soa-trial

post prison letter

2007-07-23T12:38:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends,

I have for a while wanted to put out a post prison letter. I would start one, even got one pretty close to done and then could not get it done. This lack of focus, restlessness, nightmares, and unpredictabliltiy has been called Post Tramatic Stress. I am not sure what it is but having read a dignostic manual defination from a book loaned me, it seems like it could be this. Anyhow, I am getting help. It is a humbling experience to sometimes not be able to put two thoughts together or to "loose it" and simply just cry for a while.

It seems impossible just two months at Carswell could provoke such strong experiences but when I think about my friends being there, in some cases for the rest of their lives, well, there is a depth of sadness I never in my life have felt before. The inhumane treatment of the guards comes up when I read the account of an article I am enclosing. It is hard to put into words but the helplessness, the feeling one gets that they are not really human in the eyes of those guards...it just gets to you. Even if you have a very high self esteem, you begin to feel less than and then start feeling as if you don't have any rights as a person.

I wanted to give some hopeful news. It seems that people have taken parts of those prison letters and presented them to their Senator. Well, she has asked for more information and is getting other Senators involved.

In another development, one friend from Carswell asked me for an immigration lawyer who works with the poor. Well, someone put me intouch with another person who was able to help find an organization in Ft. Worth!

I am absolutely certain peacemaking is a communal activity. Together people can achieve what they could not achieve alone. This is so true here. So if you want, I will continue to write with news from Carswell and related prison news. I am including a part of an e:mail from one of my friends in Carswell. She encourages us to support this early release Bill currently in committee. Please click on the link and write your congressperson in support. This gives so much hope to the women there that people care and are willing to write, call and advocate for them. It is all they have, really.

I did receive an e:mail from one woman, Ms Smith, who we call the DA of Carswell because she helps so many women with their appeals and 2255 forms. She wrote to me that an officer told a woman who had put some clothes in the washer on the "hot water" cycle to remove them or go to the SHU. She told the officer the water was too hot at that moment. The officer screamed at her to remove the clothes. The woman had third degree burn on her hands and had to be taken to the burn center. The officer bragged to the other women that she would not get into trouble. Well, the officer was "rotated" early from that unit. I am sure she not be in any kind of trouble but at least she was investigated.

I am so grateful for you support. It helps to know there are places on this earth where people are treated as people. It is my hope that bit by bit people will be able to "sow love where there is hatred...and where there is despair there will be light instead."

May peace fill our minds and love fill our hearts,

Tina

CPTnet
18 July 2007
BORDERLANDS: Everybody does not love Raymondville

by Haven Whiteside

[Note: People wishing to follow the progress of Christian Peacemaker Team's
Borderland's Witness drive may do so at
http://cptborderlandswitness.blogspot.com/]

Everybody does not love Raymondville, a federal detention facility forty
miles north of the Mexican border, near Brownsville, Texas. Run by Management Training Corporation (MTC) of Utah, under contract with the Department of Homeland Security, it holds persons suspected of immigration violations of various kinds. Currently 2000 prisoners are awaiting processing there. The U.S. authorities have brought from all over the United States, so most of them are far away from family or any other support.

According to attorney Jodi Goodwin, who works with these immigrants,
processing can take from weeks to many months. The only inmates to receive legal advice are those with money to hire a private attorney, or lucky enough to find one pro bono.

Jay Johnson Castro, a border activist from Del Rio, Texas, calls Raymondville a "concentration camp." Elizabeth Garcia (CPT-Brownsville) and others have nicknamed it "RITMO," because they see it functioning in ways similar to the GITMO facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where prisoners from the U.S. "War on Terror" are held without due process and mistreated.

Some refer to Raymondville as "Tent City", because it consists of ten huge tents of Kevlar-like material, holding 200 people each. In the middle of each are the toilets, with no privacy. Food is inadequate and does not meet the nutritional needs of people from the many different countries and cultures there. Surrounding the facility are two 14-foot chain-link fences, with double coils of razor wire on top and in between.

Most of these prisoners are only accused of various immigration violations and are not required under the law to stay in detentions while being processed.

On Sunday morning, after Mass and breakfast at San Felipe de Jesus in
Brownsville, the CPT Borderlands Witness team headed to Raymondville for a vigil. We parked in the lot out front and got out our banner, saying "Close RITMO Now." To our surprise, we found no signs restricting our presence. But before long, two guards driving the perimeter road stopped and told us to go back. While walking towards the front, were able to show our banner to some young men in the yard inside. They gave us thumbs-up signs. The guards walked respectfully behind us, just making sure we kept going until we reached the front corner of the administrative building.

There they said we could hold our prayer vigil on the sidewalk, which we
proceeded to do for the next half hour. Later, apparently on word from
above, an officer directed us to the parking lot, where we continued our
vigil. The only audience was the guards. When invited, they declined to join us, but some appeared to be listening.

As the hour drew to an end, a county official came out with him and said the sheriff was on his way. Not sure of the implications, but apparently free to go, we packed up our banner, got in the car, and headed down the road before noontime, on a quiet Texas Sunday.

Friends,
Here is a web site where you can support the bill advocating early release for non-violent prisoners over the age of 45:

www.washingtonwatch.com/bills/show/110_HR_261.html

Click on the email link to your own congressman, then write a brief statement of your support for the bill HR 261.

final letter--finally!

2007-06-26T21:23:00.000-07:00

Yes, it is finally here. No more waiting for me to get on the internet, since you can call and email Tina yourself! I talked to her on Saturday and she is working on the big transition back home. It is certainly a blessing that she has the summer to just be with family. Being with her on this journey from crossing the line, to trial, and now through prison has been quite an experience and continued prayers and support will be most appreciated. Coming back to the "free world" is certainly no walk in the park. Thank you for you patience and support of me these past two months as I sometimes struggled to get messages out.

Peace,
Beth

June 11, 2007

Dear Friends,

This will be most likely my last letter from prison. I honestly never thought these days would come, EVER. My sisters here have asked me if my time has gone slowly or quickly. In all honesty days felt like months and months felt, especially in the beginning, like years. But now I am down to 3 days and an overnight as they say here.

It is a bittersweet leaving for me. I am SO ready to see my kids and family and my dog. I am missing all my friends on the outside as well. The bitter part is that I have come to love my sisters on the “inside.” Leaving them behind is not easy. I need to go. It is my time to go. I have come to question a lot and find very few answers. Often times I have this experience of seeing SOMEthing out on the horizon but I am not sure what it is I see. It’s like a distant vision. I have this now as I try to understand the impact of these two months. I don’t do too well with blatant injustice but it is such an everyday occurrence here…I just question again and again, I have no answers…I go over it with God all these questions in my heart. Why? Why? Why are such innocent folk here? Why the elderly? Why are people psychologically tortured here over and over? Why don’t we have simple things like toilet paper and hand soap? Why are we treated like dirt? Why do I make $5.25 a month for over 40 hours a week of work? Why are families torn apart? I could go on and on. Sometimes as I listen to story after story, esp. these last days, it takes everything inside me not to throw my apple or curse loudly. The only thing I know to do is to pray and write, pray and write, pray and write. Sometimes I talk with a couple of friends, a woman from Arkansas and one friend from Kansas. They listen and we talk. It helps. Not that I understand any better but the gauge inside me that is overflowing comes back within more normal ranges.

Please continue to shower people with prayers. I feel so…how to say, powerless in one sense to make any change or heal any pain and yet I know all I have really to offer anyone is my prayer. It is a powerful commitment to pray for someone, to lift them to God and hold their concerns and spirit up to the Light. When I am not hearing such horrific stories, believing in the power of prayer comes easier. But now I am leaving these women I have come to so love and respect to an atmosphere and system that is so brutal and terroristic. It is so much harder to believe in prayer now when I have to believe with all my heart. Now, I must understand that the power of prayer is more powerful than the power of presence. I am trying to believe and understand.

I went to a jailhouse farewell party tonight. It was for a woman who was falsely accused by her ex-husband in order to get custody of their son. She spent 2.5 years in prison on a 15 year sentence. Talk about great food out of NOTHING…tamales made with ground up corn chips filled with beans and chicken and pork rinds (softened in water!), a fruit salad that rivals anthing I have ever made and served in orange rind cups…Flour tortilla shells made in a reused cheese dip container filled with a great rice with broccoli…bean dip and chips and the best of all a cheesecake made with graham crackers and I am not sure what else, chilled by putting it in a dishpan filled with ice and wrapped in trash bags. The decorations were cut out magazine pages hung in curls from the ceiling, a table cloth made from taped magazine pages, a card made from cut outs from magazines. It was festive, colorful, and whimsical. You would not believe you were in prison. But the night officer had to be on or they would shut it down. Mr. C. is the regular officer and he knows us but in case we get too close or too comfortable or he gets to know us too well, they (BOP) will rotate him at the end of the month. I think they get 3 month shifts. So ALL will change…from the way mail call happens, to the way washer times happen, to what level of noise or what dress at night is allowed. Some officers are so picky that even the slightest form of creativity, like needle pointing their initials on their houseshoes or putting glitter on their shower shoes…All seized as Contraband. Head scarves are made fom ragged bedsheets…contraband. I had found a plastic spoon…I got rid of it right away b/c if there is a shakedown, I could get a shot for, you got it, contraband…if you have move than I think two pairs of tennis shoes, more than ten books, more than a shoebox of letters, it is considered contraband. One officer went so far as to accuse me of running a political card business b/c I get “too much stupid mail.” He is the same officer who tried to humiliate me during mail call by smelling an envelope and asking me if I get a lot of FATHER’s Day cards! (He was suggesting I was gay.) My sisters here were outraged b/c many feel as though I am still a nun. They wanted me to report him. I is not worth my time. But I guess my point is that they can pretty much say what they want and construe what you have as contraband. Right now I have nothing sice I had to pack everything out. I still laugh at the political card business.

I don’t know where this experience leads me. Sylvester Brown’s article suggested I have a “new cause.” I thought about this…I really don’t have any causes…what I see is all of this is born of loving people, consequences of loving. I could go to jail and just do my time and get out and continue my life. That is permissible. It is a possible scenario…but when you love someone, when your heart has been touched by people, then it is difficult to ignore their plight. It was suggested to me before I began my prison time, to keep my heart soft. I’ve thought of this often during these two months. It is easy to harden your heart here. There is so much pain, too much pain. It would be reasonable to protect your heart here by hardening up. But when people are involved, people whose sorrow is written on their faces, in their tears, when I read Pema Chodron’s book and she suggests to lean into the pain…well how can I harden up my heart? How can I not be touched? How can I not feel the pain and despair? If I did this here, I would not be receptive to my children and Sandeep or my friends I love in the “free world.” I can’t pick and choose, hardening for some, softening for others. And while I face the fact everyday that I am NOT God, that I am just a person I see that loving people bears consequences. I don’t know what exactly that is other than feeling their pain and listening but it is not a cause. It is about a way of living and seeing and, I am sure with a lot of questions and a lot of errors, trying to find where this all leads to, if it leads anywhere.

Alec, my son, wrote a paper for me on a woman, Elizabeth Fry. Elizabeth was a Quaker who had a bunch of children and worked for prison reform. She believed in the Gospel and felt serious about living it. She saw her role as a mother and as a Christian not mutually exclusive. I found it significant that my son, my first born, gentle boy chose to write to me about this woman who worked for prison reform b/c she saw it as part of the Gospel. Sometimes the wisdom of a child is the hand of God.

I wanted to close with a quote I got on a letter…the card is by Gen Cassani, SSND, the quote by Kay Weaver…”…and my road is a little easier cause she (you) were here, I see a little clearer through the darkness called fear…” I could add each of your names as Gen included the names of women who have made such a difference…But I think Beth might quit before I got home…just too many names. But each letter, card, note, phone call, prayer, song, book…each meal cooked, lesson taught, child loved and toted…All this and more eased my road and dispelled a fear. I am more convinced than ever before that any act of peacemaking is a communal act. It is not an individual action. So all I have to offer is my thanks…from deep down and heartfelt…I love each of you and again, loving has consequences. So I hold each of you in prayer. I am grateful and humbled by your love…I am more convinced than ever that God works in our lives in ways we can never know or understand. It is, for me, just keeping my heart soft through love and prayer and my eyes open to the daily ways God works…

Next time I write, I will write a homecoming letter!

