Tag Archives: ex-offenders

Mothers and Sons and Sibs

Once a month or so since I started this blog, I’ve posted a roundup of all the prison-related news. Lately there has been a lull in the media, but not in my personal life.

I met a grade-school friend for dinner. Even though I have a constant desire to live somewhere else or to at least travel constantly, as I get older I’ve found I appreciate the old friendships more. We went to the same school, lived in the same neighborhood, spent a lot of time at each other’s houses.

And our sons have much in common. Over dinner, she told me the long story of his unraveling. To protect her privacy I won’t go into detail, but he is looking at some serious prison time—maybe 10 years. His circumstances didn’t come about over night; she’s been trying to balance support and detachment for 20 years. All I could do was empathize about how powerless and bereft she felt. She didn’t seem to feel the shame that was predominant for me when Vince was first imprisoned. I think she was too exhausted.

—

Another friend, whose son is a Lutheran version of Vince, called to say she had phoned the police to report her son acting threateningly. It took the police an hour to show up. They took him down to the station and she didn’t know what would happen and she asked if she could sleep on my couch in case they let him go, because she was afraid. I said of course. The police did let him go and there was more drama but in the end they both slept under her roof and no one was hurt.

—

Two professional colleagues have brothers who were recently jailed for Driving Under the Influence, neither one for the first time.

One asked me if I thought she should bail her brother out. In Alanon I learned not to give advice but to talk about my own experience and offer support.

“If you pay his bail,” I said, “expect to lose that money. And since he’s looking at 10 years inside, don’t be surprised if he goes on a major bender.”

“But he’s going to live in the family cabin in the middle of the woods, and he won’t have a car,” she said.

“Is there a riding lawn mower or an ATV there?” I asked, and we laughed because there is a riding mower at the cabin and she knows he would ride it into town to the liquor store.

—

A member of my own family spent time in jail recently. He managed to find an old grade school friend to bail him out.

Note to my grade school friend: If I ever wind up in jail I hope I can count on you to bail me out.

My relative is out now. He was ordered to undergo mental health and chemical dependency assessments as a condition of his release. This is a good thing but since he is homeless and unemployed and doesn’t have a vehicle, it’s hard to imagine how he will make it happen, even if he was enthusiastic about it, which he isn’t. He calls his mother and hangs up, or leaves messages which start out sweet then turn sarcastic when she doesn’t pick up the phone. She is doing a wonderful job of not reacting to him. But then, she’s had 30 years of practice.

It’s never, ever just the person sitting in jail who is affected, it’s the whole family. All the old narratives, grudges, and codependency kicks into overdrive. Mothers feel guilty. Fathers hide in their workshops. Step parents are often the most sensible ones because their identities aren’t hanging on the offender’s actions. Siblings are either overly involved, ordering everyone around like they have an invisible clipboard, or distance themselves even further from the family.

So what’s going on? Is it the full moon, the holidays, the dark cold season? Or because, like most people, I associate with people like myself?

Alone in the City of Dreaming Spires

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I spent Thanksgiving in Wisconsin with my cousins, which is what I do every year. Vince couldn’t come because he is not allowed to leave Minnesota.

After eating way too much food, I made the mistake of checking Facebook right before I turned out the light. There were a couple posts from Vince. He sounded so lonely.

I couldn’t fall asleep. I laid there thinking about the time I learned to be alone. I think this is one of the most important skills we have to master in life.

—

I had moved to Oxford, England four months before my birthday. I rented a house with a three-legged cat named McCartney and housemate who went home to Scotland every weekend. I had a great job. I had joined a posh gym. I had made some acquaintances through work and Alanon meetings.

This was before Skype or Facebook or What’sApp. My family and friends used email to communicate with me, but there was no internet at the house.

I don’t normally even care about my birthday. I hadn’t told my housemate or acquaintances it was my birthday because I didn’t want to seem like I was fishing for a fuss.

I walked into town to see a movie. February in England is dreary and drizzly. Well, most months are. In comparison to November, the sun was setting later (almost 5pm!) but the sky really only went from murky black to dark grey and back to murk again.

