You might remember from “Descent into Lent” last year that my typewriter has some basic memory. I can type up to ten pages and then go back to edit them. It isn’t anywhere near what most of you write with, but it’s far better than simply typing on paper. Being able to edit makes a big difference.
I spent three days working on this post, and finally finished it yesterday at 6:00 PM. Then I had to unplug my typewriter to heat water for some Asian noodles my friend, Pornchai received in his twice-a-year food package. These cells have only one receptacle with four single outlets, so plugging something in often means unplugging something else. We constantly play musical plugs. Anyway, the food was far better than any of the “in-house specials” I described in “Looking for Lunch in All the Wrong Places.”
You may already know where this is going. When I plugged my typewriter back in to print my post, the screen flashed “memory lost.” Three days of work was just gone with nothing to show for it. It was the Vigil of the Feast of Saint Maximilian Kolbe who would not have been very proud of my initial reaction.
Then it was mail call. I wonder sometimes if TSW readers who send snail mail to me have any sense at all of the irony of their timing. I opened a letter from a reader in Bellmawr, New Jersey who wrote, “Your writing is so full of patience, humility and love.” Then another from Fairhope, Alabama who wrote: “Through your writings, it is apparent that you have overcome fear, hate, anger, abandonment.” “Oh Great!” I told Pornchai. “Now I can’t throw my typewriter down the stairs” which is exactly what I felt like doing. I want to thank these two wonderful readers for their support and encouragement, and for the reminder of what it means to be a priest in an awful place.
Sometimes I feel that I just don’t have the tools to write, and sometimes I want to quit, but the mail from these readers reminded me that this is not my call to make. As I wrote in “SNAP Judgements Part I,” the very existence and impact of These Stone Walls seems such an unlikely grace that it requires surrender – including surrender to its limitations. I imagine young David had to make that same surrender standing before Goliath (1 Samuel 17:50). Sometimes I look at the agendas surrounding the priesthood scandal and see Goliath standing there, smirking at my fragile typewriter.
I often let my friend, Pornchai read mail from readers. It gives him hope, and a feeling of being connected with other Catholics beyond these stone walls. It’s part of our Consecration to Saint Maximilian’s Knights at the Foot of the Cross described in “Saints and Sacrifices” that we both offer each day in prison for TSW readers. Yesterday, after three days of work got deleted, I hope there was some special grace in the offering of that day for the two people who wrote to me. This morning, Pornchai had a visit, after a 20-year absence, from someone who reconnected with him after reading of him on TSW. He left a note on my typewriter as he was going out the door. It says, simply, “Start over.”
LONG WEEKENDS IN THE SLAMMER
Prison is like a parallel universe. Many of the things you look forward to in the real world are reviled in this one, and long holiday weekends top that list. For three consecutive days, all work is cancelled, all programs are closed, educational classes and library time are suspended, and prisoners are locked into a prison within the prison. On long weekends, we’re not just imprisoned within the imposing wall that runs the prison perimeter, but behind locked doors within that wall. Prisoners dread long weekends.
In “Holidays in the Hoosegow,” last Thanksgiving, I wrote of how difficult it is to see holidays in context from inside these walls. That post even has a photo of the building I live in, found by our editor in an article on Catholic prison ministry. You’ll see an imposing guard tower in the back of the building, and this cell is just at its base.
If Thanksgiving is one of the bigger holiday challenges in prison, Labor Day runs a close second. The effect is mostly psychological, I think. Labor Day signals the coming end of summer which, for anyone in prison in New Hampshire, means that close on its heels is the sort of confining winter I wrote of in “The Books of Long Winter’s Night.”
About the only upside of any long weekend is the fact that prisoners don’t usually “get bags” then. That’s a prison euphemism for being moved in the night, sometimes to a better place and sometimes a far worse one. Sometimes it’s even to another prison where the unknown is a source of great anxiety. When it happens, the usual procedure is for guards to give a prisoner a few plastic trash bags after lockdown at night. With these, the prisoner must pack his belongings, and, by morning, he is gone.