I want to ESPECIALLY thank Beth w/o whom these letters would not get transcribed. I don’t think she knew what she was getting into when she offered to do this (hahaahahah, very true!). I am so grateful, Beth.

With hope and sorrow and love,
Tina

Two women who do not get any mail and would appreciate a pen pal:
Denise Burruss 79086-180
Daria McAdams 13267-078

end of May and beginning of June (I think!!)

2007-06-16T19:33:00.000-07:00

Sorry this is soooo long--internet issues on my end. So here are some letters and Tina's last letter from prison is on its way. She got out on Thursday, June 14 and flew home the next day, so now comes transition time for everyone!

May 28, 2007

Dear Friends,
Texas Humidity has hit. I’m sure St. Louis humidity has hit as
well…Actually given how freezing cold they keep our unit (they say it keeps
the germs down) the humidity feels good…at least outside I don’t need the
long underwear I wear inside.

The days are ticking down to freedom. I am READY. It will be hard
leaving the women I have met. Someone I think once said, “No one is really
free until we all are free.” I don’t know who said it but I now understand
that in a way I never understood before. Yes in 16 days and one overnight I
will go home or at least begin the journey home. And I will go where I want
to go and do what I want to do (which is hold me kids and kiss my husband)
but deep down inside I know too much and that knowledge keeps places in my
heart yearning for everyone’s freedom or at least just sentences and humane
treatment. How can I hope for less. I guess again it is a consequence of
loving and living.

It is Memorial Day and the schedule is a bit more laid back. I am now so
used to getting up at 4:00, that waking at 6:00 to do laundry seemed like a
luxury. I was outside early when it is cool and ran a mile and walked two.
After lunch I walked another mile. Everyone is outside so it is getting
crowded. I went inside and the only place to sit and write is in the Spanish
TV room. A Novela is playing…It helps my Spanish, I guess. At least every
other word is not F—K. I am getting tired of everything being a F—King
thing. The English language gets a work out here…I am tired of the fights,
the cursing, the yelling. I am not a person with virgin ears or a virgin
mouth for that matter. I am not one who needs to be kept with kid gloves
either. But the harshness and anger is the norm rather than the exception.
I find myself saying less and less. It is this introverted part of me now
just rebelling totally…there is no more placating it with an extra long
shower or miles of walking o nthe HAMSTER wheel (the track). I dream about
working in my garden and digging my little pond!

I took a walk today with Ms. BB. She spent 7 days in an outside hospital.
She told me that inmates were segregated from the general population. She
described trash overflowing on the floor, 8 beds in a room, with beds packed
into the room so tight she could reach out and touch the next bed. She said
the first night she woke up with a used bloody syringe on her bedside table
along with bloody dressings from the lady prisoner in the next bed. She was
shackled to the bed and if you had to use the bathroom both feet are
shackled. She told of dirty bathrooms and guards who talked about and
laughed at the people they (were) sent to “guard.” She said it was hurtful
and humiliating. She is facing 34 years on a conspiracy charge. She would
not take the plea agreement because she knew she is innocent so she took it
to trial. People she asked to testify for her were threatened with
conspiracy charges if they took the stand for her. No polygraph tests were
allowed. I know there are lots of jailhouse stories but her story I believe.
She was building a home for kids in need of a meal and a place to stay. She
is a Native American woman. One of many for whom a large part of their
family is in prison. They are on Federal land and have a “U”-number (I am
not sure what this is). Conspiracy charges usually carry 10-15 years with a
plea agreement and 25-45 if you take the charges to trial to try to fight
them. Funny thing….you try to prove your innocence: you presume you are seen
as innocent until proven guilty but it is not really how the system runs…here
you are guilty and often times strong armed into filling up the jails and
prisons. I now understand the “prison industry economy” a little better.
Here at Carswell inmates run the prison (I make $5.25 a month to work in the
kitchen 8 hrs. day) but the main money maker is Unicor. All federal prisons
have Unicor units. Here inmates answer directory assistance calls for
between 23 cents to up to a dollar twenty five an hour. Now think of how
much directory assistance operators make in the “free” world…maybe 8 to 10
dollars an hour + benefits. Here they pay no benefits and there are no
unions…So you can imagine the money phone companies save and the money the
BOP makes…Someone said some new men’s prisons are being built and factories
are being built for inmates to make cars!!! I have not read this for myself
but if it is true…Some car company has a SWEET deal…No automakers’ unions, no
pay raises, no benefits…Talk about the “perfect” storm…this seems perfect.
No wonder we need more prisoners and more prisons. The economy depends on
it! Sorry to say…

I am reading a Philip Gulley novel called Home to Harmony. It is a sweet,
innocent novel. The author has little stories about a place kind of like the
town I grew up in. I read it and most of the time, I laugh because it
transports me back to growing up in Smithton…small town where everyone knew
everyone…including your business…my parents have lived there all their
married life and my mom grew up there as well. Harmony, IN and Smithton, IL
are the same…The story is told from the point of view of a Quaker minister.
Her is a part that struck me today…I felt it describes something about
prison. In this chapter the “Friendly Women’s Circle” decided, in addition
to their chicken noodle dinner fundraiser for Brother Norman’s shoe ministry
to the Choctaw Indians, they would stitch a quilt. On the 25th anniversary
of quilt making, they wanted to make a special quilt…One of the women during
Sunday worship thought she saw Jesus’ face in the quilt which drew crowds
from all over the Midwest to the Harmony Friends’ meetinghouse. Finally one
woman confessed she had taken the quilt home to finish it and had spilled
coffee right where people thought they saw Jesus’ face. So Sam, the Quaker
minister, offered these thoughts for his Easter message: “I don’t think we
ought to look for Christ in a quilt. I think we ought to look for Christ in
the poor, in the common, in the lady who rings up our groceries, in the man
who mops the grocery floor, in the kid who delivers our pizza.

I told (in my Easter message) how we always look for Christ amid
magnificence. But that Christ has a history of showing up amid the unlovely.
Born in a dirty stall. Crowned with thorns. Died gasping on a shameful
cross atop a jagged rise. We don’t need to be beautiful for Christ (or the
Divine in us for that matter) to take us in. He is equally at home when
we’re broken-down and dirty. It’s like George Herbert wrote:
“And here in dust and dirt, O here,
The lilies of God’s love appear.”

We think magnificence is in short supply, that dust and dirt choke out the
lilies. But that’s not true and never was. Lilies (I actually love irises)
may root in dirt, but they reach for heaven—and in the reaching, reveal their
magnificence.

Now that is a wonderful stopping place for this letter. But just now the
fire alarm went off and guess what…we are LOCKED in! Being different, I went
to the guard’s station and asked Mr. C if maybe we should leave the building.
Amid the deafening noise, he scowls at me and says, “Hell no!” For a second
I forgot Mr. Barnes first instructions to me when I came to Carswell: “All
questions are stupid!” (His exact words) So Mr. C leaves and LOCKS US IN! I
stood there thinking how dangerously ridiculous this is. I made up a plan in
my mind. I would break the window in the officer’s station and use the phone
to call 911 as our inmate phones would not accept 911, not an approved number
on any of our lists. This is the idiotic part of prison. Hell we’d all
perish because of BOP red tape and I am not kidding. Besides the noise is
beyond deafening now.

And so life goes on…I never could make up this experience…NEVER! From
tornadoes (in locked second story prion alleys) to fire alarms in locked
second story prison alleys and beyond….it all continues.

Jesus or the Higher Beings within us all reside here as they do in the free
world. I guess maybe it’s a little easier to recognize this here because
there are fewer “things” and less busy-nesses to distract us…and then there
are the women themselves who find God walking around in khaki brown or
bright orange jumpsuits from the SHU.

Anyhow, Now I will obey this stop sign and will write again soon. Please
look up HR261 and read about it. If you can support it, please call your
representatives and please call Obama’s office and thank them and encourage
them to look into Carswell’s record. Tell them to look DEEP. Women’s lives
depend on them looking deeply into Carswell’s practices. And call your
Senators and ask them to look as well.

I wanted to give an update. Remember the 23 yr. old with cancer in her sinus
cavity which has spread to her brain due to delays in the BOP…well she ended
up in the hospital b/c she started losing her sight in one eye. Please pray
for her, hold her to the light, please…It is so hard to watch her suffer. I
put myself in her place and it takes my breath away…Honestly, it does. She
is being so courageous and brave. But she needs surgery badly…How do you
push a clogged enormously slow machine like the BOP who could care less about
inmates..the only way I know is Congressional investigation.

Love to all and more gratitude in my heart than I can write about,
Tina

May 31, 2007

Dear Friends,
Tonight I wanted to just write and go to bed. So instead of going to “chow” I
ate tuna from a pouch and a packet of instant oatmeal. I am an unimaginative
microwave cook! You can’t begin to imagine what they cook here in a small
little microwave. Such creativity: tamales made from crushed corn chips and
reconstituted beans…cheesecakes of pudding, cookie crusts, and candy
bars…jail house suckers made of Now and Laters melted down and swirled around
a Tootsie Pop…I can go down the list. I have eaten great pasta salad and
wonderful Mexican rice and beans. But I am so uncreative. I just open a
pouch of tuna and a fork…simple! The other day I tried to make a creative
snack. I have some powdered milk, a little honey and some coffee (I ALWAYS
have coffee. I even now enjoy instant coffee…wonders never cease nor do
miracles). Well I got some hot water and made a paste of milk, honey, and
coffee…It was as awful as it sounds. Take my word for it. But you know I
was hungry so, I ate it…every bit. I had an awful stomach ache afterward.
So instead of wasting my efforts on creative microwave cooking, I write and
eat RTE (Ready to Eat). I am happy with that.

The noise is considerably less now that most folks are at dinner. I can
write in peace. I wanted to share a few things about some women here. One
woman on my unit is a prime example of getting sent very, very far from her
children. She lives in Washington state. She has a 7 yr. sentence. I don’t
know for what but it really doesn’t matter her crime. She was sent to a camp
in Florida. There she wrote “cop-outs” (the way inmates communicate with
staff) asking to get transferred closer to home. It would cost around $5,000
to fly her mom and kids from Washington state to Florida! She kept on asking
her “team” for a transfer. She started plumbing school and made it to grade
one (the highest pay grade which is maybe at tops $1.50 an hour). She did
nothing wrong, only asked for her rights. They transferred her to Carswell
behind a fence, took away her camp status, and said she was “Harassing the
staff!” She said she was ALWAYS polite but persistent. Now she has to stay
at Carswell for at LEAST 18 months before they review her request. She must
work to get her “camp status” back. She found out there IS a camp in
Montana, four hours away from her home. She is 1000’s of miles away all b/c
of retaliation and asking the staff to do their job. My heart breaks for
her. I could not honestly imagine being away from my beloved children and
husband w/o seeing them for 2 years. She is NOW on Prozac due to depression.
She said she was never on drugs before in her life.

Retaliation is a way of life in prison. I am sure I have not made myself
popular here with the staff…I know they are pissed off about OBAMA’s
investigation (Thanks, Mom and I mean that positively). They don’t know what
to expect with the cranes and they are aggravated that I will NOT sign the
papers for a half-way house…which by the way, comes down to MONEY!!! I did
some digging in the Law Library. One woman who has done 7 yrs. of an 8 yr.
sentence ( ALL conspiracy of which she knew nothing by the way) is a legal
expert. She taught me how to look up legal documents, how to cite law and
what books are important. I found out some interesting stuff…You know that
“half way” house would charge me 25% of my gross income to stay there for 3
nights but I don’t pay for 3 nights, I would pay for the month. They would
put another inmate released to a half-way house in my paid for but vacated
bed and guess what, charge them for the whole month…Now they are making
double on the bed! I am not sure if the BOP gets a kick back or not…the
half-way house is double, triple, or even quadruple billing so something is
in it for the BOP. Ms. B told me that guards here clamor for out trips where
prisoners need to be chained (shackled and cuffed) b/c they get “extra” pay.
Now Ms. B is camp eligible so when she goes out (which is never now) b/c she
refused to be chained due to her camp security status!!! So they do not take
her to her outside doctor appointments or tests b/c she said “No”. Pure
retaliation and why can they get by with it? B/c they hold all the power and
control.

