here.  You can do your bid just sleeping away the days, only coming out for meals and the twice monthly walk to commissary.  Or, you can head outside everyday; you run or workout regardless of temperature or precipitation or your own outlook.

I love the summer.  The days are longer, the sky clear, the temperature warm. Summer reminds me of beach trips and bike rides, swimming and runs in the sand.  As I said, summer isn’t the same in here.

This will be my last blog until Labor Day.  There are a number of important issues I need to address this summer which require more attention than I’ve initially given them.  In July, I’m able to petition the Governor to modify the terms of my sentence.  The Virginia Constitution gives the Governor absolute power to modify the terms of any sentence.  Each year, hundreds of inmates petition the Governor to modify their sentences; very few are granted.  I’m not sure what the reaction will be to my petition.  I only know that I can honestly tell the Governor that I’ve done everything possible since my arrest and conviction to atone for my bad deeds.

As I’ve written previously, I have an eBook in the works.  It’s a collection of short stories and essays I’ve written over the last few years.  The working title is “40”.  It’s the title of a story I wrote while in receiving in the heat and humidity of a Virginia August.  My four months in receiving taught me more about the ills of humanity and the possibilities of redemption than anything I’ve ever experienced.  It was horrible, and disgusting and painful.  And, I consider it, in hindsight, a blessing.

“40” is based on a real young man I met.  He was going through heroin withdrawal while locked up in the Henrico County Jail.  Watching that young man suffer as his body, physically craving the drug, broke down before my eyes is an image I will always remember.

But it’s the story of hope.  It was during that same time frame, as I’d talk to that young addict and then return to my cell and battle the self loathing I felt, the intense internal call to give up, that I read on one particular sad, lonely night Isaiah 40.  I found verse 27 and froze.

 “Why do you say and assert your way is hidden from the Lord, and the justice due you escapes the notice of your God?”

It was addressing the people of Israel who had squandered their chosen status as “God’s people” and were in the midst of a loss beyond comprehension.  Exiled and enslaved in a foreign land, their life, their home destroyed, they wondered “Where is God?”  And in those few brief, beautiful verses Isaiah tells them:  God sees you; God knows what you are going through; and, God will deliver you.  “And those who wait on the Lord will soar on wings like eagles.  They will run and not get tired.  They will walk and not get weary.”

I cheered my young drug-addled friend on, telling him he could survive withdrawal and he could turn his life around.  And I told myself the same thing every night as I recited those verses over and over.

That’s “40”.  That’s part of the book.  More importantly, it’s part of my life.  I’ll be working on that over the next two months.  When new blogs return I hope to do more interactive things, direct readers to groups pushing important issues like prison reform and restorative justice.

So, it’s off to draft my “Dear Governor McDonnell” letter.  I look forward to the new and improved Bars-N-Stripes blog after summer break.  Now, go enjoy this weather!

 If you would like to contact Larry directly during the summer you can do so at:

Lawrence H. Bidwell # 1402909
Bldg. 4A, Bed 81
Lunenburg Correctional Facility
P.O. Box 1424
Victoria, VA  23974-0650


There are some restrictions on sending mail to the prison and everything is read before Larry receives it.  Envelopes must be no larger than # 10 and no heavier than 1 oz (i.e. one postage stamp).  No stickers or other object may be glued or taped to the envelope.  They will only accept an envelope with a return address label, mailing label and stamp.  If you have items that exceed the 1 oz weight limit, you must split them up into several envelopes (each weighing no more than 1 oz) and you can identify them (as 1 of 3, etc.).

The Firing

The attorney/inmate – officer saga took another strange twist this week.  The officer’s life has been dramatically altered.  The compound is reeling with rumors.  Ironically, I feel quite sad for the officer involved.

First, to refresh everyone’s memory, the facility housed a mid-forties disbarred criminal attorney from Richmond.  I knew him in my former life and thought he was a bs’er of the top order.  My year at the Henrico Jail with him and then running into him here only reinforced that opinion.  Last week, I reported that the illustrious inmate had spent another week in the hole, under investigation for being paid to handle legal work for men in here.

It is a series 200 charge to accept compensation for legal work.  DOC cannot prevent an inmate from providing guidance to another regarding the law, but they can hem you up for being paid.  I walked a fine line for over a year here helping guys with their cases.  I never charged, and I never said no.  I’d read anyone’s file that asked and I looked for any avenue legally possible to get these men a new shake.  I never lost a moment’s sleep over it.  I experienced firsthand the problems with the criminal justice system.   In simple terms, little justice occurs.  The prosecutors and police resort to questionable – clearly unethical and at times illegal – conduct to win a case.  The prisons do nothing but house and make better criminals.  Few people – in both shades of blue – believe this system is worth even a modicum of support.