Awhile back, my friend, Scotty, “got bags.” During the night, the whispered rumor made its way from cell to cell until it reached mine at the very end of the line. “Scotty got bags.” It made my heart sink, but I also knew that at least Scott was heading in the right direction toward eventual freedom. Every prisoner knows that footsteps in the night and the rustle of plastic bags could mean moving, and possibly never seeing friends again in this life.
There was talk in this state of shipping up to half the prisoners from here to private, for-profit prisons in Texas and Oklahoma to save money on the prison budget. It had most of the prisoners here very anxious, especially those who would lose all contact with their families and children. But the idea seems to have been put on hold pending further studies about the, fiscal bottom line. For those who live in anxiety over this, long weekends at least provide a brief respite from it. Prisoners are rarely moved on weekends and holidays.
For me, the biggest downside of a long weekend is that the ballfield is closed for that entire time. In the northwest corner of this prison complex is a baseball field with a quarter-mile walking track on its perimeter. I wrote of it in one of my earliest posts on These Stone Walls, “Field of Dreams.” It’s the sole place where prisoners here can walk.
Along one side of the field runs the towering prison wall, but the other three sides are surrounded by trees populating forested hills that stretch off into the distance. In between me and those trees is a barrier of two 20-foot high chain link fences spaced six feet apart, topped with spiral after spiral of imposing razor wire that decorates prisons everywhere. It’s a testament to the power of trees that the visual cortex of a prisoner’s brain can tune out all the fences, and razor wire and see the forest. When I first went to walk in that field seventeen years ago, I was intimidated by the sight of all those prison barriers. Now I see only the trees beyond, and the view of freedom.
I love to walk in the field on weekday mornings when it’s scheduled to be open. Guys my age – I was 41 when I was sent here and now I’m 58 – need to move. I can usually walk three or four miles in the one hour I have in that field, but this summer was among the very worst for access to it. It opened on average of only two mornings per week. So I get there when I can, and it’s the source of my relative sanity.
The long Labor Day weekend means that the field will be closed, and I will once again be locked in, but it also signals the coming end of summer. In just a month’s time, in October, the field will close until sometime in May, and I will miss it terribly. This is the most whining about prison I will ever do.
SAILS ON THE HORIZON
When a long weekend is coming, I usually try to find a book to get me through it. Over the last few years, I have read just about everything from some of my favorite writers like Tom Clancy, Ken Follett, J.R.R. Tolkien, even J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series. They’ve all helped me endure long stints of being locked inside on an otherwise beautiful day. But my first ever “Stuck Inside Literary Award” is going to the late Patrick O’Brian, author of the 22-volume “Aubrey-Maturin” series of historical novels.
Okay, stop yawning! These are very special books. Patrick O’Brian was an Irish writer who used real Royal Navy ships’ logs from the age of Napoleon to weave his stories, and he was masterful at it. The only truly fictional characters are often the two protagonists, Captain Jack Aubrey and ship’s physician Stephen Maturin, placed on deck by the author.
The series follows the adventures of Captain Jack Aubrey from his first stint as Master and Commander – the title of the first book – in the British Royal Navy. The book became an Oscar-winning film starring Russell Crowe as the daunting Captain Aubrey. Several years ago, one of my nieces sent me the first four books in the series, and the prison library had the next five, so I have read less than half the series. I just reserved number nine, Treason’s Harbour (W.W. Norton, 1983), to read over Labor Day weekend. Even after all my squawking about being locked up for long weekends, I’m looking forward to reading it.
Patrick O’Brian’s publisher has compiled all 22 volumes – and, posthumously, a partially written 23rd – into a four-volume set that I hope one day to read from the beginning. A part of what made this series so very special is that I first wrote of these books in “Come Sail Away! Pornchai Moontri and the Art of Model Shipbuilding.” While I’ve been reading these nautical adventures, Pornchai has been carving some of these very ships from the Age of Sail that I wrote about in that post.