Another small example…one officer named Limon (his last name, we never get to
know their first name!) was handing out the mail. There were many cards and
letters for me. He said, “Nema, you are running a business (which is illegal
here) a political card business, aren’t you? I think I’m going to shake you
down!” This means he could go through my stuff and take whatever he wanted.
Now I have nothing “illegal” but he could cite anything and even make up
stuff. I have women here willing to take up for me should he do anything.
One woman said, “BP 9 him, Tina. What he did is humiliating.” (A BP 9 is a
way inmates write up staff members when an inmate feels they were treated
unfairly. I will do what I need to do but I will not antagonize him. Still
it is just b/c he doesn’t want to “DO HIS JOB!” It happens all the time.

An update on Lisa, the 23 yr. old with sinus and now brain cancer. She began
to lose sight in her eye so they took her to the hospital. Have I written
this already? Ms BB the Native American looking at a 34 yr. conspiracy
charge b/c she tried to fight the charge instead of taking a plea
agreement…she finally got out of the hospital but she told me of some scary
stuff. Imagine you are in a “ward” of like I believe she said 6 to 8 beds.
You wake up to find a used syringe and bloody gauze on your bedside table you
eat off of and that your water pitcher and cup sit on. And worst of all the
bloody gauze belongs to your neighbor and was left by the nurse. You are
shackled to your bed. The guards are constantly with you, watching you use
the bathroom, cracking jokes about patients, being LOUD and in the middle of
the night with laughter and jokes, the floors have overflowing trash on them
and the bathroom is filthy. This is what she found. She said one night the
woman next to her fell out of bed! Ms BB hollered and hollered till someone
came. Ms BB had an abscess at site of her colostomy. She had pneumonia and
other health problems I have forgotten. She is back now at Carswell. She was
collecting sticks to make a teepee out of paper. She wanted to use a sheet
(a piece of a sheet) but would get into trouble for “destroying gov’t
property). She struggles to have her culture survive. She told me her story
as well. I bet we walked a good mile and a half as she poured out the pain.
It was as if she only needed someone to know the TRUTH, to listen to her
story and know the truth. She has in effect a life sentence b/c she will
only get out on appeal and she is poor so she can not afford a good lawyer.
There are some good public defenders but not a whole lot is what I am
learning. So I listened and listened and listened as we walked around and
around. What can I say to her? How do I comfort her? She tries to be
self-sufficient and strong but she is scared, sick and alone. I just pray
and ask her everyday how she is and listen.

There is a woman here who is a doctor. Stella is here also on totally bogus
charges. She has 6 children at home ranging from 20 to 9 in age. Most of
the time she is this bulwark of positive energy. Tonight as we walked what I
think I will now call the “path of tears” or the track, Stella just started
crying. She misses her children so much. She has sole custody…her brother
helps but she misses her kids and they her. I know from the absolute depths
of my soul what she means. I know her tears and despair. I prayed so hard
b/c I had no words of comfort. All I could say is “I know and understand.”
I thought “God please help her. Please give her hope, give her peace.”
Another woman heard her and tried to comfort her. We talked and named the
evil of GREED that trumps up charges and how power, misused by, in her case,
a judge, can rip up families. Then she shared about this nanny her brother
hired who she’s never met…how this woman told her over the phone what
absolutely wonderful children she has…how they care for each other, how they
carry Stella’s spirit. Then I remembered how one of you had written these
beautiful cards with compassionate quotes for the ladies at Carswell and so I
gave them to Stella, Theresa, and by this time two other women had joined us.
We sat there reading and passing around these cards. It was a prayer. I
began to weep b/c it was so obvious to me how God was holding us in these
loving tender arms and had given us comfort of words I had lacked. In the
end, another woman joined us. Stella went to check her messages and was
laughing. They are taking one each and passing the cards with the beautiful
messages to other women. There was healing and peace. We cried together
tears of joy. What had been tears of pain were transformed all by God using a
few cards. You see, cranes, small squares of paper, cards written by a
stranger, a hug….a chance meeting, God uses all these ways, I KNOW this so
surely. There are times when I despair, when I am scared, when I just want
to hold my kids and i think what I have done and where I am…. then some small
miracle, some small seemingly insignificant chance meeting, some “accident,”
some small window opens and whoosh God sweeps in and light dispels this
darkness which just a few minutes ago seemed so dark, so black, so heavy.
“Nothing is impossible with God.” My how the starkness of Carswell proves
this point. It may not be on our time or in our way but the light comes and
pushes back just a little of the suffering, the pain. It is like opening
Christmas presents as a kid…the sense of wonderment, surprise, the
anticipation knowing God will be there…God’s love holds us and is displayed
in such wonderful ways. And so maybe everyday is Christmas her at Carswell.
God continuously being “born” in the women and (maybe even the staff?) and
God using people to “gift” each other? What a miraculous gift God gives. I
mean even for me when I thought and sometimes still think, my God why have
you forsaken me? How in the hell did I get here? And then I look back at all
I have seen, what I have learned, what I have been given and have given…It is
an ABSOLUTE, honest miracle…so I just praise God.

(There is one more small portion to this letter that I will send out on Sat.)

The end of the last letter from May 31, 2007
I want to share a poem/ and maybe a song…at least there is a melody in my
head…

Dusky light of orange and purple
Shimmer through ancient cottonwood with such
beauty that I almost had forgotten the prison fence
surrounding me.

As I stand here my soul sings
Glory, Glory, Glory, Glory, Hallelujah
Yeah, I almost had forgotten
That prison wall surrounded me.

As the sky continues turning
hues of pinks and orange and purple
And the birds roost, bedding down
in the ancient cottonwood tree
It’s as close I’ve been to heaven
all these days, yearning to be free

And my soul sings, “Glory, Glory, Glory, Glory, Hallelujah”
Yeah it’s as close as I’ve been to heaven
while my soul longs to be free.

Now that lethal razor wire takes the
color of the sky, shining pinks and orange
and purples
Turning what’s meant to imprison, a thing reflecting all the beauty God can
bring…

And my soul sings, “Glory, Glory, Glory, Glory, Hallelujah…Now my soul sings
Hallelujah and my spirit is set free. Those prison walls cannot contain me.

I know it’s a work in progress but Oh! Gosh how good it felt to write it
down, to find it because I just was struggling so these past few days as
these last two weeks seem like 2 years.

Thank you so much for your prayers---please, please, please continue to pray
for us here, especially the dying and the despairing. A young woman
approached me wanting to know why I get so much mail. She said she rarely
gets mail and, with a palatable sadness and loneliness in her voice said
she’d give anything for some mail. I include her name and number if anyone
has some time. Jessica Ortega #60416-053

Last thought, it occurs to me…yes, your letters to these women are a gift but
also as they write you will continue to learn about Carswell and prison life
long after I have returned home…

With huge love,
Tina

June 2, 2007

Dear Friends,
An annoying thing happened this afternoon. I went outside after work. It
was funny that I had the energy b/c usually after work I am dog-tired and go
to bed, laying there amid the noise to try to rest. But today I had energy
to spare. I saw Stella and Betty under the roof-like shelter by the raven
tree I’ve described in an earlier letter. Stella was very sad, I asked her
if she would like to learn how to make a peace crane. Kind of reluctantly at
first, she agreed. I had two Smithsonian magazines someone gave me. I found
my scissors and went outside. I cut squares of paper and we talked about how
depressing Carswell is, the unfairness of the justice system and how much we
miss our children. Then somehow I thought “But despite all this, God is
faithful.” Really God’s faithfulness is all we have to trust in. We talked
of how we got to prison. Stella’s story is especially poignant. But despite
all the injustice, all the tremendous loss and sorrow and separation…amid all
the DARKNESS God’s faithfulness is like manna from heaven, sustaining life
and in the harshness, the nastiness of prison. And all the while we talked
we folded cranes. It was healing for both of us…As if those scraps of paper
were empowered to perform miracles. People would come up and ask about the
cranes and I would tell them the story of Sadako and the thousand cranes.
Some would make a crane, some would watch. Then a woman named Alice came by.
Alice has some psychological issues. She listened with an unusual
intensity. She asked for four cranes, one for each woman in her room. She
carefully picked four as if she was considering with great deliberation which
bird was meant for each person she lived with in this tiny, tiny cell room.
It was close to 3:00 PM when she came out again saying…”Everyone loved them,
can I take more?” I invited her to learn how to make her own and told her
about the Carswell peace crane project. Honestly, she caught on amazingly
quickly. Her enthusiasm and intensity were contagious. At 3:30 PM we were
yelled at to “Get ready for 4:00 count.” Alice asked if I could come out and
teach her more after supper. I agreed. I wanted to know more about
Alice…And her absolute, childlike joy as she made her first bird lightened
Stella and Betty in a way all the theologizing and philosophizing could never
do.

After supper I was ready. Armed with new squares I cut after 4:00 count and
while I waited for “C-H-O-W.” I listened to one quite ill woman in a
wheelchair talk about how the ceiling in her bed caved in and six inches of
standing water, along with mold and mildew filled her room. I knew what she
said is true b/c other women on the 5th floor shared similar stories and b/c
in the dining room the ceiling tiles in one part have fallen in due to leaky
duct work…It constantly leaks. It is like it is raining indoors all week.
It fills up a 33 gallon trash can in 2 days. The floor there is constantly
wet no matter how much we mop it. I cringe as older, sometimes disabled
women walk past this area with the wet, slippery floors.

Alice came out and waited somewhat impatiently for me to finish listening to
the woman’s story. Her radio and headphones seemed to give her a sense of
groundedness that without them she would lack. Finally I broke away and she
asked if she could learn where “No one could watch her.” Now if you could see
this campus it is tremendously overcrowded. Everywhere people sit, stand,
walk…I suggested we sit under the cover by the raven tree to escape the sun…I
wanted to escape the crowd, too but we had to settle for escaping the
sun…Alice again dug right in with the intensity of a dog with a bone. I told
her maybe we could fold 17 new birds, one for each woman in Maximum. Helen
Woodson is here in Max. Helen is a peace activist. If you want to know more
specifics about Helen, go to the Johan House website. They tell her story
and ministry of civil disobedience. I wanted to make these cranes for these
women b/c we have absolutely no contact with them, so they could not even
find out about the Peace Crane Project going on right outside their building
b/c of the lack of contact. I am hoping Sister Ille can bring them a crane
and tell them the story.

Alice made one, then two. By the third crane she had it…she almost jumped
out of her seat, she was so proud of herself. She had amazingly caught on
very quickly. You could see her visibly grow stronger, prouder of herself.

Alice’s story…well, I’m not quite sure. Perhaps she really does have CIA
contacts and know Saddam Hussein personally. Maybe she has seen a nuclear
weapon and has electronic tracking devices in her leg. It really doesn’t
matter b/c it was as if Alice needed a task to center and ground her spirit
and God gave her the task of peace crane maker. We whipped out 17 cranes in
an hour.

Alice shared with me her radio. It is the first time in almost 2 months I
have listened to the radio. Alice has all the preset stations to Christian
music. “It’s all I listen to,” she confides. I offer her headphones back.
“No, I have another one,” and she whips from her pants another radio. Now at
Carswell this is “CONTRIBAND,” the catch-all word for anything they deem on
any given day that they want to harass us with and threaten to take. Alice
says she traded it for some tennis shoes. I wonder to myself how many times
Alice has been taken advantage of in a place where getting “the Advantage” is
the main task of the day. With her fantastic story, her child-like trust and
intensity, I could only imagine the hell her life must be. I marveled at
God’s goodness…in this simple woman, in letting her “find” me and the magic
of a folded square of old magazine paper. Miracles, I believe, can not be
categorized by big or small, major or minor. EACH and every miracle is an
act of God’s faithfulness. Each a gift to us. So all are marvelous,
wondrous and joyful. Each one is special. I had my doubts that the peace
crane project would ever get off the ground. Honestly there are 1700 women
here and a new bus load will be packed in this week. But I’ve learned a few
things in the process. First, it really does not matter what the outcome is,
whether we can make enough or have a way to disperse them. It is clear that
the process is far more important, miraculous than the actual outcome. And
second, if the officials were to shut down or try to shut it down, it’s
unimportant b/c so VERY many people know how to fold squares of paper into
cranes and the DEED (the seeds of peace) is already done. The women who fold
and pass on the knowledge have a centeredness, a lightness, a purpose that is
simply a gift from God and nothing, no punishment or punitive actions can
take this away.

