So Much to Share

I can see the lights from the prison where I work from our home on the opposite side of Resurrection Bay. During evening beach walks, I often think about the men I now know who live within the concrete cells.

So many stories laced with pain that spread far beyond the yard, but intertwine with every facet of society--from fractured families to overcrowded classrooms to impoverished neighborhoods to gated communities to a loss of security to millions of victims to the building of endless walls.

All of us caught in a web of "have and have nots", of "us verse them". Our fear of the "other" blinds us from seeing that we all scrape our knees when we fall on the asphalt.

We all skin the palms of our hands. We all bleed.

**********

Before the big news-making earthquake on November 30th, a smaller one shook South Central Alaska the day before Thanksgiving.

I wrote the following passage in my journal later that day:

When the earth shook I sat inside a windowless classroom with six criminals, who also happen to be fathers, making cards for our families...

"Earthquake," one of the men in yellow says, as my mind registers the same.

"What do we do?" I ask, thinking of our monthly earthquake drills in schools where we taught the kids to get under their desks, hands over the backs of their heads. Where we practiced evacuating to our assigned meeting places if needed.

"Nothing," an inmate responds, as the walls sway and the table we sit around moves.

"Haven't you ever felt an earthquake before?"

"Not in prison." 

"That was a big one," the grandfather in the group says.

"Nah, not that big," the youngest one replies.

"No, really, what is the plan if there is an earthquake here?" 

"Nothing."

"They lock us up."

As if on cue, my radio crackles: "Institutional lock down, we are on an institutional lock down."

"We're inmates, they don't care about us."

"But you're humans."

Rewind to the beginning of the class, when I arrive with my colored pencils and markers and coloring sheets and card stock paper and say: "Bear with me, I'm a former elementary school counselor, and its the day before Thanksgiving, so I brought supplies to make cards."

I explain that one option is to trace their hand and decorate it for their kids. "I think any kid would love to receive a picture of their Dad's hand."

The men stare at me in silence. One laughs with his hands resting on his large belly, chair kicked back on two legs.

I spread the pictures out on the table, a turkey with the words "I'm thankful for...", a colorful alphabet wth blanks next to each letter. "You can either write a word you are thankful for that begins with each letter or just choose the letters in your child's name." 

The guys stare at me with their masks of indifference.

The sullen white guy with a swastika tattoo on his neck says, "I'll take the paper to trace my hand."

"Me too," says the clean cut Native man.

"I'll take the alphabet."

"Pass the markers."

Before I know it, all the Dads are creating cards for their families, and our discussion about parenthood flows easier than my previous classes--despite our various ages, ethnicities, and social statuses, we connect as parents.

And then the earth shakes.

And I'm not worried about being a in a room alone with prisoners, but worried about us as a group if the building collapses.

The walls have already fallen, we are in this together, all of us human, suffering, with stories to share. 

***********

On my lunch walk yesterday, I made my way to the beach, just half a mile from the maximum security prison where I work as an educator. The men I teach can't see the water despite their proximity.

The contrast between the correctional land of concrete and razor wire, where every movement is relegated, and my meandering lunch walks along Resurrection Bay, seemed even sharper, with the day's crisp air and the sun rising a little higher in this northern sky. 

The mountains seemed to be a more vibrant shade of white, the sky more regal blue, and I found myself collecting heart shaped rocks as I often do-- but more aware of this privilege. More thankful. More in awe of the world.

There is so much beauty, so much love, so much joy to share, that rides right alongside the ugliness, the hate, and the pain we all hold. 

My New year's resolution is to pay more attention to the beauty--to stay out of the dark hallways of my head, where my fears and worries clutter like piles of books I never finished, countless half-read plots, without endings, that only overwhelm my ability to notice the snow dancing off the ridge-line, enticed by the North wind that carries a story all its own.

All those unresolved manuscripts of my mind also impair my ability to see myself in the stranger, to see beyond our perceived differences, to the broken humanity we all carry within our similar cells.

I resolve to be more present for this one life, this one narrative, my breath beholds. 

Comments

[Linda]

Thank you, Christy! Another thoughtful and well-expressed column. I read aloud a couple of sentences to relatives whom I love but hesitate to discuss certain subjects with - and they agreed! We aren't so far apart after all. Another assumption about "the other" fell today. So grateful for the start you gave us toward that discovery!

[Greta]

Thank you, Christy! This was a gift to read at the beginning of the day - and year. Remember the notes we stuffed in between books on the shelves of the faculty room? You were always a writer, all the way back to Baldwin. :)

[Christy]

Linda thank you so much for sharing this anecdote about your family--I'm honored to be a part of the connection. and yes, we all are so much more alike than we often think.

Oh Greta I love that you reminded me of our note writing in the balcony of the faculty room. I talked with my parents yesterday and told them about your comment and my Mom said our notes could still be in some of those books. That would be a fun discovery at an alumni day:)

[Greta]

Was thinking the same. Perhaps our kids can help find them. Best to you and the Jordans. Think of you up in Alaska often!