Many prisoners I meet struggle with their separation from family. When they hear that my marriage to Carole took place in a prison visiting room longer than seven years ago, some ask how we keep our love alive without physical intimacy. The answer to me is simple, and it would be the same answer even [...]
I’m pleased that Carole has agreed to expand her assistance with some of the blogging for our Web site. She assists me in many ways already. I write all of my content in longhand and she types it, then publishes it on our sites and various other sites to which I contribute. Now she has [...]
Before sleeping each night I read at least one passage from the Bible. I’m not deeply religious as most people would measure that term–I don’t attend worshipping services or participate in prayer groups. By reading passages of the Bible every night, and thanking God for the blessings bestowed upon my family, I strengthen my spirit. [...]
This morning, I woke at 2:05, eager to begin my outline and initial pages for chapter nine of Earning Freedom. This chapter will bring me great memories, because it is the chapter where I write about the beginnings of my relationship with Carole. This is where our story begins together, and I’m eager to live [...]
I’m happy to have received a message from my wife, Carole, that my mom reads my daily blog. The Bureau of Prisons likes to promote itself as being family friendly, but the policies it enforces seem designed to isolate prisoners from families and communities. I’ve lived with those policies since 1987, and as a consequence [...]
It’s now eight minutes past one on a Tuesday afternoon. Ordinarily I’d be in a small room in my housing unit at Taft Camp writing at this hour. Today I’m in the library, sitting amidst thousands of books, with the rat-a-tat-tat of typewriter keys coming from the adjacent room on my left. I’m not writing [...]
Today my younger sister, Christina, celebrates her 42nd birthday. I began serving my prison sentence when Christina was only 19, and my criminal decisions began before she graduated from high school. Those bad decisions I made led to my missing a significant portion of my sister’s life, and on days like today, her birthday, I [...]