I got some popcorn and found a seat. Someone behind me said, “Pssst!” Hurrah! It was a friendly woman from my Alanon meeting named Rebecca. I wouldn’t spend my birthday alone after all! But she just said, “Nice to see you,” and that was that. I thought, unreasonably, “Why couldn’t she have invited me to sit with her and her friend?” I felt really put out.

The movie was Walk the Line, the Johnny Cash biopic. There’s a scene where Johnny is drying out and his family confronts a drug dealer with shot guns. The theater exploded in laughter. “Typical Americans!” I could hear around me.

I had picked a bad time to move to England. George W. Bush was using their air bases to transport terrorists and political prisoners in black helicopters, and most Brits were not happy about it. Most people were nice enough—if reserved—but I had been confronted by several very angry people who took me to task for everything my country had ever done wrong.

It really hit me that I was not only lonely but alone. I was on an island with 64 million people and I didn’t know a single one of them beyond asking the time of day. It was piercing.

I went home and had a few beers while I stared out the front window like some tragic heroine in a period movie. People strode past with their hands deep in their pockets and their heads down. I wallowed in self-pity. But somehow I knew I would get through it, that I wasn’t going to die of loneliness, that everything would change eventually—if not the next day then next week or next month. Everything did change. I’ve had a lot of great adventures on my own and with other people.

Now we can feel like we’re never alone by floating along on endless social media streams of cutsie platitudes and cat videos and political rants and “breaking news.”

—

Did Vince know that nothing stays the same forever? I finally fell into a worried, fragmented sleep. I dreamed that Vince fell into a river and was swept away into a big pipe. I ran along the river bank until I came to an opening in the top of the pipe. I could see his face underwater, looking up at me. The iron bars over the opening were wide enough for my hand to slip through so I could touch him, but too narrow for me to pull him through. Ugh. I woke up crying. I don’t need a psychiatrist to analyze that dream.

Free But Not Free

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After avoiding each other for a couple days—not easy to do in an 800-square-foot space—I offered to make dinner so Vince and I could talk and clear the air. “Unless u want me to write a letter to u instead,” I texted. No, he texted back, we can talk.

We started with a hug and “I love you.” It reminded me of our moments on the hug rug in prison.

He wolfed down his stir fry while I talked, then talked while I ate. We went through our lists of grievances. To my surprise I didn’t get defensive and he didn’t roll his eyes and walk out of the room.

The one thing I was nervous about was saying, “It is my house.” That’s a fact, right? But saying it would feel like I was lecturing a teenager. This was about my request that Vince ask me—or at least give me a heads up—when he was inviting people over—even family members. He responded that I had brought my friend Sarah home a few nights earlier without warning him.

“I didn’t even know who she was,” he said.

“Sarah? You don’t remember Sarah?” I asked. “We came down to visit you and we spent the day together picking agates. We had dinner at that nice restaurant where you ended up working….” Had he been high on something, all day and evening, and I hadn’t been able to tell? It didn’t matter now.

“It’s my house,” I said, and the world didn’t end. We agreed to have dinner together a couple times a week so we can talk things over on a regular basis instead of saving them up.

—

A few days later I texted Vince to ask if he’d like to eat lasagna with me that evening, and he replied that he just wanted to go home and go to be after work.

This is it. This is what they were talking about the day Vince was released, when they said that adjustment to life on the outside would be harder than anything they experienced in prison.

And now the weather has turned, to the cold, dark days of Minnesota winter. It’s hard for anyone to get up and leave the house when it’s dark as night and freezing drizzle, but Vince has to walk six blocks, take a bus and a train, then walk six more blocks to his job in the laminating factory. He still can’t cash his own paycheck because Wells Fargo requires two forms of ID, even for checks drawn on its own accounts.

—

There was an editorial and an article in the St. Paul paper about criminal justice system reform. At the end of a local forum, two mothers got up and spoke about the effects of incarceration on the family.

“There’s no help,” said one mother whose son had committed suicide at age 28 because he just couldn’t make it on the outside.

“There really isn’t,” said the second mother. One of her sons is schizophrenic, and thanks to her persistence he’s in a state hospital, not a prison. She faces eviction because her landlord won’t let her other son, newly-released on 10 years of probation, live with her. He was convicted of criminal possession of a firearm. If I was renting in her building and found out he had moved in, I’m sure I’d be unhappy.