As he designs his Royal Navy warships and other vessels, we’ve had long discussions about the decks, masts, rigging, and sails that have been part of my nautical education from Patrick O’Brian’s books. As I wrote in “Come, Sail Away!” so many of the terms we use today in casual conversation had their origins on the decks of British Royal Navy vessels from the Napoleonic era. The very walls around us in this cell are decorated with photos of Pornchai’s ships, and I can place myself upon some of their decks as I read of Captain Jack Aubrey.
A few TSW readers – notably Sharon Morris and Lavern West – have traveled to New Hampshire to obtain one of Pornchai’s vessels. Lavern has a magnificent tall ship displayed in her living room window in Cincinnati with some beautiful handcrafted stained glass in the window just above it. She sent a photo which Pornchai proudly added to the collection on his cell wall.
One day, a guard came into this cell and was looking intently at the photos of Pornchai’s beautiful ships. When he saw the one in Lavern’s window, he said “Wow! That’s just incredible.” Pornchai smiled and sat up straight waiting for the usual comments about his carving skill. Then the guard said, “That’s some of the nicest stained glass I’ve seen!” I just about hurt my ribs laughing. Pornchai told me that on his next ship, he’s adding a plank for me to walk.
It’s not a case of “great minds think alike,” but Editor John Norton wrote of the Patrick O’Brian series in a recent editorial in Our Sunday Visitor (“Summer reading that makes for poor – or better – Dads,” OSV July 24, 2011). John Norton cited many of the same details that have drawn me to these novels, especially the Catholic sub plots.
Captain Jack Aubrey, like every officer in the Royal Navy at that time, was a loyal member of the Church of England with a disdain for “papists” and “popery.” However, his best friend, ship’s physician Stephen Maturin, is a devout Irish/Catalan Catholic and a spy for British intelligence. Stephen Maturin introduces into the stories an intrigue and commitment to reason that counterbalances Jack Aubrey’s “full speed ahead” style.
In an odd Catholic twist in the series, as Captain Jack Aubrey is promoted to Admiral, and all the political requirements such office required, he learns that his half-black son – born out of wedlock in Aubrey’s youth before the series begins – becomes a Catholic priest for whom the anti-Catholic Admiral becomes intensely proud.
There is also much music. In the very first chapter of the very first book, Captain Jack Aubrey and Dr. Stephen Maturin met while quarreling over a seat at a concert.
Aboard ship, they are both accomplished musicians – “prodigious fiddlers,” the Captain would say. In one of the early novels – I can’t remember which – the crew of the HMS Surprise sinks into near despair while caught for days in the equatorial doldrums. Her sails just hang for days from the lack of wind. Captain Aubrey asked Dr. Maturin for some music to stir their hearts. “How about ‘Stone Walls do Not a Prison Make,’” said the doctor. It’s the poem by Richard Lovelace on the masthead of These Stone Walls. At some point across the centuries, it had been set to music.
These adventures at sea have been an enormous blessing as both Pornchai and I faced long stretches against the wind, or hung out to dry in the doldrums of prison life. My first ever “Stuck Inside Literary Award” goes to the late Patrick O’Brian.
“So it was we who strayed from the way of truth,
and the light of righteousness did not shine
on us, and the sun did not rise upon us.
We took our fill of the paths of destruction,
and we journeyed through trackless deserts.All those things have vanished like a shadow,
and like a rumor that passes by,
like a ship that sails through the billowy water,
and when it passes no trace can be found,
nor track of its keel in the waves.”
(Wisdom of Solomon 5:7,9-10)“Those who sail the sea tell of its dangers, and we marvel at what we hear.
For in it are strange and marvelous works,
all kinds of living things, and huge creatures of the sea.
Because of him his messenger finds the way, and by his word all things hold together.”
(Sirach 43:24-26)
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Father Gordon, I was laughing about what you wanted to do with your type writer. My new “Bed Top” is frustrating me to death. I lose more than I can even type. It has a mind of its own. So, to be honest since I said I owe…. I owe… if I say bad words. I owe you 20 bucks now. The check will be in the mail by Friday, sent through my PAL. Oh well, it is better than getting my mouth washed out with old brown soap, that Mom loved so well. You are so much fun. AND, you lift me up spiritually.