So yes, I tackled this system every chance I got.  And guys appreciated it and I’d find a six pack of ginger ale on my bunk, or a bag of nacho chips.  My goal was simple:  every guy I helped who got his sentence altered or won a grievance was my way of giving this broken, corrupt system the finger.  But, the system still goes forward.  I was called to the investigator’s office and told “we’re watching you”.  So I pulled back and regrouped.  I’ll answer questions all day, but I won’t work the file.

Not so with the other barrister here.  He was operating a “for profit” enterprise.  In a good month, he would have the families of these men sending checks and money orders to a street address that helped him clear $3000.  That’s not shabby “cheddar”, as the guys in here say.

But, as I discussed last week, he let it get out of control.  You can’t promise a guy you’ll get him out.  And, you can’t run game on a CO.  He did both.

I know there are a lot of “black and white” readers out there.  “You broke the law.  You suffer the consequences.”  The “right is right and wrong is wrong” crowd.  I know.  I was that person.  I’ve come to learn through this experience the world isn’t black and white, yes and no.  Its many hues of grey.  We all screw up.  We all make stupid decisions, say hurtful things, and yes – almost everyone has broken “the law” at one time.  Yet, we tend to live with this moralistic, self righteous attitude that somehow we know what the right thing to do is in every situation.  We judge our neighbor’s behavior.

Three days ago, the shift change occurred and the “under investigation” CO showed up to work.  She made it inside the fence then was immediately escorted to the watch command office and advised she was terminated and under investigation by the Virginia State Police.  I felt terrible for her and that night I included she and her husband and children in my prayers.

I remember what my arrest was like.  I remember the earthquake like shock waves felt by family and friends each time my name and circumstances appeared in the area papers.  It is not a pleasant feeling.  I wouldn’t wish that on my enemy and quite frankly, this woman wasn’t my enemy.  She was a younger, married mom who had some problems in her life.  She also happened to be an officer who was part of the system that keeps me confined.   But she always treated me with respect and I felt for her.  I don’t know what was happening with her marriage, with herself, that led her to this decision-making.  I only know I made a great deal of stupid decisions myself that with the benefit of hindsight I wish I could change.

The day after the officer was fired, a state police investigator showed up in the law library with one of the institution investigators.  They ran hard drive checks on the research computer and tore the file cabinet apart looking for additional evidence against the lawyer in the hole.  A second officer has now been suspended pending investigation.

As I strolled down the boulevard the past two days (has a nice summer ring to it) a few inmate clients of the lawyer stopped me.  Their cases, their paperwork, locked up in personal property until their “attorney” is released from the hole.  And, their families have paid.  “My mom sent him $300”, one young kid – Joey, age 22 told me.  “They’ve already spent $40,000 trying to get my ten year cocaine distribution sentence reviewed.”  Forty grand to lawyers who told his folks and him “you’ll probably get two years”. 

The system keeps slogging forward.  It grinds anyone in its path.  This week it got one of its own.  She never saw it coming.  She never had a chance.  One of these days, real justice will be meted out.  And it will be based on principles of kindness, forgiveness, compassion and mercy.  Until that day, we are all just one bad decision away from what that officer experienced. 

The Re-entry Con Game

Prior to his inauguration, amidst much fanfare, then Governor-Elect Bob McDonnell visited the Henrico County Jail to announce that under his administration a partnership would be formed with the private sector and faith based organizations for the re-entry of inmates back to their community.

The hearts and minds of thousands of inmates languishing in Virginia’s prisons were suddenly buoyed that finally a politician had been elected who gave a damn.  It was surprising, no astounding, that the politician was a “tough on crime” conservative, born-again Christian, Republican.  Within weeks of his inauguration, a huge “Re-entry Initiative” was printed at a cost of thousands of dollars and who knows how many trees.

But, it appears that after months of talk about re-entry, Governor McDonnell’s plan is nothing but a sophisticated snake oil sale.  Nothing about McDonnell’s plan is different from the past.  Bob McDonnell is long on words and short on action.

