A few years ago, my father and I exchanged a series of letters. He was in prison and I was home with a toddler, desperate to know more of “our story”. The letters were the first in-depth communication that we ever had, I was often amazed, and perhaps slightly troubled, in our similarities. We even seem to arrange language in our head the same way, translate it to paper in the same way. Just like Barack Obama, whom we both love, we both love commas, love a good pause for effect.
Similarities
I’ve noticed that we have a few things in common besides reading. I had a pretty f**ked up childhood, also. You know, I beat Bill, my so-called step-father, over the head with a candy vase when I was 14. I beat him until you couldn’t tell if the blood was from my hands or his head. That was my xmas gift.
I don’t want you to think that I am using that as an excuse for the way I am , maybe a factor, that’s all. We all make choices, most of the time mine have not been the right ones. We have to live with what we choose.
I see that you have a few of the same traits that I do. I am loyal. I am honest, other than when I’m breaking the law. Ha! I love a movie theater and rain on a tin roof. We both root for the underdog.
He’s a Vampire
I often joke that my father is a vampire. He should have died 10,000 times over, but he’s still kicking. Outliving everyone seems to be his grandest punishment. He is left to keep living with what he has chosen.
Those letters allowed me to get to know him a little. I was able to see, for the first time in my life, that he was a multi-dimensional person. As much as I didn’t want to, I found myself looking forward to his letters…because I kinda liked him. It is somewhat disconcerting to find yourself enjoying someone whom you spent the majority of your life hating.
His heartbreak and guilt about the death of my brother was not only real, raw, honest, it’s almost palpable.
I guess I’m about like anyone. I love, I hate, I hurt, I feel mean, I feel good, I feel alone. Mostly alone, he’s gone. Never coming back.
At the end of the day, mostly I feel pain. Pain and loneliness. I feel so lonely when they slam my cell door once again. I feel the pain of missing the ones I love, the pain at the loss of the three people that I know did love my worthless ass; Zack, Starr and Sharon. Why are the gone and I am still here?
Convict Book Club
We shared our love of books, movies and music.
I read my first Toni Morrison book, ‘Beloved’. Wow, that’s all I can say about that. Thanks for turning me onto her.
No one talks about heartache, strife, loss, and loneliness in a more beautiful way than Toni Morrison.
There is a loneliness that can be rocked. Arms crossed, knees drawn up; holding, holding on, this motion, unlike a ship’s, smooths and contains the rocker. It’s an inside kind–wrapped tight like skin. Then there is a loneliness that roams. No rocking can hold it down. It is alive, on its own. A dry and spreading thing that makes the sound of one’s own feet going seem to come from a far-off place.
Beloved – Toni Morrison
We are both drawn to stories of adversity, of loss. We connect with characters and stories that have fucked up, been beaten down, but have persevered. Funny that we even escape into loneliness, suffering.
Empathy and Poetry
I empathize over the grief he feels over Zack, our beautiful boy. I miss my brother, but he was not my child. The loss of my child is the only thing that I feel could break me, crumble me to my very foundation. Therefore, rather than heaping all of my hatred and all of the blame of Zack, of everything, on him, I am trying to understand where he came from and where he still wants to go.
He writes poetry. Although I think that Philip Levine’s job is safe, it is not the worst stuff I have read. The poetry world would probably warmly welcome a one-handed, opiate addicted, convict – they’re an eccentric bunch, after all. I tell him to keep doing it.
More Dreams than Nightmares…Maybe One Day
He is haunted by nightmares. I am too. Yet another similarity. Fortunately, he still has dreams, and where there are dreams, there is hope. I dream he holds onto his hope, his hope for more, his hope for change, his hope that one day, just as I have, he will have more dreams than nightmares.
He dreams of freedom, simple freedoms.
Freedom is a fresh pot of coffee, the morning dew
Freedom is a moment of silence, grace
Freedom is a myth, perhaps not, a turning lock
Freedom is a deception, not perfection, just an objection
F.I.A. – Steve Testerman
He dreams of Zack.
Never will this end, my missing you
All my hours filled with rage
Peace, may I find another page
Memories never end, they only age
Forever Missing You – Steve Testerman
Zack was twenty-three this month. God I miss him! Why? There is no answer. I still can’t believe he’s gone. No more Zack. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Sorry. What else can I say? I know I am so much to blame. He was my baby boy. Why? Wish it would have been me.
I was once told I had a very old soul. I feel that you do too.
Sosha, you know that I’ve been dreaming of this for a long time, us getting to know each other. I am scared that I will let you down, let myself down. I can’t walk a tightrope. I always fall.
He has always fallen off a tightrope. However, for the first time, rather than just assuming that he will, I dream that he won’t.
He dreams of the hereafter.
If there is life after death, I can’t wait to get there. One day maybe we will all be together, my baby boy, my beautiful Starr. Free and happy. That’s my only hope.
He says if there is life after death, just as I do.
He lost the two women that he loved, that he had fathered five children with, a month apart. My mom in November 2008, and Sharon in December 2008.
He has a hard time believing that he outlived them, that they beat him to the exit, to the flip side.
Your mom, my Starr, sometimes, well most of the time I miss her. She was my first true love, not my only, but the first.
I was a little shocked, maybe even disappointed that she wasn’t his only love. I know that they both had several other relationships, many of which when they were still married to each other. However, I always had this vision in my mind that they were star-crossed lovers that loved only each other even when they were with others.
The last letter I wrote her, which she did not answer, I guess that she was tired of letters. I asked her if she was ready to see some more sunsets.
I weep every time that I read that line. I picture he and mom, sitting on a beach, watching their grandchildren giggle in the surf. Getting up, brushing the sand off their shorts, when Zack yells that the steaks are ready.
We all have dreams.
This article was written by a guest blogger. The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions of Bob Lacey, Sheri Lynch or the Bob & Sheri show.
Soshally Awkward
Sosha Lewis is a writer whose work has been featured in The Washington Post, Huffington Post, MUTHA Magazine and The Charlotte Observer. She writes about her sometimes wild, sometimes hilarious, sometimes heartbreaking past filled with free-lunches, a grimy sports bar, a six foot tall Albino woman who tried to save her teenage soul, felonious, drug addicted parents, an imaginary friend named Blueberry and growing up nestled in the coal-dusted mountains of West Virginia.