Tell Pornchai he is loved as is Charlene and all who help you. BTW, This is the second time I’ve read this post and I love every word. And Mick’s write the best books, even if the Mick is a Mac. These posts turned into books long ago, I believe. I thank God for them. OK, now I want you to tell me…us….what book do you believe we should read during Lent, please.
God love you and I love you:
Sheila McCabe Ryan
This is really an outstanding blog in every way. The visual images always do justice to the text, and this post was no exception. Pornchai’s wood carving is just amazing. He is truly gifted. The ship in Laverne West’s window could easily be a museum piece. I learned from a past post that Pornchai designed this ship and carved it’s hundreds of parts by hand. There was no kit and no printed plan. It all came from inside his mind, and i am in awe of his skill. He is an accomplished artist.
Fr I loved this. I love ocean and books. My big bro in Maine has a sail boat and when I was able to go up there, I didn’t want anybody to talk. I liked to listen to Jesus on the open sea. I did think of something strange as I always do when I read you. Make sure nobody is walking behind you when you are walking the plank. big grin
Lots of love and blessings.
I look forward to seeing Pornchai’s next ship with the plank!
Pornchai’s ships are incredible!
I’m sorry to hear that you will be losing your field walks soon. N.H. is a beautiful state, no doubt about that, and October, with its glorious foliage is the most beautiful month of all here. Hopefully, the field stays open long enough for you to enjoy it.
And Father? Please don’t toss that typewriter just yet. I think you’d be surprised at how much you are accomplishing through that machine, as temperamental as it may be.
If the good Lord can forgive me for the time I profusely (Fifty Cents!!)-ed at the Olympic torch-bearing runner who caused the roads to be blocked off one morning while I was on my way to Holy Mass a few years ago … surely He forgives you for wanting to throw your vexatious typewriter down the stairs in a moment of anger. Let’s hope humor is likewise next to godliness.
Dear Father
I feel for you as you contemplate the onset of the cold weather and the even greater clipping of your wings as a result. I use a mobility scooter and on one of those you feel every wind that blows!
During the warmer months it is a pleasure to ride the five or ten minutes to pick up anything I might need, but in the winter it is a different matter! I am encumbered by layers of clothing and still can’t guarantee I’ll feel warm enough. It takes longer to wrap up than it does to do any errand, so I usually only go out on Sundays, to Mass.
So I can feel for the extra restrictions on you during the cold months: I think if you are in some way confined, the freedoms you do have are all the more precious to you and to lose any part causes greater suffering than otherwise. So I don’t blame you for having a moan one little bit; next time I feel like having one myself I’ll remember you and know I am not alone. You may have felt the moan was not an expression of your priesthood: in that moan you encouraged me, so …. I wonder … even when you thought it wasn’t very priestly, perhaps it was?
St Ignatius Loyola says “Take, O Lord” – he doesn’t specify that we should only ask the Lord to take the good bits: the Lord wants the whole lot.
That is enough – I suspect I am teaching my grandmother to suck eggs as it is!
I am lucky enough to be able to study, so the winter months will be put to good use I hope (and there is so much to read that I NEED those winter months to do it!).
God bless and keep you, particularly through the restrictions of the colder months.
Pornchai’s ships are amazing. My eleven and five-year old sons happened by when I was reading this post and they were blown away. “Whoa, look at those! Can I see the other pictures?” (Sometimes, I think all of the years of “may” and “please” are pointless…perhaps someday it will catch on!) We sure will be praying for you both this weekend and all prisoners. That is something I never thought of.
Happy September, Fr. Gordon!!
What a wonderful article today. Thank You.
Ahhh..I think we Christians sometime think that we have to be “perfect”
in order to witness to others, of our Lord’s Kingdom and His miracles and
graces.
About eight years ago, I had two major back surgeries, within a three month
span. The surgeries, one on my neck and the other, lumbar, rendered me
handicapped. I am limited in what I can or should do. (I had just injured by
back after moving into a new neighborhood. I didn’t know anyone here).
But oh! the aloness! Up until a month ago, for the most part, I
have been alone, sort of a ‘solitary confinement’. By God’s great grace,
I was able to muddle thru those long stretched-out years, ok.