I know I just wrote a few days ago, but I so need to write down these
miracles I see. To me, in this place and time they seem so beautifully
poignant. The contrasts here of light and dark, of kindness and cruelty, of
tenderness and harshness make it so visible. Honestly there are so many
things I see and hear, I could NEVER, even if I had a 10 year sentence (for
which I am ETERNALLY grateful I DON’T) I could never write it all down.

Yesterday even one of the guards asked me why I am here and listened intently
as I told them about SOA and Fort Benning. I so grateful to Helen Woodson
and Kathleen Rumph who have paved the way for me here. Some (a few,
actually) are interested most aren’t…But this one listened intently.

Well, I got to get up at 4:00 AM. Must sleep.
Love,
Tina

P.S. You know as I read this I thought of the Beatitudes and I made up
another…Blessed are the simple, for they know the joy of the wonderment of
God.

P.S.S. Here are two women who would love to get mail
Eva Brasker #20191076—from Yakima, WA misses her family, the BOP put her far
from home.
Lisa Taylor #08253003 from Mobile, AL—very nice, compassionate woman

May 19, 2007

2007-05-26T19:53:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends,
There are times when the fences of Carswell press on me and I feel as if i can't move or really breathe. I feel hemmed in. It is then when I have to look up at the sky...it's spacious and wide....Right now, the light blue calms me and the orange-tinted clouds of pre-dusk still the restlessness that haunted me today. There was a fight on our unit last night. Now this is not the first fight I've witnessed but it is the first one I've seen in our unit. No one was seriously hurt, thank God. But in the flash of an eye it happened and the jeering and encouragement of some of the other women bothered me a lot. We were all locked down and confined to our beds after that. At first no bathroom breaks were allowed and then bathroom breaks were granted. There are times the cruelsness of this place astounds me. I found it hard to sleep then. When I did, I kept having dreams about having to leave and not be allowed to enter. I'd go, in my dreams, someplace pnly to be told I was not allowed. I'd turn and try another way. I'd take Thunder (my dog) with me and the dog was not allowed. Needless to say, not a very restful sleep.

I keep busy writing, mostly letters to you all, some poems and now trying to write something on healing and stories. I have found toward the latter half of my stay at the Carswell Hilton, a prayer spot under an old cottonwood. It is still too close to the compound but no one walks right by. I have seen this tree every day but only today when I was so in need of a hug and a quiet conversation that I wandered over to this tree. I can feel the rootedness of this ancient tree. It helps root me in the present moment. I also close my eyes and I see myself under a tree of my childhood relishing a late spring day like I've done since I was a young child. I find the outside healing...inside the echo chamber of our unit I sometimes feel stifled. I will so need to canoe down a quiet Missouri stream when I get home.

I want to tell you the story of a 23 yr. old woman who came here about 2 weeks ago. Lisa just found out the cancer they found, at another prison, has spread to her brain. Originally it was in her sinus cavity but delays in treatment have made it such that they will have to perform extensive surgery now. I can not imagine at 23 yrs of age being told I have cancer w/o the support of family or friends...she was alone, save a strange guard, when the doctor gave her the news. Now she will have to have this enormous surgery and when I asked when, she said they won't tell her for security reasons. She will be shackled to the bed, shackled in the van. Shackled after surgery. One woman told me when she went outside Carswell for tests, she had to sign papers that said should the van become disabled or there is an accident en route, she will wait by the roadside for security to pick her up! She is a very trustworthy source.

My heart hurts for Lisa. Please, please hold her in prayer. She is such a sweet woman. Very brave. She is teaching me so much about FAITH--practical faith...faith that is REAL not words but honest to goodness real life.

In three days I will observe my birthday (It was the 22nd). I don't think there will be a fiesta. I told Alec (my son) that I wanted them to go out and celebrate for me. I think I will celebrate in my heart with gratitude for being alive, for all the gifts this past year of life has brought and for the gifts of this present moment of life. I have given up counting years and instead use it as a kind of landmark. A time to say thanks for what has been and a hopeful yes to what is and what will be. At first I thought it will be a bit of a depressing birthday given the place but then I thought of what I am celebrating and that does not preclude any place...besides Carswell has given me gifts and has been and is a teacher. Maybe that day I will look for SPECIAL gifts. Each day brings gifts of its own. Some days I am able to recognize the gifts better than other days. So really I think it will be a fine day-that part is really up to me, isn't it?

I want to share with you all some poetry and writings of Thomas Merton from the Book of Hours, which by some miracle reappeared in the chaplain's office. I want to also apologize to you all b/c it is a bit long. Mostly I apologize to Beth who has to type this up!

"Go tell the Earth to shake
And tell the thunder
To wake the sky
And tear the clouds apart
Tell my people to come out
And wonder

Where the old world is gone
For a new world is born
And all my people
Shall be one.

So tell the Earth to shake
With marching feet

Of messengers of peace
Proclaim my law of love
To every nation
Every race

For the old wrongs are over
The old days are gone
A new world is rising
Where my people shall be one

So tell the Earth to shake
With marching feet
Of messengers of peace
Proclaim my law of love
To every nation
Every race

And say
The old wrongs are over
The old ways are done
There shall be no more hate
And no more war
My people shall be one.

So tell the Earth to shake
With marching feet
Of messengers of peace
Proclaim my law of love
To every nation
Every race.

For the old world is ended
The old sky is torn Apart.
A new day is born
They hate no more.

They do not go to war
My people shall be one.

So tell the Earth to shake
With marching feet
Of messengers of peace
Proclaim my law of love
TO every nation
Every race.

There shall be no more hate
And no more oppression
The old wrongs are done
My people shall be one."

Then I close with the end of Victor Frankl's book "Man's Search for Meaning" (no underline or italics available on here!)

He writes, "So let us be ALERT-- ALERT in a two fold sense:

Since Auschwitz, we know what people are capable of,
And since Hiroshima, we know what is at stake."

Thanks for your love and prayers...I will write again soon...please call your congresspersons and let them know about SOA and issues I have mentioned, please. Read between the lines, you know what I mean--
With love,
Tina

P.S. Another young woman in need of support...SHe has 3 young children and is SO trying to do right by them. Encouragement would be wonderful for her.
Katrina Rodgers #04521-063

Two writings Tina included in the last letter. These are her personal poems typed on a typewriter originally.

"Doing Time" by Tina Busch-Nema
Here in prison we're all doing time
serving an arbitrary punishment
for a crime, real or imagined.

But while doing time, how to measure time?
Crossing days off a borrowed religious
calendar seems as impersonal, dehumanizing as
the prison itself.

Measure, perhaps by the blossoming cottonwood tree
Pregnate with grape-like pods
Sending downy white balls floating gently
down to litter the earth.

Or maybe measure by the gift of ripening
fruit of the mulberry tree.
Where for days, birds, squirrels and humans alike
pluck dark purple berries
And savor an unexpected sweetness from a bitter place.

Perhaps measure by the daily antics of the raven
fledglings who just weeks ago lay as eggs in
messy, toilet paper strewn nests
Now frantically they flap around squacking
Noisely, demanding food from weary mothers

And so it goes, days fade into the dark of night
And nights give way to the light of day
as seasons come and go.

And trees shed their seeds
and bear fruit
and baby birds leave their nests
All while we're doing time.

"Through the Razor Wire" by Tina Busch-Nema
Blurs of yellow and black feathers dip and soar
playfully chasing their mate or their supper
through the razor wire

Some perch gently, as light as air
Watching, waiting, singing without a care, all the while we watch
through the razor wire

From inside the fence I watch in wonder and envy at
how these tiny finches escape the glint of the blades meant
to slice and mame

And as I watch the women corralled by this wall of deadly wire
I notice that inmates, too, fly, in their mind's eye
through the razor wire
HOME

May 17, 2007

2007-05-25T15:34:00.000-07:00

...Maybe it is not a one time shot.

To be honest, I am finding little patches of clarity where I sense God's presence and have the sense that miracles are happening as we speak. The peace crane class continues and I am hoping we can make cranes for everyone here at Carswell--guards, staff, and inmates included. I am astounded that the squares of paper have been folded into a thing of beauty and from that, some hope and goodwill has happened. God's small miracles on a grand scale...Grand b/c you can't imagine what this means at a place like Carswell.

Somehow I have a hunch that it is this concept of accepting our lives, holding the journey of our lives as sacred that we find peace. Maybe peace is achieved not as much by outward revolutions as it is by inward revolutions of the heart. And maybe, I'm not sure but just like a deep, deep wound it heals from the inside, from inside each of us bring healing power to the world outside. Again I am not sure of what I feel but somehow through out history horrible atrocities happen and the healing happens from within and moves on outside. So if I can forgive and heal my own hurts then perhaps this is how I forgive the guards. And I can forgive them than perhaps some of the bitterness and heaviness is relieved not by me but by them.

Oh well, I want to close with a couple of Merton quotes from The Book of Hours...
"Oh, the depths of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!"

A door opens in the center of our being and we seeem to fall through it into immense depths which, although they are infinite, are all accessible to us; all eternity seems to have become ours in this one placid and breathless contact.

THis is the litany for tonight:
"No matter how simple discourse may be,
it is never simple enough.
No matter how simple thought may be,
it is never simple enough.
No matter how simple love may be,
it is never simple enough.
The only thing left is the simplicity of the soul of God,
or better, the simplicity of God."

My prayer to God, who can do all things and for whom nothing is impossible is to own this mystery which is life...to love well, not properly, but well with a fire burning...to simply and generously love. Somehow I think it is in loving, giving love that we receive peace. And the world will know peace-

PLease, please, please hold the so very sick and the young, confused and scared women who are here...please hold them lovingly to the light so they might know love and peace.

With so much respect and love to and for each of you as you live peace in the world,
Tina

Continue to send origami paper!
"While there is a lower class,
I am in it,
while there is a criminal element,
I am of it,
And while there is a soul in prison, I am NOT FREE!

May 17, 2007

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you."~Lewis Smedes

Dear Friends,
As I was wiping tables yesterday I found a question welling up inside me. Many of the women I am with constantly ask me if the protest I did was worth it given the circumstances I find myself in. I consistently say yes and I do not lie. I do mean it. Yes, I do not regret for an instant.
But the question that welled up in my heart is a little different....I thought, what is the most important thing I can do? Is closing the SOA? Is it standing up to the powers that cause such death and destruction? Is it ending torture or war or poverty? And what came from deep inside me was this...I think the greatest most important thing I can do is to simply love! And out of loving comes the rest. The stand I took at Fort Benning was simply an act of love and prison is a consequence of loving people. Here in prison I have come to love some the women here and listening to them and doing what I can are acts of love and consequences of loving. I have come to understand that what is done out of love is what is my heart's desire and that wanting the SOA to close, working for peace and an end to torture and war in and of themselves simply acts of loving people. This is not theory or nice words...it is my heart's desire. It burns in my heart. It makes my love for my husband and my kids burn inside of me in a deeper way.

I am by no means a saint..I am learning. THis prison is one of the more unlikely places to learn about loving kindness. I keep on thinking about the words to one of Carrie Newcomer's songs..."God speaks in rhyme and paradox. THis I know is true." And as I listen to the Mother F---ing this and M.F. that banter that goes on outside my little cell...Ironicly there is God, too. A real God or Grace or Spirit not a theological theory...no there is Maria and Elaine talking, one comforting the other..there is the lone deaf inmate who just found a new arrival who is deaf and their hands FLY in their desparate yearning for conversation. And paradoxically, there is God in that "thank you" from a guard or just the sheer absence of the usual crude, rude, and demeaning behavior we usually experience. There is Grace in those small and large miracles as I witness one wheelchair-bound woman teach another how to make a peace crane...and the light in her eyes when she sees her handiwork!