As I sit here at Lunenburg, a facility specifically designated as a “re-entry center”, I can assure you the exact same “transition out program” used for years before McDonnell’s election is still the same program used today.  Nothing different.  Nothing new.

The old “Breaking Barriers” program, a touchy feely group exploration of why “we” break the law has been replaced with “thinking for a change”.  Same poor program taught by prison “counselors” (who are a joke).  The name changed but the content remained the same. 

Even worse, Lunenburg is now being managed by a warden who plays no role in the day to day operation of the facility and by an assistant warden who actually scoffs at the notion of inmate programs.  In other words, DOC has placed management of one of its re-entry facilities in the hands of people who are opposed to re-entry.  Is it any wonder approximately one third of Virginia’s inmates re-offend within three years of release?

My friend in “Alaska” has been taking me to task for the great waste of resources used on prisoners who never even admit their culpability for their crimes and see themselves as the victims.  I couldn’t agree with you more “Alaska”.  Almost every day I have some guy come up to me and say “I didn’t do it” or “the Commonwealth attorney paid off the judge”.  Most inmates won’t accept responsibility for their behavior, won’t seek forgiveness for their wrongs, and won’t apologize to their victims.  And the reason, quite simply, is because people that do that suffer worse at the hands of the system.

What “Alaska” wants I think, is what I have called for almost from the inception of this blog, implementation of restorative justice principles, not retribution.  Founded on Biblical tenets, it was what Bishop Tutu used in South Africa and what is leading to societal reconciliation in Burundi and Rwanda.  And, it is the exact opposite of what we do in our prisons.

Over and over I am told by well meaning people inside and outside of these walls that for “a smart man” I was “foolish” for (1) admitting my wrongdoing the day I was questioned without even asking for counsel; (2) pleading guilty to all charges brought without requiring proof of the “loss” or any sentencing deal.  I’m looked at as a fool because I apologized to the court, my employer, my wife, children, parents and friends and told the judge I deserved prison time.

“What were you thinking?  “Why would you give everything to your wife knowing she would divorce you?  Why would you apologize to an employer who was calling the prosecution demanding you get one hundred years?”  When I tell them I did what the Lord requires us to do when we fail, I’m met with “the Lord sure didn’t tell the judge to be just did he?”

Inmates and accuseds will never accept the idea of remorse, of just punishment, and of rehabilitation, as long as the system is so blatantly unfair.  Sentences bear no relationship to the crime committed and in many instances are products of an accused’s race and class.

A book that draws widespread attention in prisons is Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow”.  In it, Ms. Alexander argues quite persuasively that prisons in modern America have replaced the plantation model of pre-civil war America for black men.  I’ve read the book.  It is disturbing and insightful and correct.  White, middle class teens committing the same crime as impoverished black teens receive substantially shorter sentences.  And once in prison, inmates (a majority of which are African American) are put to work doing dangerous, harmful work for slave wages.  During the Gulf Oil spill, for example, thousands of Louisiana inmates were put to work handling carcinogenic laced oil without adequate safety measures and without pay.  Here at Lunenburg, VCE (Virginia Corrections Enterprises) operates a furniture shop in an un-air-conditioned shop.  Inmates build furniture for state universities for 55 to 85 cents an hour.  That furniture is then sold to those schools (who must buy it even though furniture from private manufacturers is less expensive).

The system should be built on the simple, yet all important premise, of restoring the lawbreaker – where possible – to the community as a whole person.  To do that requires the law breaker to admit their wrong, reflect on why they did it, apologize to the victim, where possible make restitution to the victim and be reconciled to the community.

This process isn’t accomplished by giving a man fifteen years with no hope of early release and in his fourteenth year sending him to a ten week “transition out program”.  All that time before is wasted, making the inmate more embittered, feeling more victimized himself.

Governor McDonnell needs to quit selling snake oil and really make prison matter.  Reinstate early release and tie it specifically to the principles of restorative justice outlined above.  Make prison an effective method of correction, not a dumping ground based on punitive principles.  Inmates will change when they see the sincerity, not the hypocrisy, in the system.

Through the Deep Waters

For months as I’ve run around the yard here I’ve prayed for divine intervention in my broken marriage, with my kids, and in my case. It dawned on me a few weeks ago that I was missing the big picture. It all made sense in my writing class a few weeks ago.