However, in more recent years, I started to lose patience. I saw myself
starting to lose my grip on being alone so much. There were times I felt that
I just could not bear it! I had times that I felt so badly for me, that I got mad
at the dishes or the tv or whatever. Then, I started to realize that our Jesus
ALWAYS talks, about love, patience, long-suffering, etc. Then,
towards the end of my lonliness, I started to believe that I had lost my Jesus somehow.
I’ve somehow traded in my salvation for my own suffering.
ALL of this to say, Fr. Gordon, that when I read Your articles and see that YOU
admit, at times, to feelings of ‘losing it’, You build up my confidence that
‘maybe I didn’t lose my salvation or my Jesus’ to my own petty annoyances.
I beleive I even wrote a response, on Your last article,
“SNAP Judgements Part I: Catholic Priests Among the Public Ruins”
that often YOU make me check myself. I am so thankful for those
lessons from You. You teach me by YOUR own experiences and
generosity, by what You share and it is the strength I get from You.
I am not perfect by any stretch of anyone’s imagination. I am a sinner!
I contantly fall short and, when alone for the most part, without companions
to build me up or unable to get to community, I DEPEND on YOUR HONESTY.
Father Gordon, YOU give me hope…hope for my salvation. Most stories of
the saints make them sound perfect. If I have to be perfect, I’ve already lost!
But because You so kindly shared your anxiety over your typewriter, and other
stories You’ve shared, I HAVE HOPE! I NEED to know that saints can be imperfect.
WOW! I didn’t mean to write so much about one subject. You inspire me so much,
I can’t seem to stop writing.
Thank You for sharing about Pornchai and his beautiful work. Please congratulate him
on his beautiful work on his ships and clocks (of which I hope to be in possession of,
one day).
Thank You, Fr. Gordon. Please, continue to allow me to know that I can be a person
with weaknesses and STILL have hope for my salvation. I cherish Your honest
‘confessions’… and YOU!
God bless and continue to use and bless You. You are in my thoughts, part of my heart,
and of course, in my daily prayers.
Helen
Thanks for the pictures of the ships that Ponchai has carved – a great talent and good use of it. I can identify with Pornchai’s penchant for asian noodles – i look forward to large bowls of “pho” every time I go to Viet Nam.
Thanks for persevering in your newsletters – always inspiring in the midst of very down to earth matters.
Your writting was one that was felt deeply tonight, father. Keep writing and I will keep praying.
God Bless
Susan M.
The first part of your posting tonight you mentioned timing of your readers letters, the timing if your post today was perfect.
My 10 year old son and I are staying in a hotel tonight. We are flying to florida tomorrow. He will be staying with my mom by him self for the first time ever and he is having a lot if anxiety.
After a major meltdown I finally got him settled and in bed. He asked for a bed time story. I didn’t have a book with me. I thought for a minute and remembered I had seen an email on my phone a short while ago from TSW so I decided to read it to him.
He was so happy to hear your story…and that u were writing of his buddy pornchai! The timing couldn’t have been better tonight.
My little man went to sleep with a big smile on his face tonight.
Thank you and keep typIng
…..I’ve read most of Patrick O’Brian’s books…..love ‘em !!!!!!
Pray for you every night!!
Michael S.
Father,
What a great post.. I can certainly understand your frustration about losing all that work! but, I am glad you didn’t ditch the typewriter..
I just watched Master & Commander again the other night. I liked it so much when it came out I bought the DVD.. Because of you, I will now look into reading the books you write about here. Thank You
I also have to echo another poster. While some may think you “will never function as a priest again” I can say first hand that is an outright lie.. I’ve written to you about my life and you know the type of prison I am in and I wait every Weds for your words of wisdom and I can not tell you how many times since I have begun reading your blog, you have helped me without even knowing it..
I pray that you will be free but until then please know, you are a BLESSING to all of us who read this blog and I do believe you are sent to us and all those around you straight from God. Being in prison is a horrible thing but I always believed “God puts us where He wants us” even if we don’t like it.. and I can definitely understand how it feels. Please don’t ever give up your writing or your hope Father.. You are so needed. Where you are and here as well..