These forums and op-eds are good news—there are reform efforts like this going on at the national, state, and local level, and that they have bipartisan support. But the words of these mothers weighs on me. Vince actually said the other day something like, “It would almost be easier to go back to prison that to be trapped on house arrest like this.” Ugh.

MUST be positive! Must make gratitude lists! Must not indulge in self pity! This too shall pass!

Only eight more months to go.

Geographic Cure, Denied

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We’re having a long, warm, sunny autumn here in St. Paul. I get outside as much as possible. I hike along the Mississippi River or go to a park and sit in my car with the sun on my face while I read or do a crossword puzzle. I even went camping in the middle of the week.

Well, it was cabin camping. A heated cabin with electricity. I went for a long hike along the St. Croix River then made a roaring fire outside the cabin. I drank some wine and read a book. It was soooo quiet. Lovely. It was just what I needed, but now it seems like a year ago.

I love being outdoors and I love to travel, but I am also a homebody. I’ve been trying to not be home as much as possible because things are tense. Sharing 800 square feet would be tough with anyone, but I am living with my grown son. No grown man wants to live with his parents.

And my grown son is newly released from prison and negotiating all sorts of challenges, like maintaining sobriety in the land of 10,000 liquor stores and bars. His time outside the condo is very limited and must be pre-approved. The probation agents have not come to the house lately, unless they’ve come in the middle of the night and I didn’t hear them. Apparently they are now showing up at his workplace and making him take urinalysis tests there.

He is working full time, volunteering, cooking, getting out into nature and exercising, and going to AA. He doesn’t complain. He doesn’t ask me for much. I thought things were going relatively well.

When there is something I don’t like, I’ve been direct—asking him to take off his shoes when he comes home, for instance. He always says okay.

He’s been mostly silent for weeks. It’s uncomfortable, but I figured he was going through lots of changes and it wasn’t about me. I figured if he had something to say he would say it. Then I discovered that he had said it, just not to me. Ouch.

I want him to have his say. I want him to speak up. This morning he took me to task for making noise in the kitchen while he was sleeping. His bedroom is on the other side of the wall from the garbage disposal…I got defensive at first, then apologized. I’m glad he said it to me, not to the spectators in the arena that is the blogosphere.

—

I interviewed for a job in London three weeks ago. Typical for a nonprofit, they wanted someone who could do at least three jobs in one. They wanted a researcher, a relationship/sales manager, a writer/editor, a trainer, and a budget/finance person all in one. Ideally, there would be a division of labor by people who are suited to and strong in different skill sets.

It was 10 days until I found out I didn’t get it, but it was 10 days of daydreaming. It was like having a “Move to London” lottery ticket in my pocket. I researched where the office was and looked at flats on Craig’s List. I mentally packed two large suitcases with everything I would need. Vince would, of course, stay behind in the condo and have all 800 feet to himself. We would get along great again, once I was 4,000 miles away. I would use every vacation day to travel, travel, travel. London would be such a great base! It would be so much easier to get to my long-haul bucket list destinations, like Australia, New Zealand, Japan, India, and all of Southeast Asia. Oh yes, and the job…of course the people would be easy to get along with and they would love my work and it would be cosmically fulfilling. Then after 3-5 years I would come home and semi-retire, just as Vince was getting married and wanting to buy his own place.

Yep, I had it all figured out. I probably dodged a bullet. But now what?

A Cell is a Cell is a Cell

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ANNE

Is there such a thing as prison-phobia? If so I’ve got it. After nearly two years of thinking, reading, talking, and writing about prison, I have an irrational fear of ending up in inside myself.

Just for the record, I have not broken any state, federal, or international laws.

However, just last night I was reading the novel, “Go Tell It on the Mountain” by James Baldwin. In it, a character is minding his own business when a two robbers being chased by the police come running along and stand next to him, catching their breath. He is arrested with them and beaten mercilessly in an attempt to get him to confess, which he doesn’t. He is eventually released, but he slits his wrists the next day because he is so traumatized by the experience.

Did I mention he is black and the cops are white? Does this sound familiar? The book was published in 1953. Sadly, some things don’t change.

So that scenario is not likely to happen to me, but phobias are irrational, not rational.

I was also freaked out by the third season of Orange is the New Black. I won’t give away what the last scene of the last episode sets up for the inmates, but it had something to do with crowding/lack of privacy and it really hit a nerve.