I was sharing a story with my advanced students. It concerned the call I had placed to my wife from the Goochland Sherriff’s Department. By the time of the call, I’d been arrested, booked and denied bond. I was waiting to be transported to the Henrico Jail. I remember every detail of the call from the precise time it was made, to pushing the buttons on the detective’s desk phone, to the painful exchange of words between my wife and me. It is a conversation that I will never forget. Each detail will stay with me for the rest of my life.


Something else struck me as I shared yet another story with the guys. My wife and sons showed tremendous resilience and courage getting through this trial. I’ve always known they were strong people. But, this situation which was thrust upon them could have broken each of them. Instead, they found the strength to go on.


For all the explaining and dissecting I do of the twists and turns my life has taken, the disappointments and failures, the simple fact is I knew what I was doing was wrong. I justified my behavior in a thousand ways. I’ve come to understand what led me to this behavior, but still, I can’t escape the fact I was wrong.


My ex is a remarkable woman. Yes, I am deeply hurt and pained by her abandoning me. However, she did an amazing job keeping our sons and herself going after my arrest. Our older son still was able to leave, three weeks after my arrest, to study at a university in Scotland. She handled all those details.


Last May, he graduated college with honors. The effort my ex put forth to ensure his college education moved forward was astounding, especially given the daily crises that popped up and her own emotional ups and downs.


She made sure our younger son had counseling. His piano lessons and other after school activities continued without interruption. She insisted that he would continue to live his life as he had before my arrest. Friends from home tell me he is the same happy, outgoing young man he was when our life came crashing down. I can’t imagine how difficult it was for her to tell our kids I’d been arrested. I know as bad as things were for me, I never had to tell our sons their mom let them down.


She dealt with a wide array of fears and concerns that I couldn’t even begin to understand as I sat in my cell at the Henrico County Jail. Jail isolates you from “the real world”. I never dealt with calls from creditors and nosey people in town. I was self-absorbed with my personal problems in the jail. My wife, on the other hand, faced newspaper articles about me. She spent dozens of sleepless nights worrying about our financial situation. Would she lose the house? How would she pay the monthly bills? How would she provide for our sons?


What I did to her and those boys was, well, shitty. Yet, she handled it with steely resolve. Most people saw her strength as she moved forward day to day. I bore the brunt of her anger, and frustrations, and tears. I shouldn’t have expected otherwise. I was the catalyst for the crisis that overwhelmed my family.


Throughout this trial I’ve seen my wife (sorry, I can’t help calling her that) and sons in a new light. As I’ve grown and been changed by this, I noted the changes in them as well. They are stronger and more resilient than I ever could have imagined. Their capacity to survive, to succeed in spite of great heartache, anger, and turmoil, was profound. I only wish they had the same level of commitment to forgive and love.


My ex has a favorite hymn – “How Firm a Foundation”, from chapters 41 and 42 in the Old Testament of Isaiah. In one verse these words appear:


When through the deep waters I cause you to go,
The river of sorrow will not overflow.
For I will be with you
Your comfort to bless
And sanctify to you
Your deepest distress.


Those are words of deep comfort and hope, knowing that whatever confronts us, our God is there and will see us through. I know there were terrible days for my wife and two sons, days they thought were impossible to survive, days when tears and fears and sadness and pain appeared to overwhelm each of them. But, it didn’t. They are three people of amazing faith and courage. I love them more having seen them weather this storm.


I read an interesting devotional take on Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. In a play on the often used chapter regarding love, the writer encouraged you to substitute the word “God” every time love appears in the chapter. “God is patient, God is kind . . . .” On and on the verses in Chapter 13 sing out with a beautiful melody about the elements of God’s feelings for His children.


Then, the writer suggested, insert your own name in place of love. My eyes welled up with tears as I recited: “Larry is patient, Larry is kind, Larry does not act unbecomingly . . . he does not take into account a wrong suffered . . . Larry bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.”


I want to be that “Larry”. I owe it to the people I love deeply, in spite of all this: to my ex and my sons who acted with such grace and strength in a terrible situation. I owe it to my God, who saw me through my mistakes and gave me hope when all seemed hopeless.

8/18

This past Wednesday marked the second anniversary of my arrest. There are so many dates I vividly recall: the first time I saw the woman I married; the birth of both our sons; the day I found out I passed the bar exam. Those were all amazingly, wonderful days. August 18, 2008 was not one of those days.  Yet, everything that happened – every second of that day – is etched in my psyche.