Last night we had some unusual drama. A poor mother raven got up our 4 flights of stairs and eventually got into our unit. If flew from rail to rail to rail on the second tier. Women were screaming, cursing, laughing, and running around with towels draped over their heads. There were 100's of ideas on how to catch the poor thing. I tried to throw a sheet over it. Others threw food, popcorn, crackers to it. Some tried to throw shoes at it or hit it with their mesh duffle bags. And where was the guard? Locked in his office. I left, went to Mass and came back. Finally we got the bird in the bus-stop which is a little larger room. One woman is swinging her commissary bag, screaming. "I'm gonna kill the f---ing bird." A few times she nearly hit me in the head. I finally grabbed the bag and held on while one of my roommates caught the poor thing. An enormous cheer went up along with some more coloful language...and I thikn an audible sigh from the congregated group of guards. I'm happy to say the bird lived! That was enough excitement for an entire year.

I have also had the experience of having someone "packed out" on a moment's notice. Ms. Mary is perhaps the one and only kindred spirit I have on my unit. She is from AK...we work the dining room together. ONe minute we are running around wiping tables and the next she is gone. No chance for good-byes. I did catch up with her after work to give her a hug. Mary was the only person I felt comfortable asking for a hug when the weight of this place was just too much. There were not strings, no layers of anything, nothing hidden with her. She is simply a good soul. They are not relling her where she is going. She was just told to throw her belongings into a trash bag and take it to Registration and Discharge. She even had to pack her own shoes, underwear, and bras...she had to give back her khaki shirts and pants and socks. She was issued "flight clothes" which are a sportsbra that is so stretched out it gives no support, a flimsy khaki shirt and pants about 5 sizes too big. THey gave her blue slip on deck shoes which flopped off her feet. No socks and the soles of her slip ons were completely through. If it rains, she might as well go barefoot. These are her only clothes till she gets to where ever they are transferring her. She will probably spend days if not weeks in these same clothes while being transported from county jail to county jail. Folks, this is common...she will find out where she is going once she gets there. Meanwhile she can't call her daughter to tell her anything...the reason: securit risk. My heart aches for her.

Then there is a young 23 year old who just found out she has cancer in her sinus cavity and nose. the cancer has also spread to her brain. She was told shackled and alone. Her parents were not there. She will see doctors, go through surgery and recovery on her own. She will be guarded 24/7 even when she uses the bathroom. She will be shackled to the bed or while being transported. Even in the recovery room while she is unconscious she will be shackled to the bed. If she dies on the table her death certificate will say escape by death and she will be "soft-cuffed" in the body bag. Hopefully she will live...hopefully her age is on her side. Those of us who know her pray for her. She made a peace crane yesterday. Think of your 23 yr. old son or daughter or brother or sister...at the time when perhaps they need family around the most...it is denied.

This, my friends, is so inhumane. I know I keep on using that word. I have witnessed inhuman treatment before in my life but the DAILY manifestation, the hourly manifestations, time after time, after time beat down on one's heart...and what keeps people human are those small and large acts of kindness that pop up day after day.

I am continuing to pray for the ability to forgive and not carry the heavy sacks of anger around. I found, in a Woman's Day magazine of all places, a page on for-give-ness...there is a small blurb about the "F" word. Now the other "F" word is used her with the regularity the likes I've never seen but this "F" word is about a website called www.theforgivenessproject.com. I will be looking this up when I get home. If anyone finds out what this is please let me know. I try day after day, incident after incident to forgive the cruelty, the indecent behavior, the contemptous, rude and brutal treatment. It is a very, very conscious effort on my part. It is like literally slowing down my natural reaction of anger and contempt and dropping those stones which come in the form of thoughts and/or words or snide remarks. It is so hard. It goes against the grain so much. SOmetimes quite a few times, actually, I fail. But there are those times when I drop it all and do Tonglen instead. I breathe for myself and for them. I realize we are both victims of an injust system. It seems to help if I can think about how we are alike rather than isolating myself and/or them into us vs. them camps. It is so much easier to forgive someone I identify with than someone I have out in a foreign camp. Perhaps these are the first steps to loving enemies...finding ways in which they are not enemies anymore..finding them human.

Our Peace Crane Project continues on. By now you have gotten the internet message to send origami paper. Please do if you can. The women on the 5th floor chronic care unit have taken up the idea to make a crane for each person in this prison. It's too hard to cut squares from magazines...I am typing up a small message about peace cranes to hand out with the birds. I don't know if I will be here to see each person get their bird but I feel as if a strange seed of peace has been planted here in the most unlikely place. And so it goes on and on.

I willl try to write more frequently in the remaining time I have. I have many stories to tell. Women who have specifically asked for advocacy of media or just word of mouth. Women who just want a voice and of course I will oblige. Please continue to hold us to the light which dispells all darkness. The light which heals and keeps reminding us we are precious human beings.

With love,
Tina

May 14, 2007

2007-05-25T15:07:00.001-07:00

Dear Friends,
Someone passed on this Maya Angelou quote. I love it. She says: "I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refused to be reduced by it." Definitely I say I will not be reduced!

I write at the half point of my stay at the Hotel Carswell! I am sitting in the law library! Six chairs...that's it! If someone else comes and wants to study law or look up their case...well I will have to leave. The typing room has 12 typewriters! There is one copier and this is for ALL inmates, 1700 of us. It is not working well at all so if someone, like Ms B wants to make copies of legal documents on her case and the copier is not working well...(It leaves a black streak down the bottom of the sheet) well then we all, esp. Ms. B and those working on their appeals SOL (shitty out of luck) I kid you not. One lousy printer and she could not file it on time b/c Carswell might not get the one and only copier fixed on time...

These "little" things are so annoying and can turn deadly. FOr example two elderly women each told me how one has an enlarged heart and congestive heart failure and the other has blood clots in her legs. Neither one could get a pass for the elevator b.c the doctor who saw them said that decision had to go before the Medical Reviews board. A friend of mine said the one with heart problems should wear a sign around her neck that says I am a heart patient. If you find me unconscious on the stairs, please call my family. So they walk 4 flights of stairs everyday, many times a day while the Medical Board decides if the can have a pass for the almighty elevator no less...Ridiculous!!!

I continue to read Man's Search for Meaning. It is giving me so many insights into how even the horrors of the concentration camps have very, very similar dynamics to what happens here at Carswell. I know we don't have the gas chamber threat or physical deprivation like the Holocaust but the psychological dynamics between inmates and guards, inmates and inmates, and inmates and the fence...my God! I wonder if people realize we are recreating in a small way, yet a powerful way the same dynamics. Honestly I am sure people don't know. In a way unless yhey lived through being in prison they could never really know. I don;t say this braggingly, not at all. It is just the reality. It is the same with someone who has fought in and/or survived a war. I may imagine the fear, the horror, the adrenaline rush, etc but I really really don't know. Now I am not saying I understand the horrors of living through the Holocaust. But how Frankl talks about the dynamics of suffering, apathy, stealing to survive, picking through another inmate's clothes or bedding when they leave, the dynamic of guards, the picky rules meant to demean and keep someone under their thumb. I can go on and on. I find it fascinating and sad! The wastage of life over and over...young and old, well and sick, guilty and innocent. And the wastage goes on and on in ever widening circles...the children of prisoners, the spouses, the parents, the friends, All of the ripples of destruction continue to move out generation upon generation.

I wish I could discuss this book with each of you point by point b/c it seems so importatn at the moment. Frankl puts into words much of what I have felt and feel. He talks about apathy, blunting of emotions...I see this ALL THE TIME! It is a way to control and keep people under thier thumb. It is also one of those emotions that keeps one self centered, despairing in a quiet sort of way.

Thw way food becomes the center of prison life. Here poeple live by either the menu or the microwave law. The microwaves are controlled by few and fought over frequently. It becomes like the lowest common denominator. Commissary is another issue. It is the small, little seemingly insignificant stuff that become big issues here.

He talked about the spiritual development or lack thereof. My gosh how I see this dynamic. He says that he realized at one point that the salvation of people is through love and in love. How true this is with or without prison. He goes on to say,"Love finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self..." The inner life of a prisoner tends to become more intense that they experience the beauty of art and nature as never before. I have seen this in myslef. I walk outside and notice birds, flowers, trees, even ants. It is as if takig away the big things like freedom and controlling our every movements make a person focus on what they can't take away or control.

Then he talks about suffering. I am still digesting what he talks about on this subject. He talks about how he sensed at one point his spirit piercing through the gloom. He talks aboout how he struggled to keep his mind and inner freedom intact, his yearning for privacy and silence. my God how this fills me...today, this morning was my day off and so I got up and spent the morning outside before it got too hot. THere was silence...only the song of the birds and occasional hello from the women walking the track. Honestly this was the very first time I had silence and uninterrupted time to just meditate, write and drink in the silence and beauty. I came back to the unit and I felt as if I could do it again. I could be here and find peace amid the absolute chaos and noice. Yes! I think there can be stillness in noise...there can be a space un between all the chatter that one can find some stillness. I am amazed at this. I hit points, walls such as when I was so sick and could not get time off the rest or when the noise got so loud and out of control and constant that I was so tired when I had to get up at 4 am...I hit the wall again but the amazing thing is when I hit that wall and I think, "my God this is impossible, please help." Then just as I ask, there is help...it is right there and I just have to smile and then laugh right out loud!!! And i realize that I am walking with God...as Psalm 23 says, I fear no evil for you are there with your rod and staff to give me courage..And yes...if we walk through the valley of death...I fear no evil for you are there with me to give me courage." I can not tell you how very very real these words are. I've said this psalm MANY MANY times over and over...But now, now the words are so very real. Now the words are living words not just nice or kind or thoughtful words...

I am realizing that each person walks in this world, with in their own skin. Yes we are loved, carried at times, and we carry others but that basic living, loving, suffering, joy and sorrow we live through and live with...this is ours and ours alone. Each of us have this sacred journey. We make choices on this journey. I think there are times I want to run away from suffering, hoping someone can take it away. But now I realize that somehow all these things are not to run from but to be embraced, cherished, they are part of our living and by God, I want to live every speck of it. It is not lonely, this aloneness..it is a Holy aloneness that I believe strengthens our commonness...strengthens the human family. It is as if when I take responsibility for myself and my life, then it adds something to the dignity of the world...a small light of a life lived...maybe, and to be honest, gratefully, not lived perfectly..I don't want to be perfect b/c it would not be any fun really...and I would have nothing to learn from and grow deeper from...But accepting what life gives rather than wanting something different from life. THis is a glorious gift tihs living...even in a place like Carswell where Hell seems to be made real on earth. No somehow in embracing where I am, I am finding small bits of freedom...I don't know if I am more loving or compassionate. I still get so angry sometimes at the just plain old meanness. But I am praying for them (the officers) I pray esp. for the nasty and seemingly hateful ones. Honestly I want to forgive them. There is one level that says I want to forgive them then there is another level of actually forgiving. That next step is a bit of a mystery to me honestly...I want to but when they act like jerks and idiots then I feel the disgust rise up in my soul. then i find actually forgiving seems impossible...so I pray about it. I actually do LOTS of times. And maybe it is something I have to do agian and again and again. Maybe it is not a one time shot.

(I will finish the end of this letter at the beginning of the next, tomorrow) Sorry!

May 9, 2007

2007-05-22T23:23:00.000-07:00

Ok, I am almost caught up! One more after this one and everyone will be up to date as far as I have received letters. Thanks so much for your patience.

Dear Friends,
I sit here looking out the window which is about as long as my arm high and wide with these square gray bars that run vertical from top to bottom. My window looks on to the base. I see the fence that keeps us in,a few sheds and lots of trees. There are water towers in the distance, one is painted red and white check. In the very distance I see cars. But they look very small from my vantage point...not real!