—

My cousin, Molly, and I have talked over the years about buying a piece of land overlooking the St. Croix River and building a retirement community of tiny houses. You know, these are the 250- to 400-square-foot houses (75-122 square meters) made of beautiful woods and lots of clever features to store stuff and make the most use of the space. The idea is, you can have a paid-off house, live in the country, and feel good about yourself because you aren’t destroying the planet by consuming as much as the average new home built in America, which as of 2013 was nearly 2,500 square feet (762 square meters)!

Then Molly sent me this article, “Dear People Who Live in Fancy Tiny Houses” and it killed my dream:

What if you’re having a shitty day and you just want to be alone? You can’t be alone, right? Because your partner or children are sitting two to ten feet away from you at all times. Don’t you feel like a rat trapped in a cage? Don’t you ever want to turn toward your lover or spawn and shout, “Get out! Get out of my tiny house!”

The condo Vince and I are sharing is 800 some square feet. So it’s not the tiniest, but there are privacy issues. When the other Molly—Vince’s girlfriend—is over, I’m sure he wishes I would disappear. I wish I could kick back on a Friday night and watch my geek-ola shows like the PBS News Hour and Washington Week in Review with a couple glasses of wine, but I can’t.

On the whole, things are going well with us, at least from my perspective. But I have mostly lived alone since Vince left home 20 years ago, so it’s an adjustment.

Breaking Free, Mom-Only Version

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ANNE

It’s been nearly two months since I’ve written a post. For those of you who began following this blog recently, I’m Vince’s mom. He and I co-wrote this thing for a year. I had been posting every other day for over a year. He sent me hand-written pages and I typed them and posted, alternating between his content and mine.

When Vince was released from prison, I checked with him every other day: “Do you want me to write a post?” and he’d reply, “No, I’ve got it covered.” I asked him several times to give me a couple days’ notice if he wasn’t going to post on a given day.

I winced at his typos and sloppy spacing. But Breaking Free was his blog too, and he was really unloading some powerful content—stuff he had not been free to write about in prison, some heavy experiences and emotions.

It was kind of a nice break for me. Vince wrote that he wanted to take his writing in a different direction, and I started thinking about what else I might blog about eventually—maybe something fun like travel.

I felt blindsided when I read his post in which he announced that he was done with the blog—right now—for personal reasons. I have no idea what the personal reasons were. When I tried to discuss it with him he said, “You weren’t writing anything anyway.” Aargh.

I was pissed. I was hurt. He hadn’t given me a heads up, so I had no content ready. And when there’s no posting on a blog, readership falls off quickly. I had invested over a year of my life in conceptualizing what the blog would be, figuring out the technology, keeping it fed, and getting the word out about it. I watched as the readership stats shriveled with each passing day of inactivity. It was like sitting by the bedside of a dying loved one, patting his/her hand, and feeling powerless to do anything.

I was waiting for inspiration (and time) to write. Then I read one of those Facebook quotes—it was by Albert Einstein or Fred Flintstone or a maybe a fortune cookie—something like, “If you wait for inspiration you wait in vain.” That snapped me out of my procrastination and resentment. Hey, whatever works.

Co-blogging with Vince created a natural cadence, a tension, and a story arc that was a pleasant surprise. I’m not sure how it’ll go with just me, but we’ll find out.

2 Out of 17 Isn’t Bad?

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VINCE

I learned early this morning from a guy that went through boot camp and graduated a month earlier than I, that two of my squad-mates aren’t doing very well. One of them I’ve known has been on the wanted fugitive list for a few days now, but the other is now in jail. For what, I can’t be certain. But I know that I’m not in jail, and I’ve been following the rules. I can’t think of anything that would make me want to do something that would send me back. But there were many times in my life where I wish I would have followed the right path.

When I was 18, I was arrested for my first felony. I walked into the Schwinn bicycle shop off of Snelling and University avenues in St. Paul with the intention of stealing a bike that I could sell for cash, and eventually weed. Something I did fairly regularly back in the 1900’s. Unfortunately, when I took the bike that I wanted down from the display and rode out the door, I had some troubles with the gear shifter and I barely made it across the street before being tackled down by a store employee, and humiliatingly taken back into the store to await the police. I’ve written about this incident before, so I’ll skip ahead to the part where I was sentenced to one year of Project Remand. It is an opportunity for first time felons to basically be good for a year to have the felony knocked down to a misdemeanor. Sounds easy right?

