Fourteenth Visit to Taft

Today was a great day for Ron, a visit with old friends, in addition to a visit with his old wife. Phil and Ellen have known Ron for 54 years. They all went to high school together, Phil and Ellen married and stayed in Chicago and Ron moved to Los Angeles. For many years they were out of touch but reconnected about 15 years ago. They now live in Scottsdale and made a trip here with the express purpose of seeing Ron. Now that's a good friend. When Ron was first incarcerated he never expected many people to come see him other than family. After all, if you live in San Diego it's a full day's journey, if you're in Los Angeles it's a six hour time frame. He never expected that people would put themselves out to come see him. But he was wrong. Several friends have already been up to Taft, and in two weeks time he has a few of his Carlsbad buddies coming up to visit. In the future some of his softball friends are also going to make the drive up to see Ron.

It was great. Ron was so happy today. Telling jokes and stories as he loves to do, he was just having a great time. I think he did 75% of the talking in the four hours we were all together. Some of the time was spent catching up on news of high school friends, but much of the day was spent with Ron describing in detail his daily life, talking about the people he's met at Taft, and his plans for the future. I think Phil and Ellen were happy they made the trip. Just seeing where he is, how he looks and his great attitude let them know he is a survivor.

I just sort of sat back and took it all in. Often our visits are intense one on one conversations for hours (which I love), but today I got to watch Ron enjoy himself with old friends. I arrived about 1 1/2 hours before Phil and Ellen. We always have so much to talk about. Today was no exception, in fact there's so much to say that I have to keep a list of topics, lest I forget. Telephone conversations are taped so we wait for visitors day to discuss anything that is private.

All in all it was a great visitors day, and it was great to see Ron's spirits so high. The only downer is that Ron's 50th high school reunion is in June (Phil and Ellen are in charge of the event) and we won't be there. I know that he is sad about missing it, but there's nothing he can do about it. Hopefully we'll be at the next one.