I try to imagine myself on the other side of that fence. WHen I see the cars, it reminds me of going someplace. I sometimes forget what the "outside" us like. I remembered the first time I realized this, it scared the hell out of me. Now I honestly don't panic. Somehow even with the avalanche of mail I get, I find it hard to remember any other life but this one. Psychologically speaking I thikn one's world while in prison gets whittled down to work, inmate concerns, court cases, and appeals and mean guard complaints. Inmates can become very isolated and self-centered. There are exceptions...Like the women on the fifth floor chronic care unit. I have taught them for the past two afternoons how to make peace cranes. Now they are getting the hang of it and teaching others. I've told them the story of Sadako and the Ten Thousand Cranes. They are making cranes for the very ill on the 4th floor. (These are women who are sicker than they are.) When I got to class today there was an envelope with folded cranes to add to the shoebox collection and paper they had painstakingly cut from old magazines. (Lots of things get reused in prison). One woman with tears in her eyes told me how two years ago she saw this address to send cranes to...A children's peace project in Japan. She was going to make the 100 cranes and in return they would put a plaque with her father's name who fought in WWII. She told me her father was dead but she wanted to remember him. Then she had a couple of strokes and a heart attack and could not remember or figure out how to do this. She said she has been praying for someone to teach her this for two years. She told me all of this with tears in her eyes. She is confined to a wheelchair and will "escape by Death" when her time comes. It's the only way she will leave prison, when she dies. But you know she is now teaching others on her floor and is the biggest contributor to the Carswell Peace Crane Project. She does not yet keep them for herself. I feel so humbled as I work and hang out with these ladies. Despite strokes and severe handicaps they try and are determined to learn. Their futures are not rosy and bright but their spirits are so strong and alive and vibrant. I learn so VERY much fom them. My crane class is just my excuse to hang out with and learn from them!! And so the peace crane revolution goes on! I'll update later.

I have discovered the joys of ear plugs. Now the noise is muffled. it is stil there, just not as loud and distracting. I am learning as I go..."seat of your pants" school here at Carswell. Let me say my pants are wearing thin by so much "scraping by." But I have clear conduct and I hope I can keep it that way. I'm sure my brother Bob will be happy to read this.

ANd I hear more stories...Now people introduce me to people who tell me their stories...Today one woman told me of her friend who had to leave the prison grounds for chemo. The guard from here would bring her to the hospital. It was an all day wait. The woman would have no sack lunch so while it was bad enough she was having to get chemo, she would sit all day hungry! Remember prisoners are NOT allowed to handle any money. The officer from Carswell would send out for her lunch, eat it in FRONT of the woman waiting hungry and then give her the empty container her lunch was in and tell her to throw it away~

Two women told me of medical issues...One has an enlarged heart and is put in a second floor unit where she MUST climb 4 flights of stairs b/c the Medical Board must REVIEW her request for an elevator pass. Another elderly woman who has a blood clot in her leg also must climb 4 flights of stairs to a second floor unit b/c her case, too, must go before this board before she can use the elevator. I just find this mean spirited and bears no purpose.

I am reading Man's Search for Meaning by Victor Frankl (thanks Reggie). (Beth's added explanation: This is written by a man who survived the Nazi camps in Germany--how his search for meaning in that horrible place actually kept him alive. Some of it is difficult to read but it is definitely an important account) I just had happened to shove it in my pocket before I went to my "job" this morning. It is NOT allowed to bring 'personal items' into the dining room but I had a call out to the eye doctor which would mean a long (in this case 2 hr) wait and the book is small so I could get it in my pocket. I am only about 50 p. into it b/c people wanted to talk but I was so struck how his insights into the psychology of the camp is so similar in some ways to the psychology that happens here, especially among long term folks. He talks about self-defense, how prisoners get down to primitive levels of self-preservation. He talked about how apathy blunts emotions...how people become desensitized to the brutality and about the mental anguish injustice causes. How anxiety over one's own future takes center stage. I have seen these things he describes on a small scale here. While it is not that people are getting physically beaten, they are beaten down psychologically. I have seen people get dressed down and am grateful it is not me...instead of standing up to the guard. I am looking forward to reading more of this book. I think he speaks to universal human emotion and behavior in crisis...I find it interesting that the concept of imprisonment regarldless if it was the horrific scenes of Auschwitz or behind the razor wire at Carswell.

I wanted to apologize for my preaching in the last letter. I realized more and more as I read another chapter in Pema Chodron's book When Things Fall Apart that somehow it is a blend of internal changes that lead to external change. I am only reading this book a chapter at a time so I can digest things. Sometimes I have to read a chapter twice. THe last chapter I read was "Servants of Peace." One thing that stuck out was the challenge to not become moralistic..she encourages the 'flexible mind.' She uses the phrase "a kind of bull shit detector that protects us from becoming righteous."

She writes, "When we are training in the art of peace, we are not given any promises that b/c of our noble intentions, everything will be okay. In fact, there are no promises of fruition at all. Instead, we are encouraged to simply look deeply at joy and sorrow, laughing and crying, hoping and fearing, at all that lives and dies. We learn that what truly heals is gratitude and tenderness."

When I thought about this I looked at the women around me, those who are sooo tender. Those who are so grateful (some who have gotten letters or I've shared books are sooo grateful to be thought of and/or remembered). The statement of Pema's seems to hit the nail on the head...all we have is the pressent moment, the simple joys of talking with someone, or walking on the track or watching the yellos birds zip in and out of the razorwire fence. The sorrows if the women's stories and the pain in their eyes when they share. THe laughing at Ms. J or Ms. B's statement--they have this dry, state-the obvious-sense of humor that has me rolling...So I guess it is not the big things that lead to change but the small things that bit by bit, step by step, sharing of one story and then another that we learn how connected we are, how much love and loving there is..How precious human beings are...not b/c of any great or small thing they do but b/c of the pain and laughter, the tears and smiles, te loving kindnesses and not so loving deeds...It is not about trying to be good but perhaps just about BEING...The goodness or badness...those things are byproducts of being and I am finding the being part, if I am faithful to not running away ffrom just being in the moment. From that change happens in me...it is as if it really doesn't matter if I am "good" or not. I is not a matter of trying to be anything but present...the rest just happens out of that honesty.

The 250+ women in my unit know that all the mail I get contains prayers from you all to them. THey express such child-like, simple yet powerful gratitude..you can't imagine. And while I count the days till I get home with my family and friends, my heart will break to leave my sisters. THe strong ones and the sick ones, the young and the not so young, the guilty and the innoecent, the ones who know God is with them and those who are still discovering that reality....I will be BROKEN inside to leave them behind the Fence. I wish I could "set the captives free." Oh! I cannot tell you how I long for that day. Please Dear God, tenderly yet with the strength of Hercules, hold these dear women...Blessed are the poor in spirit...yes these are blessed women. Like Mary b/c all they have honestly their poverty is so extreme. Their spirits are so in tune with God's love b/c the have NOTHING else. I know I have repeated this insight over and overbut just like when you see a newborn and you KNOW that within you how horribly much you love this fragile being that is how REAL the reality of God's spirit moves in Carswell.

Well again, I write by the book light I bought and it is very late, 4 am will come far too soon. I've made it a habit of sleeping in my clothes for the next day so I don't have to do as much to get ready in the AM. 10 minutes extra sleep is like a 2 carat diamond.

Good Night, Dear Friends--May the Lord Bless you and keep you close. May God shine her face upon you with a loving and gracious glance and br gracious to you. May God look upon each of you kindly and give your heart intimate knowledge of Her Love. Amen

With Love,
Tina

P.S. Could anyone give me the name and address of Jackie Tobin's prison ministry. A womean here will come back to StL in Oct.
Thanks,
Tina

May 6, 2007

2007-05-21T22:25:00.000-07:00

Hello from the Great State of Texas and tornado alley.
We have had two tornadoes spotted in our area. The last one was a "headed this way" one. Guess what our precaution was...get in the rooms and we are on the second floor. The first tornado warning was the same. I didn't ask the second time if it would be a better plan to go to the first floor b/c I knew the answer from the first time..."shut up." So we remained LOCKED in the second story of the High Rise which is a large two story building. Sitting duck, I think you'd call it.

Each morning we are greeted with a loud speaker rendition of the Star Spangled Banner played base-wide. I find this a bit ironic b/c many of the women here are extremely angry w/ the gov't and America in general, as it was Them vs. The United States of America that got them here in the first place. People would think that of course every inmate feels they are innocent and of course, we all know they are ALL guilty. I have found out that just the opposite is true. Many who are here on fraud, drug, even murder charges will readily admit they did something. The ones here on CONSPIRACY, they feel railroaded. Most of the elderly and many women, in general I think, get this charge b/c they just happened to own the car their child or grandchild was using when they got busted or someone said they were involved. Heresay gets many people 10-12 years. I do not lie!

If you are poor or stubborn and will not plead guilty, you will do time. If you can't afford a lawyer you will do more time. I promise you I am NOT exagerrating. Prison reform is a real flesh and blood issue to me now.

I am sitting outside this morning. It is windy and warm. There is some sort of tree near the center of the compound where the ravens love to nest. It is a thick, compact tree with a tight tangle of branches which must give their nests and young ones the protection they need fro the almost constant wind which blows through here. It is hard to count how many nests are built in there b/c of the gnarly branches and the oval waxy green leaves that are so tightly woven and give lots of privacy. I have tried but I can't get a good count b/c I can't stand on the grass (another one of the myriad of Carswell's silly rules). Plus i really don't want to get pooped on. These raves are very messy birds! But I think this must be their community tree. They call and chatter with each other from dusk to dawn, fighting, flying, chattering with each other like old washer women gossiping over their clothes line on wash day, except for them everyday is wash day. I am grateful for their playful entertainment but their noisy shrieks and stacatto chatter only adds to the constant din of noise. Even though it is Sunday morning and it is a restful day, the human bantering and arguing that goes on wears on one's ears. Just now one woman yells across the compound, "You come up to my floor and mess with my people again I am going to knowck those gray hairs out of your fucking head." I am biting my lip to keep from laughing out loud. It truly can be comedy central bere sometimes. I know it's really not funny b/c many mentally ill people suffer deeply from the torments of depression, personality disorders, and other severe psychiatric problems. It seems to me that they only receive drugs to try to keep them sedated and manageable. There seems to be no meaningful therapy to go with the extensive drug regiment. Probably the talking they do with other inmates is the closest thing to therapy they will ever receive while here at Carswell. It is a sad warehousing of human beings, many of whom only decompensate further falling into the depths of despair from which they may never recover.

I sometimes wish fro a quiet room away from teh angry exchanges and just the normal chatter of 1600 women plus the shrieking, shrill callings of the ravens...But at least outside on the coupound the endless space of sky and air lets the noise disapate and be blown away. Up on our unit it just echoes around and around till you honestly believe there is no more airspace for sound waves. It is a contant noise chamber. I thought being a mom and used to the fighting, singing and yelling of three active kids, I would be immune to the noise factor of prison. I was wrong. Having lived now for almost 3 weeks w/in the cinderblock walls of the High Rise, I know the chatter of my children will sound like a beautiful opera. I never in my life thought I would say that.

From my vantage point i can see the first wave of visitors filing in . I was shocked last week when I saw children. It was then I realized how much my body ached to hug an innocent little soul, to hold their small, vulnerable being close. I want to breathe in their joy and freshness. It is so unnatural not to have kids around. THey are such a contrast here where constant anger, bitterness, and despair seems to saturate the air we breathe. Just seeing children from a distance seems to bring a ray of light and hope to me. What a paradox someone so small and vulnerable has the power to cleanse and heal even the deep, deep pain incarceration brings.