Well, the first directive I was given was to enter an in-patient treatment center in St. Paul called Twin Town. At some point during the arrest, I made a remark about me using marijuana recreationally. So I packed a bag and entered my first of 4 treatment centers. I knew I didn’t want to be there. Oh if only I could have seen the future.

I got my first taste of group therapy. They were all real addicts, not like me, because all I did was smoked weed (and did acid and mushrooms, but only once in a while!) and I didn’t get into trouble for using, right? Well, these people did all sorts of things that I hadn’t done (yet). And in three or four short days I was asked to leave the facility, which I did.

When I got back home I called my probation officer and told her that I had been kicked out. She actually said it wasn’t a big deal, and that I could simply continue to follow the rest of the rules and still be okay. Can you believe that? So I stayed drug free for a few weeks until one of my friends told me that they didn’t test for alcohol. Minutes later I opened my first of many beers to come in my lifetime. I successfully passed all of my drug tests for a couple months, but the urge to get high was powerful and I started smoking weed for a couple weeks after every U.A., but eventually I went back to full time. I stopped showing up for my probation meetings, and stopped taking the drug tests, and of course shortly after that the warrant came out, another first of many.

I was arrested up north in Crow Wing County for my first D.U.I. and they held me there for a week until St. Paul came and got me. When I saw the judge about the felony, he was very kind in staying the adjudication but put me on regular probation for three years. And because I clearly had troubles staying clean, he ordered me to outpatient treatment. I never showed up. I just kept using. They gave me so many chances but I just couldn’t do it. I didn’t know it then, but I had become powerless over my addictions. My life had become unmanageable. And I was just warming up. In the end I was on some form of probation for that charge for almost a decade, but they actually did move it down to a misdemeanor. Win!

I don’t think I would have listened to my future self had I been able to go back to try to save me, I was going to do whatever I wanted to do. It may have taken a lot longer than it should have, but I am finally on the right road again. I’ve wasted away many years, but I can redeem myself by sticking to the script, listening to my agents, going to meetings, and making forward progress. I’m starting to enjoy life again, and there’s plenty of time left for me.

Good Boy

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VINCE

After having written nothing by hand since my release from prison, I’m back to it with this journal I received for my birthday from Ms. Toaster. I think it will help because I can write a little here and there and maybe not feel so rushed sitting in front of the computer screen trying to think of something to write. It was a very thoughtful gift from a very thoughtful woman.

Today, my friends Curt, Sara, Seth, And Seth’s daughter Audrey came for a visit from down in Fillmore County. They brought my dog Willie who I had not seen in two years. I was so excited when I saw him and all my friends. Unfortunately, only four out of the five recognized me. Willie didn’t seem to have a clue who I was. It was the exact opposite of what I pictured our reunion being. I felt terrible. I knew it was my fault because I had left him so long ago. I pet him, and scratched him, and hugged him. But he didn’t show any sign of affection that I thought he would have. I had him for about 10 years before I left for drugs, and I hoped he would pick up on a scent or the familiar face, but nothing. I was heartbroken, but I didn’t want to admit that so we continued on with the plan for the day.

We packed in the car and drove to Woodbury which will be his home until I can move out on my own. My aunt has a nice back yard and a playful dog for him to hang out with. He moped around and peed and pooped. Good boy. I will be able to visit him once a week for now as my restrictions allow, and as transportation is available. I am going to have to start from scratch with him. Get to know each other all over again. I’m sure there’s something inside his little dog brain that will be triggered at some point that will make him know who I am again. And if that doesn’t happen, at least I will know who he is, and I will love him for as long as he lives. And that will make me feel better about it all.