It had started out well enough. It was a Monday morning, typical hot, humid August morning. My folks had come up for the weekend. I had cooked all weekend – a passion of mine: fillet kabobs Friday night; lamb with rice pilaf Saturday; pasta with a sausage Bolognese sauce Sunday. It was a relaxing, carefree weekend. My wife and I even found time alone and made love.


I left for the office at 5:00 that morning as I did everyday. Everything was normal, in sync. That is, until the call from upstairs, the company president, who asked to see me. The time was 8:32. I will never forget the time.


I won’t go into detail here about that morning (Hint: you can read all about it and more in my book. Literary agents – it’s a good story!). Suffice it to say, I was asked about one $30,000 check, admitted I had been gambling and going on spending sprees for family, friends, and coworkers, and asked for help. Instead, within minutes law enforcement arrived. I was arrested, arraigned, and denied bond (the prosecutor argued I was a flight risk).


At 1:36 pm, I made the worst telephone call of my life. I called the woman I loved, the woman I had dreamt of spending my life with, and broker her heart. I unleashed consequences I couldn’t begin to comprehend.


I was transported later that day (6:00 pm) to the Henrico County Jail. I was placed in an “observation cell” by intake because of fear that I would try and end my life. I spend the remainder of that night staring at the walls of my new home, my mind racing as I tried to come to grips with what I’d done.


At one point, I looked at my watch and realized it was 8:30. Trying to regain my equilibrium, I decided to calculate my “living space”. I counted each concrete block, deducted space for the commode cut out, and concluded there were 326 blocks making up my cell and approximately 62 square fee of total floor space. Satisfied with my calculations, I looked back at my watch. It read 8:35.


I was crushed, despondent. I lost all hope. I spend the remainder of that night in the hell I created.


I’d like to be able to write that within a day or so I found my bearings. But I didn’t. As bad as things were on the 18th, they got worse. My marriage completely unraveled in the days and weeks ahead (though looking back now, I wonder what really kept us together anyway. She obviously didn’t love me). My court appearances brought newspaper articles. I was threatened by inmates on at least two occasions. The court – with me in handcuffs and shackles – sentenced me to more time in prison than the typical second degree murder case.


Within weeks of sentencing – almost 30 days to the date that the court rejected my motion to reconsider and I had signed everything over to my wife – I was served with divorce papers.


I was shipped by DOC on August 12, 2009 to a hellhole called Powhatan Receiving Center and placed in a 8’ by 10’ roach infested, leaky toilet cell with a 24 year old psychotic gang member who was beginning to serve 76 years for the murder of two rival gang members.


My divorce was signed by the court on September 4th. Ironically, I didn’t learn of it until the 22nd at 3:30 a.m. when an officer brought the papers to me. “We misplaced them.” The 4th – the day of my divorce – was significant. It was exactly 29 years after my wife’s and my first date.


Throughout those months my darkness began, albeit slowly, to be replaced by light, by hope. I’m not sure exactly when, but at some point I knew I would overcome this.


There had been a night shortly after my arrest, when I believed I couldn’t go on. I determined then and there I’d end it all and planned out taking my life. I began to carry out my plan, and then paused. As I closed my eyes and prepared to step off my bunk and hang myself, I saw someone, an angel perhaps. At that precise moment I promised God I wouldn’t quit.


There were so many days those past two years when I really thought I couldn’t go on. But, somehow I did. I memorized scripture and would recite them over and over.


It’s odd really. You think you can’t live without certain things. You think your life is all about the people beside you. Then, everything is taken away. The love you thought people had for you, you learn is really fiction. You find yourself alone, broken and empty. And, at that precise moment you realize you can overcome. You realize no matter what, God loves you and is with you. You find faith, and in faith – hope, and with hope you endure.


This past Wednesday – my second year imprisoned – I went outside and ran 13-150 yard sprints then walked 3 miles. I went to the law library and put the finishing touches on a young man’s pardon application.


And, I prayed a great deal, mostly thanking God for seeing me through this. Prison can’t break you. Only you can break yourself. Faith, I’ve learned, can overcome these walls.

Birthday Observations - July 30, 2010

I turned 51 yesterday. It was my second birthday “behind bars”. This may sound strange, but I had a great birthday. Last year wasn’t so good. I was in the Henrico County Jail waiting and worrying about getting shipped to a prison. I was waiting for my divorce to be finalized. While I tried to tell myself my wife – my soul mate, the love of my life – would reconsider, I knew she was going to go forward and divorce me.