It is particularly windy today. I watched the branches of the trees sway with each gust. This seems obvious but I realized that the trunk of the tree does not bend with the wind, only the branches are disturbed by the blowing. I thought of how God or a HIgher Power is like that trunk of the tree and how we are the branches. The closer the branches are to the trunk, the less disturbed and shaken they are by the stong gusts. Only the outer branches are whipped about. I thought to myself, I am really one of those outer branches as I still get whipped about by the emotional and spiritual gusts that seem to come my way. Hopefully the closer I get to the trunk, the less disturbed I will become. Perhaps one of the many lessons I am learning from prison is that all we really have here is the promise of God's loving faithfulness. All the rest is smoke and mirrors. I think it is only this absolute that moves people here emotionally and spiritually closer to that trunk, to some SOLID center point which provides the stability to allow people to remain sane and weather the tornadic-like conditions of prison. I am reminded of Pema Chodron's book "When Things Fall Apart." Her words of wisdom "to lean into the pain," I believe are the only way to this solid spiritual center. There is not way around, only through. Maybe it is the "going through" that makes me feel so tossed and battered...but then there are days of peace and I think, perhaps I can do this, I hang on to those days of strength and peace, remembering them b/c I know the days of pain turmoil will come again.

I have about 40 days to go. It seems like a long time. Heck, it seems like I have been here a long time already. But in reality I know once I hit that half-way mark time will fly. I so want to document my experience here. I t is not only an interesting story, it is a slice of life folks on the outside would not even believe.

Just now amid the clammer of the noisy Inmate Raves and the chatter of Spanish and English conversations, I hear the lovely deep voice of a black woman singing, like a prayer, a plaintive, soulful spiritual. It is as if she is pleading with and praising God at the same time. It is simply lovely. What a wonderful Sunday gift. I guess if I sat here long enough, I could record many, many of these small gifts most of which I miss b/c I am occupied with some sort of distraction.

It is such a blessing, an inspiration church service all it's own just to sit here in silence and solitude and write. Maybe finally, I am learning to find the contemplative spirit I so hunger for amid the constant conversations, noise, and activyt of a severly overcrowded prison. Somehow, I am astounded that I don;t mind the noise and chatter as much as I did just an hour ago. Another small miracle.

A mourning dove just cooed her mournful gentle call. It stands out b/c it is such a contrast to the shreeking ravens. It sounded as if it was right next to me and when Ilooked under the blue open waffle bench I am sitting on, there was the beautiful soft brown mottled feathers and these gentle eyes right underneath me. Her soothing call makes me forget for a second that I am behind these prison fences...see another Sunday miracle...they are all around.

I had to move from the solitude of my bench to the echo chamber of the high rise b/c the compound closed for 10:00 count. My unit is called the "Dirty South" and the slum of the high rise b/c of our dirty bathrooms and constant noise. Count is an interesting process. On the weekends we have two Standing counts with means in total silence we stand by our bed to be counted. I think 4:00 pm will be forever seared into my mind of the indignity that happens in Federal Prisons all across America. I will, when I can, stand in solidarity with my sisters and brothers in prison at 4:00 pm.

Soon it will be time for Mass. I have been volunteered by S. Ille for the choir. I really don't mind, but the hour-long homily is tough to sit through. Last Sunday I swear he ran right through at least 20 stop signs. it is an out right slaughter of words. He should geta two month sentence I swear (remember swearing and prison go hand in hand!). The blessed silence of a Quaker Friends meeting would be absolute HEAVEN to me right now. People look at me a bit oddly b/c when asked what religion I am I say Quaker Catholic. But it is true. Catholicism is in the marrow of my bones from little on and saturates the pores of my soul. It only seems natural to me. One woman asked if I would get a Quaker meeting together here at Carswell. I told her we just needed a room and we could just sit in communal silence and speak as the Spirit prompted. But I can bet you it will not happen given the MASSIVE amounts of red tape in the BOP bureacracy.

WEll, I will sign off for now. As always I am so enormously grateful to Beth who transcribes these mini-novels. Please join me in thanking here. SHe is a very busy student. I am sure she did not know what in the hell she was getting into when she offered her services. (Funny to type what someone else has written about you!!!)

I am grateful, more than you could ever know for all the prayers, cards, letters, books and love you all send. it is MORE important to me than food. It keeps my SOUL together.

Finally pleace take every thing, every reflection I write with a grain of salt. It could be a flash of brilliance but more than likely it is the result of being cooped up too long with monotony pounding down on my mind like a jackhammer on concrete. Weird things can seem completely normal under these circumstances!

I wanted to mention one more woman who would like some mail. Bernadette Appa #31800051.

With a gentle embrace and a whole shit load of gratitude for the powerful presence of your love and prayers,
Tina

a reflection

2007-05-21T22:11:00.000-07:00

From A Book of Hours by Thomas Merton

"The forms and individual characters of living and growing things,
of inanimate beings, of animals and flowers and all nature,
constitute thie holiness in the sight of God.

Their inscape is their sanctity.
It is the imprint of His wisdom and His reality in them. The special clumsy beauty of the particular colt on this day in the field, under these clouds in a holiness consecrated to God by His own creative wisdom
and it declares the glory of God.

The pale flowers of the dogwood outside this window are saints.
The little yellow flowers that nobody notices on the edge of that road are saints
looking up into the face of God.

This leaf has its own texture and its own pattern of veins and its own holy shape, and the bass and trout hiding in the deep pools of the river are canonized by their beauty and their strength.

The lakes hidden among the hills are saints,
and the sea too is a saint who praises God
without interruptions
in her majestic dance.

The great, gashed, half-naked mountain is another of God's saints.
There is no ther like him/(her).

He/She is alone his/her own character;
nothing else in the world ever did or ever will imitate God in quite the same way.
That is his/her sanctity.

But what about you? What about me?"

This is from a book Joe Z, from Loose Leaf Hollow...It is called the Book of Hours featuring the writings of Thomas Merton.

When I was a novice and on retreat I found this book called The Seeds of Contemplation. It became like my bible. One of my favorite elderly nuns, S. Noreen Slattery, found me a copy of my own. The part I just copied for you all is from that book. I remember it shook the depths of my soul and nurtured my contemplative spirit. As I rediscovered it in prison, it seems to have aged inside me like a fine wine. Ans the question what about me? pierces my heart. And so I ask the question of God. What about me?

May 5, 2007

2007-05-15T23:24:00.001-07:00

First, Tina is asking for everyone to send her origami paper. They are going to have a "peace day" at Carswell!

Dear Friends,
I apologize for writing so much. I do so for several reasons. First and foremost it keeps me SANE. It is the only way I process "stuff" and there is so much "stuff" here. Second, I feel the need to share what happens. Somehow I think ignorance of situations, while it is blissful to 'not know,' it is by knowing that change can happen and third, it is an opportunity to share ideas. Should you have ideas you want to share please use the blog or my email address cbuschnema@yahoo.com. (You know I almost forgot my own email address that I use probably more than my home address and phone number combined!) I find it astounding that I DO NOT miss the computer nor TV. I have yet to sit down and watch anything! Needless to say the downside is I really don't know ANY news at all from the outside world.

I wanted to put minds at ease. I am on the mend from my bout of food poisoning. I finally got an "idle" from work today. I will get 2 days off followed by my two "regular" days off. I will not bore you with the saga of poor/nonexistent medical care...I could write pages. Needless to say, I had to get, what for me, is NASTY. It is the only language the staff undstands if you want to get anywhere. I wish it was different.

I slept most of the day despite the constant noise of an overcrowded unit made of cinderblock and concrete.

My sisters here are so special. Many have asked me how I am and have offered to cook soups for me, seared up tattered green tea bags and offered the home remedies from their countries. I can now keep plain rice and bread down. Tomorrow, oatmeal and maybe cereal...I want to go slow to make sure it stays where it belongs and doesn't run right through, if you know what i mean.

It was perhaps a blessing in disguise that I got sick b/c now i know first hand what happens to women everyday...and this is a medical facility! In fact, when my boss asked me why I didn't go to sick call yesterday and I told him they ran out of time and did not see me, he said, "And this is supposed to be a hospital?" I about fell over.

I want to share a humorous story just so you know we do laugh sometimes. There is a treat here made by inmates called Jailhouse Suckers. They are made by taking "Now and Later" candy and melting them around a tootsie pop. Well, a bunch of us were sitting outside talking and taking turns holding the umbrella to shade Ms J who is in a wheelchair having had two strokes. Ms Gail went to scare up some suckers for us and gave on tto me and Ms J. Folks were talking and just jawing when Ms J who had been sucking on her jailhouse sucker with all her might pulls the sucker out with her teeth, announcing her teeth were STUCK to the sucker. I thought we would all pee our pants laughing! She would stick her teeth which were wrapped around the sucker back in her mouth and suck some more and some more all the while she is trying to pry her teeth off. Finally she says through the sucker..."Darling wheel me in. I got to get this off here." Honestly I thought I would not be able to move I was laughing so hard. We went inside looking for a bathroom her wheelchair would fit into. The only one we found had NO water...none at all. So I found one (she could not get her chair in) with water and she handed me her teeth and after lots of HOT water, her teeth finally were free. She told me, "Throw that damn thing away!" (Meaning the sucker, not her teeth!) SHe laughed at herself, saying "And I thought I was doing such a good job of sucking on it. I NEVER want another one of those things." So much for jailhouse suckers and Ms J!!

One thing I am struggling with is how do I forgive the torturers, the guards and officials who constantly treat us like garbage? The question came up in prayer and I struggle so much with knowing how to do this. It seems as if I just keep running into this subject over and over in my reading and in letters and books that are being sent. I will share two of these. One came from a nun I really don't know personally, it was a copy of something she sent along with a picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus knocking on the door.

The reading is called Sand and Stone
Two friends were walking through the desert. During some point of the journey they had an argument and one friend slapped the other one in the face. The one who got slapped was hurt but w/o saying anything wrote in the sand. "Today my best fried slapped me in the face."

They kept on walking until they found an oasis. There they decided to take a bath. The one who had been slapped got stuck in the mire and started drowning but the friend saved her.

After she recovered from the near drowing, she wrote on a stone: "Today my best friend saved my life."

The friend who had slapped and saved her best friend asked her, "After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now you write on a stone, why?"

The friend replied, "When someone hurts us, we should write it down in sand, where winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it."

I think I have been doing the opposite, writing in the stone of condemnation, the litany of hurts I see and experience. I guess I am afraid that if I forgive I will condone. I still struggle mightily with this! What Jesus said about loving enemies is so damn hard. To forgive, really forgive!! SOmetimes I just pray that I want to forgive but I don't know how. I am reminded of the AA philosophy of praying for what I want for myself for my enemy, even if I don't mean it and have to fake the prayer. The second thing is from a book I just received called "YOu Will be My Witness" by John Dear, SJ.

I am reading a saint a day as the book is about saints, prophets, and martyrs. Today I read about Josephine Bakhita who was born in Darfur in 1869. She was sold into slavery at the age of six. During her youth, she was tattooed over her entire body except her face with a razor blade, having salt poured into her open wounds. Josephine chose to forgive her torturers during the course of her life. John Dear writes..."Josephine finds true healing only when she decides to forgive her kidnappers and torturers. Many might dismiss this act as simplistic or pious by it is neither. It is brave, daring, and bold--the key to healing, inner peace, and personal transformation. Indeed her act of forgiveness opens n ew doors in her life by freeing her to reach out in loving service to others, as a follower of Jesus who forgave. Most of the world's problems, including most of the Church's (catholic and all other religions, I think he means) problems, stem from our refusal to forgive. If we dare let go of our hurts, anger, bitterness, and resentment, if we forgive everyone who ever hurt us, we, too, will discover the contemplative depth of healing and radiate a peace not of this world."

I don;t have much more to say. Somehow I thikn this time and the harsh psychological cruelty I witness calls me to this, though I would by lying if I said I was there. I struggle. The most I can say is...I WANT TO. Maybe this is a first step. I'm not sure.

I am also reading Thoreau's essay on Civil Disobedience. I just started it. I have read it long ago. I am grateful to Tom who sent it.

Most of all I am so VERY grateful for all the cards, letters, and books..I can not tell you how much they mean to me, to us! One of the women on the unit said jokingly during mail call, "Busch should get her own mail bin." ANd everyone laughed. I share the books and pass around some of the cards. So many women HUNGER for news from the outside.

