Thirteenth Visit to Taft

Staying connected. That's one of the most important things I want to do while Ron is gone. I want to keep him connected with my life here, his friends here, and I want to try to get to know some of his new friends through the stories he tells about his daily life. It's so easy, as the days and weeks go by, to become disconnected.

Often inmates get into their own little routine and feel their new life is something that their wife or friends can't or don't want to understand. Often the wife or friends on the outside are reluctant to share what they are doing. They feel it will make their loved one upset to know what they are missing. Luckily, Ron and I don't think that way. He is eager to share everything with me. He loves to tell stories about new friends, books he's read, new activities he's become involved in. I too, want to tell him what's going on in San Diego. He wants to know what I'm doing each day, how my bridge game or golf game went, who I had lunch with. In other words, he wants to stay connected with me and his community. I want to stay connected to him, and learn to understand as much as I can about his new life.

We never took the Union Tribune when he was home, but now he asks me to send it to him. He wants to know what's happening in San Diego. ($5.00 to get the Sunday UT delivered to him!).

One special way that Ron wants to keep connected to me was quite a surprise. He has started to go to the Friday night Shabat service, something he never did in his life, and now tells me he looks forward to all week. It's a chance for him to connected with like minded inmates for an hour each week, and to feel part of a group. Last week when we were together he asked me if I would buy an electric Shabat candle and light it every Friday night, the same thing that he's doing, to help us connect. I said absolutely. As I said, anything that helps to keep us connected is something I want to do. I am going out next week to buy my candle. We will both light our candle at the same time every week. I'm looking forward to that.

Several years ago I saw a movie that touched me, and I thought about it as I was writing this blog. It was called "La Misma Luna", a Spanish language movie, about a mother separated from her son. She tells him before she leaves that each night she will be looking at the moon and thinking of him, and he should do the same. That is how they stay connected. Staying connected is what it's all about.