God Love You Father Gordon,
Robyn
South Carolina
Another example of wonderful writing and the triumph of hope over despair. I love Pornchai’s wry humour and am as always in awe of your perseverance in the face of devilish frustration.
Luckily there is an invisible army on your side Father G!
In my daily prayers as always!
“As I wrote in “SNAP Judgements Part I,” the very existence and impact of These Stone Walls seems such an unlikely grace that it requires surrender – including surrender to its limitations.”
And therein lies hope. The heavenly intervention that’s allowed the existence of TSW isn’t lost on its’ readers. Don’t ever let it be lost on you. Hope, biblical hope, means salvation to every believer due to Jesus Christ’s willingness to put Himself in our place. New Hampshire’s stone walls haven’t, and can’t, alter the place earned for you by the obedience of Jesus Christ to His, and to our, Father’s will.
You’ve fought, and fought, and fought some more in order to be vindicated. Vindication will be yours, Fr. MacRae. It will be
I want it to happen in your earthly lifetime; thus, I do what I can to that end. It’s so encouraging that others are doing what they can as well.
Praying fervently,
Susan
Great Post Father! I have enjoyed Patrick O’Brian’s writing as well. Hopefully fans of TSW will also discover his great talent and stories of adventure now that you have given them a taste of his writing. I have to add you to my list of favorite writers now, as I so look forward to my Wednesday lunchtime which I spend eating my sandwich while reading your latest post. I learn so much and am inspired as well by your writing. I can so relate to your difficulty described in this latest post about losing your work by inadvertently unplugging your typewriter, as I have had similar mishaps in many different ways and it is always so frustrating, makes one want to literally scream. Sorry to hear about the impending close of the ball field for Fall and Winter. It is such a shame as the Fall in the New England area, features some of the most beautiful weather of the year, yet you are deprived of it by the closure of the field. Keep the faith Father and thank you so much for sharing your God-given gifts, talents, experiences and unique perspective. God bless!
Another Patrick O’Brian fan
Dear Father,
Forgive me for not feeling sorry that you might come to Texas. Don and I could visit you. I cannot believe that prison here would be worse than where you are. Sure, it’s hot in the summer, but from October to June, it’s mostly lovely. We live outdoors all year ’round.
I’m not big on naval battle novels, although I did enjoy the film with Russell Crowe. I think all adults who read great books like Lord of the Rings when young, should re-read it now. It’s a wonderful book. Ditto the Chronicles of Narnia. I’m getting ready to start Harry Potter and I’m hopeful.
I think about you and pray for you every day.
May God bless you and give you courage and consolation.
Kathy
Dear Fr. Gordon,
Two thoughts occurred to me as I read your post today.
1) It is a good reminder to us the laity that our priests are human beings who suffer, get angry, discouraged, etc. just like the rest of us. I sometimes think it is very easy to think that just because a man is a priest he is somehow suppose to not experience those things. Glad you didn’t throw your typewriter down the stairs though.
2) I was brought back to a statement your diocese made prior to your trial about “it is clear that you will never again function as a priest”. How wrong they are. You may be a priest in an awful place, but you still function as a priest. I think Pornchai and the others you have ministered to there could and would attest to that.
Thank you for adding to my reading list. I loved the movie Master and Commander. I will have to check out his others in the series.
Please compliment Pornchai on his amazing work; those ships are magnificent.
Glad you have some good reading material to see you through the long weekend. I will add a little more to my prayers for you though this weekend as well.
Thank you for your priesthood, Father. That is something you probably are not told often enough. We need to encourage and thank all of our priests more often.
God bless.
Father Gordon, thank you do much for your blog. You remain in my daily Prayer, your Faith is an inspiration. Please keep your Faith, good wins in the end. God bless you
Cheralyn A Spiritual Mother of Priests
What a great post; I am going to track down a copy of one of his books to read. Pornchai’s creativity continues to delight and his wry wisdom “start again”!
It must be very sad for those prisoners who are illiterate as they are imprisoned in an even tighter way.
God Bless you all