Lessons from TR

I recently finished Edmund Morris’s riveting biography of Theodore Roosevelt’s last years of life called simply Colonel Roosevelt. This larger than life American icon was, at the end, like many of us; dying in his sleep, exhausted, in pain and too young for the end. Morris eloquently wrote “today his death would be called a myocardial infarction . . . but he died of a broken heart.” Morris noted that months earlier TR’s son Quentin died in an air battle over France during the final year of World War I. He tried to present a brave front, yet Roosevelt was often discovered alone, weeping over his precious son.



These past four weeks have been the most trying days of my incarceration since my sentence was handed down in February, 2009. I have been told things in letters and during visits that have literally shaken and hurt me to the core. I am suffering and I am struggling. For the first time in years I have allowed myself to dwell on the injustice of my sentence. I have found myself near tears, whether running or lying in my bunk late at night, asking God “how much more do You want from me?” I have prayed for no mail, prayed for all of it to end. Still, another day rolls along and I go forward. And, the same cycle repeats itself.


I have a group of young guys who hang out around me. All are in their early twenties to early 30’s. Big S came and spoke to me the other day. “Opie’s worried about you. Go Chez, and E, and Jordan, and Bades, they want to help.” All these guys remind me, in ways, of my own sons. I was deeply touched by their concern. Who would have thought men in prison would be moved to care for a 51 year old man from a world totally different from their own.


Yet, I had to tell Big S, while I appreciate their concern (even in my despair I feel blessed by their presence), they don’t understand. Like Roosevelt, no one understands the pain and the despair I feel right now. The expression “broken heart” is thrown around so casually, until you actually feel it.


The other night on “House” (I need to be on the show’s payroll!) the story focused on a husband mysteriously dying. He had lied to his wife about losing his job and all their wealth. He pretended everything was normal. In reality, he was leading a secret life. He couldn’t tell his wife the truth. He couldn’t let her down.


Finally, with much coaxing from the medical staff, he lay in his hospital bed and told her the truth. She stormed out yelling “I never loved you. You bastard. I’m done with you.”


Two days later she is called back to the hospital. Emergency surgery is required to keep the husband alive. He is in a coma. His breathing and heartbeat faint. She clutches his hand and whispers “I love you. From the moment we met, I knew I loved you. I didn’t mean what I said.”


The husband’s heart stops. He dies. As with every episode, as the camera focuses on the wife in her pain and grief with her husband lying there, soulful music begins. The refrain sung over and over reverberates in my headphones, “I would sail back to you.”


I have been told by well meaning friends, both inside and out to move on. “Screw it. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you.” But, in prison jargon, “I’m not built like that.”


I don’t know what the statute of limitations is for a broken heart. I don’t know how much I have to lose to make up for what I did. I only know I’m hurting terribly and I’m afraid I will for a long time.


Morris noted that only one hymn was used at Roosevelt’s funeral, “How Firm a Foundation”. Ironically that is my ex-wife’s favorite hymn. In a spartan service, the minister recited the words to this powerful hymn taken from the book of Isaiah:


“When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie, My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply.”


I received a letter from a friend who provides me with Godly advice. The letter simply concluded “surrender to Him and trust.” Right now, that’s the only thing keeping me hopeful!

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.