I remember that morning one of my closest friends came by. I was down, very down. He brought me an Episcopal Church Book of Common Prayer which contained multi-year devotionals. He and his law partner wrote inside “Happy 50th! Keep the faith.” I clung to the book and left visitation and returned to my pod. There to greet me were four friends, guys completely opposite of me. They were four young, inner-city black guys who all had earned their GEDs the month before thanks to my tutoring.


We headed into “Trinity’s“ cell. “JR” pulled out two joints – yes, marijuana. I smoked smuggled in weed with four young black guys to celebrate my birthday. I hadn’t smoked marijuana since 1982 with my wife, yet here I was, in a jail cell with my life completely unraveled, smoking weed.


I went back to my cell, head spinning, and opened the Book of Common Prayer. It opened right to Psalm 27, verse 18:


“Wait on the Lord,
Be strong and let your heart take courage,
Yes, wait for the Lord.”


Fast forward to yesterday. I woke up before 5:00 as usual, washed up, did yoga and then began my devotions. My Psalm for the day was 71, a Psalm by an elderly David seeking God’s deliverance. Verse 20, in particular, moved me:


“You have showed me great troubles and adversities, but you will restore my life and bring me up again from the deep places of the earth”.


Then, I read the story in Acts 16 where Paul is imprisoned and “an earthquake struck and the walls fell”.


I went running at noon in 100 degree heat, feeling renewed, invigorated. I was blessed, I thought by this experience.


That evening, I returned from the law library at 8:00 pm to watch “Big Brother” – or so I thought. Instead, Big S and E surprised me with “bowls” (tortillas covered in cheese and then crisped in the microwave. We then fill the bowls with rice, refried beans, and chicken, then top with lettuce and ranch dressing). Then, the guys pulled a whole package of Oreos out.


All these different guys from the building – guys I’ve tutored, guys in my writing class, guys I’ve helped with their cases – came up to wish me “Happy Birthday”.


I lay down last night, stuffed with food and realized just how much I really had to be thankful for.


Friends. Though a great many people abandoned me, I discovered who my real friends are. When you go through something like this you soon find out the “hangers on” and the people who really care for you. They stand with you in the worst of times. These people have done more for me than I can ever repay. They have taught me the real meaning of the word friendship. Then, there are the guys I’ve met along this path. Big S and E are like younger brothers to me. Big S, especially has becomes as close a friend as I’ve ever known.


I’ve figured out that deep down, we all want the same thing. People want to be loved. I always thought my wife was the loving, compassionate person in our relationship. I’ve discovered I, in fact, have a deep capacity to empathize, forgive and love.


My ex has cut off all communication with me. I have been told nothing about my sons. Ironically, I could go to court and compel monthly visitation, but I’d win a battle and lose the war. Instead, I still love her and my sons. I see them with their weaknesses and their failings and love them.


It’s tough loving and forgiving someone who has cursed you, attacked you, hurt you deeply. Yet, it has to be done. Every day I pray for her, our sons, and a whole group of folks who let me down along the way.


I’ve become a better person through this experience. I always thought I was a decent person, helping the community. But, in here I’ve discovered a capacity to help people I never would have given the time of day to. There is something rewarding beyond words when you see a 60 year old man beam with pride because he was finally able to write a letter to his grandchild.


I have never felt as humbled as when the terminally ill, elderly inmate, with tears in his eyes, thanked me for getting him a pardon so he could return home and die surrounded by his family.


Prison has changed me, but not in the way the judge or prosecutor intended. I have found the Godliness in even the worst of men. We were all created in God’s image and no one – I repeat, no one – is beyond redemption or forgiveness. Some may not deserve to be released, but all deserve compassion and mercy.


Before this experience I counted myself as a “good person”. That’s a funny expression and one I heard on more than one occasion from my ex and my mother right before they launched into a venomous, viscous attack on me (I’ve kept a “Top 10 “ list of inspirational quotes from both of them). Here’s the thing – I deserved anger from both of them. I let a good number of people down. But, we’re all prone to failure, all prone to commit wrongs – maybe not $2 million worth, but how about insensitive, hurtful comments we’ve all made? There is just about no “good person” who, when confronted by their indiscretions, their off-putting remarks, their mistakes wouldn’t be embarrassed and humiliated.


Turning 51 in here wasn’t too bad. In fact, it was pretty good. I’ve got my health, my passion to help others, friends, and some amazing family. I have hope each day.


“And suddenly there came a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison house were shaken; and immediately all the doors opened and everyone’s chains were unfastened.”