We left Woodbury and headed to Afton State Park on recommendation from my aunt. I wanted to look for agates along the shore of the St. Croix river and hike around with my friends. We paid five dollars to get in and started the walk down. The place was beautiful. I don’t often care about the colors of leaves, but they really stood out there. As far as the eye could see in any direction were rolling hills, babbling brooks, and multiple colors of leaves of so many trees. The downward path was mostly wooden stairs. We heard many languages as we made our descent into the colorful valley. I felt quite like a tourist, and my friends probably felt like the minority for the first time in a while. When we got to the beach it took me about 12 seconds to find my first agate. It wasn’t big, but it’s always a good feeling to find the first one: you know they’re there. I found a few small keepers and proceeded to a bench where I just sat and enjoyed the view. Children were everywhere and I was happy to see that a few of them were looking for rocks too. We decided to make the journey back up because I’m on a schedule, of course, but not before Curt took a dreidel out of his pocket and suggested we do a little gambling at a picnic table. It’s a tradition with us four. We gamble for quarters, and I lost a dollar. Not a bad day.

The walk up was much more difficult than the walk down as you may have guessed. I did pretty well with my new shoes that I received for my birthday. Man did I need them. We had a very nice, small gathering for me yesterday. Overall, it has been a great weekend. There are many more to come as long as I keep doing what I have been doing. Good boy.

Two Hundred and Thirty-Seven

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VINCE

This marks the two hundredth post that my mother and I have written. It’s been quite a journey. Almost daily I look back through the blog and see such a wide variety of emotion, struggles, triumphs, and memories. Today also marks another important number, 37. For the second time in a year, it’s my 37th birthday, only this time it is actually real. You may have read recently about my miscalculation with my date of birth. Well, it was nice feeling young again when I realized 11 and a half months in that I was only 36. So, my two weeks is over and I’m old again. Boo-hoo.

A year ago today, I was sitting alone in a cold cell in St. Cloud prison where nobody cared about me or my birthday. I remember trying to make a big deal out of it with the other swampers (house cleaning crew) but nobody was interested. One person gave me a cup of Folgers instant coffee, and that was the highlight of the day. I sat. I read. I wrote. And I pondered where I would be a year from that day. I had no clue what was in store for me with boot camp. I actually received my acceptance letter a few days later which was dated Oct. 24th. I was so excited. I showed it to the swampers, the offenders, the guards. Again, nobody cared. I knew there was a good chance that I wouldn’t be in prison for my next birthday if I put everything I had into this boot camp thing. And did I ever.

It was shortly after that I was moved to Moose Lake into segregation, the single worst experience of my incarceration. Well, enough reflection, I’ve already lived it, written it, and read it. What’s new?

In my last post I talked about my new tooth falling out. I didn’t really mention why. My student dentist had actually forgotten to put on the bonding agent which would have secured the plastic onto the broken tooth itself. Oops. She did try to contact me, but we didn’t actually talk until a few days later at which point she explained the mistake she made and we set up a time to get it fixed. She said she felt like an idiot and she was so sorry, and couldn’t believe she could have forgotten…. I interrupted her and explained that it was okay. I learned a lot at C.I.P. And I explained that everybody makes mistakes no matter what. And when you do, you fix it, and move on. I have made some terrible decisions and made some huge mistakes in my life, and people still love me. So, I bet after she fixes my tooth, she will never forget to put the stuff on again. And that’s how we learn. Right?

I cooked vegan fajitas with my cousin tonight. Her mother was in from California, and I hadn’t seen her in roughly a decade, just like everybody else. We had a good talk, a good dinner, and we played with kittens. My cousin is a vegan and I love to cook, but I had never really given anything that wasn’t meat-based a shot. I didn’t turn into a zombie, and the desserts she brought were actually pretty good, too. I’m not saying that I will be a vegetarian tomorrow (or ever), but I did realize how much I actually enjoy veggies. Tomorrow I will realize how much I enjoy meaty, cheesy pizza for my birthday celebration. Win-win?

I’m really excited to see my dog Willie on Sunday. My friend Seth is talking to me on the phone right now confirming that he is actually coming. So, I’m done for now. I will write about the reunion in a couple days. Goodbye for now.

A Break from Breaking Free

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ANNE

Vince says he’s hit a wall with the blogging, and I need more than 10 minutes notice to come up with new material. After over a year of blogging and nearly 200 posts, I’d say we’ve earned a break.

We’ll be back. If you haven’t yet binge read the thing from the beginning, start here and click on the right-pointing arrow at the bottom of each post to proceed. Feel free to share with others, and thanks for reading.