You know scraps of tape, empty jars, bits and pieces of things are used and reused here. Some of the beautiful cards I give the front to some women. Holy cards and other pictures, like the one of Jesus knocking on the door, go up in people's lockers...so even though I get the mail, they love what write and the beautiful cards and spiritual material you send. Prison is perhaps the MOST spiritual place I have ever been. Honest, faithful, trusting, soul-searching and heartfelt...a cathedral of testimony to God's loving faithfulness. I am, with so much love and gratitude, your sister,
Tina
P.S. If someone could send the Big Book of AA it would be gratefully appreciated...thanks.

May 1 & 3, 2007

2007-05-14T21:55:00.001-07:00

Dear Friends,
I am enclosing parts of a reflection I wrote this morning. I went to the library (I had to get a pass. You need a pass for EVERYthing. I even had to just now ask the guard if I could use the restroom. Yes, I feel like I am in gradeschool). I went there hoping for some peace. I usually go outside but it was threatening rain and I did not want to get stuck locked up in the unit which is simply an echo chamber.

I want to ask you to pray for people here PLEASE!!! I mean I have never in my life witnessed the constant degrading, dehumanization of people. It is daily...like drop by drop trying to wear away at a person's soul. It is one of America's dirty secrets. This "industry" makes money on the backs of poor people who get caught in "conspiracy" laws. I am not sure if that term conspiracy law makes sense. I don't want to insult anyone but I will try to explain. Here is an example. Mrs. B was vacationing with her family. Her son in law was arrested at the same hotel room with drugs. She was indicted b/c SHE WAS IN THE SAME HOTEL ROOM!! Ms. G is here having had 2 strokes b/c her son is accused of selling drugs out of her home. She has 12 years. And the list goes on...guilty by association whether you knew of the activity or not. And then there are mandatory minimums. First offenders get very lengthy 12, 19, 20 year sentences. Now why would we want to lock up elderly or wives or first time offenders for such long stints? Well, we have privatized the prison "industry," we need to keep them full. Prisoners bring profits. They are a commodity. Just like legalized slavery in a sense...If the services are contracted for 95 to 100% full then the Gov't loses money if the prison is not full. Also we have started having private companies building and staffing prisons. Profits can be made, HUGE profits. This encourages the building of MORE profitable prisons. And so it goes....on and on.

It is up and down here. The women I have come to know help buoy my spirit. Some of the women are not so helpful. But I NEVER feel in any danger. Rapes and assaults happen but b/c of the volume of mail and how gossip flies through a prison faster than a California wildfire, most folks either leave me alone or talk with me.

There is a Toastmasters Club here. One of the inmates has asked me to give a speech. I am also invited to sing iin the Catholic choir.

I sing regularly. I sing while I wipe tables. I sing while I do the laundry. I sing while I walk the "Hamster Run." No one has asked me to shut up yet so I just keep on singing. It soothes my soul and connects me when I feel sad or alone or when I miss you all. They say music soothes the savage beast. maybe this is my way to try to soothe the savage beast here at Carswell.

We are having an "inspection" tomorrow. They have been "forcing" volunteers to clean for days now. Rat feces in the kitchen, roaches--they have painted and waxed and scrubbed. I refused to volunteer or be volunteered. I will work for my sisters here but to spruce things up for a lie, no way.

I kind of "hit a wall" this weekend. I ended up crying a good portion on Saturday (I think I typed this before...). The pain of the place, the stories I hear, the cruelty and disrespect I see just collapsed on my heart. But then Sunday evening as I was pushing Ms. G to the Law Library to meet Ms. S. who is dubbed the DA of Carswell, I ran into Lana who stopped me really said that she sensed a spirit of gentleness and kindness when she passed me. She asked to talk. We did and I stood there slacked jaw and again in tears b/c this woman, facing basically 2 life sentences is at peace. She is thriving at Carswell.

She told me stories that would make your hair curl. But she is at peace with spending the next 50 to 60 years in these 4 walls and razor wire. She will die here. I told her she was a saint. She said no. I told her what I thought a saint was...not a perfect person b/c there are no perfect people but a person who puts there life into God's hands and their heart wants to do what God is calling them to do no matter how difficult. With tears in her eyes she asked me if I would tell this to her 5 and 7 year old daughters. I hugged her and said, "Of course."

My heart breaks for her. THe greed of the prison industry is, as I am sure I have said before, really as horrific as the institution of slavery. Families are torn apart for years and years. Children grow up w/o parents, setting them up to perpetuate the "system." All for profit, all for greed. Just as slaves were part and parcel of the economy of the south in the 1700 and 1800s, so too are prisoners of the economy of the prison industry. A 78 yr old woman told me how she got 10 yrs sentence b/c she had been asked to deliver a "birthday" present. as it ended up, the 'present' had drugs in it. She got 10 yrs. conspiracy sentence thgouh she had no knowledge of the contents of the present. She is a very educated woman, retired school teacher. She has done her research. She told me the gov't "wins" 98% of all its cases. Not since Hitler's Germany has a gov't "won" 98% of the cases they try. She said by 2050 if the rate of incarceration stays the same, over half of the US pop. will either have beenin prison, on parole or probation. HALF of the population! and you acan be sure the majority of those people are the poor who cannot afford private lawyers at $1000/hr.

My family asked me not to get involved in any "trouble" while I am here. But how can I not tell what I see? How can I say, " I'm out in two months so I am not concerned?" I can no more do that than I could not help a friend or family member in need. These are human beings!!! I am not actively seeking issues. I am just keeping my eyes alert and my heart soft. It is not easy to do sometimes and other times it is the easiest thing in the world, such as when I talk with Ms BB or Ms G...when I listen to their stories and they tell me about their grandchildren with this fierce pride in their halting voice, I can't help but be moved. I cannot forget. It is nothing noble or special, listening to their stories. It is just what human beings do for each other. Please do not forget them, please, please speak out about conspiracy and mandatory minimums! Wasn't it Margaret Mead who said something about how always it has taken just a few concerned citizens to change the world? it is true. Think about civil rights, abolitionists, about equal rights...think about how the SOA/WHINSEC might close and about the exposure of Watergate...always a few concerned individuals moved mountains. My friends, we are the modern day leaders...

Someone sent me a card that quoted a poem from Maya Angelou. it said, "I think a hero is ANY person really intent on making this a better place for ALL people." You, my friends, are heroes. Your desire, your actions leading all of us to beter places are heroic acts. We all do them each and every day. And sometimes we are called to actions above and beyond our normal routine. Keep listening to your heart. It is there where the love and courage resides. It is the well spring of hope and from whreer the yearnings for peace are born. May peace be born in our hearts. It is my constant hope. I wanted to tell you so perhaps this gets to some senator or representative. They have been preparing since I came here for an inspection, I believe to try to get their accreditation as a hospital back. They are working inmates like dogs. The kitchen was FULL of rats and roaches. It still is roach infested --when I take down chairs in the morning there are roaches on the table. One women who was volunteered for detail cleaning found mouse and rat poop where the baking pans are.

My roommate went to sick call. She was asked by the doctor, in front of a waiting room full of people, what she was coming to sick call for. She politely said that she would rather tell him in private. He told her gruffly to leave before he had her escorted out. Ms BB has a colostomy and a feeding pouch. Her colostomy is infected and has bursted on her when she was sitting outside. She said she was totally embarrassed and that no one is concerned or will see her. She got here the same day I did. And the list goes on. I am disturbed at the hypocrisy of this place. It is phony and fake.

Thesre are now snacks in machines that are always empty, soap in dispensers that are always empty, toilet paper ON holders when there are usually none. Two people dispensing pills and a staff person supervising when there is usually only one person dsispensing and the pill line is usually to the basement. Elderly and sick waiting a long time....but for inspection they have more staff for the day. I wish the inspectors would see a normal day at Carswell!!!

Reflection: Living on Many Plains

One plain is solid...the world of tables and chairs, of doors and of buildings...but it is just a world of things that break down and rot....like our own bodies, I think...

Then there is an emotional level...this level is like a mist moving here and there. It's not solid, not even close. Happy turns to sad in an instant (esp. here) then back to happy again. This part is like the weather, always changing, always moving.

As I walked around the prison, at first the walls and fences were very real...all too real...hemming me in, pushing down on my spirit. There were fences I wanted to climb both inside of me and out. Buildings, walls I wanted to tear down and pull apart. But what I found is that the the internal fences and buildings came down NOT by the abuse of the guards but by the kindness of strangers here, women, inmates care for inmates and it is the only way we survive.

Then there are the stories, everyone has one whether in prison or not. It just seems prison stories are sad. I see constant pain, suffering, lonliness, the longings and the ANGER--the enormous anger--at injustice, at the inhumane treatment. I listen to story after story and breathe in the sorrow. I feel the heat, red hot heat of the anger. It rises up within me like an active volcano and I am surprised at how active it is. Then there are the tears which drown out and temper the white hot anger.

Oh Lord,I pray, please set us free. A stupid prayer, I know. But it comes from someplace deeo within the recesses of my heart. It is said to end the pain-mine, theirs, and ours. Maybe, I think, it is only a FAKE prayer, one meant to just run from the pain and not said as a way to "lean into the pain."

But what is real prayer? Perhaps it is simply a sentence...Lord, that I may see. Really see...I want to see. and then one of the small miracles happens. A woman passes by then stops and turns around and says to me,"Hi, I wanted to talk with you. There is a spiritual energy I catch when I pass by you...Can we talk?" You see she is here for LIFe! One life term and then 70 years more for added measure. (Isn't this always how the gov't does destructive things...like enough nuclear weapons to destroy the Earth 100 times over. As if destroying it once is not enough!) So we talked. I babble about how unfair this place is...how unjust...about the pain of women's stories...about the cruelty of some of the guards (actually most) abot the wasting of lives...about the filthiness of the Feds...and she listens and then speaks her truth...how she finds God here. How she is not angry anymore about spending her life here. How she had asked God to send her to help people and then she finds herself here with so much need, perhaps the neediest place she could be. ANd I realize that while she walks with her feet on the ground like you and I, she lives a few feet above. It's as if she has resurrected from this temporal place to some other level of Existence.

Suddenly I understand I have a choice, to allow this injustice to pin me down or to acknowledge the injustice, loathe it even and then allow myself to rise, to resurrect. But you don't just resurrect, you can't maybe. Maybe there is a dying, a letting go of the elusive, ever changing emotional level that leads to this type of resurrection to this spiritual level. And like Jesus after Easter, He rose and walked on the ground again, he felt and was aware of the disciples pain and sorrow, he was tender and compassionate with them but he was ablso not held down by the emotional part anymore. He had resurrected. He understood the pain in a whole new way. He was part of it yet no held down by it.

Like Lana..she is here. she has a number which is probably used more than her name. But it doesn't really matter does it? Because inside her there are not 12 foot double razorwire topped fences anymore, no punitive rules. She has more freedom than she might have had outside. Maybe it is only b/c she was sentenced here, b/c she became one of the condemned that she could have the opportunity to find this kind of freedom. She had to be as each inmate here, stripped of ALL the trappings. Stripped naked and then clothed in borrowed clothing, sleeping in a borrowed bed with borrowed sheets..putting her feet in borrowed boots. She became one of THOSE, a beggar really...condemned by society for whatever she did, but like Jesus' forgiveness in the Gospel when he looks up and says, "Woman has no one condemned you?" "No one, Sir." "Then neither do I condemn you." Like that woman in the Gospels, Lana has found forgiveness and peace. This peace has let her come here and she has become a SAINT who ministers to fellow condemned sisters, to the throw aways. Prison is one great big trash can where people who society (or the gov't) feels have committed some grave (or not so grave) or even nothing indiscretion are disposed of. And then, as a society, we promptly forget them. No wait! actually we remember them long enough to figure out how to make some profit on them and THEN we forget them.

Somehow now when I hear "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us" it means more to me. it is more REAL as if it is solid, not on a physical level but on a spiritual one. Like what used to be pious words or noble thoughts have solidified and somehow become spiritually solid. A Carrie Newcomer song says "God speaks in rhyme and paradox, This I know is true." Paradox...coming to prison and finding amid the cruelty and the harshness and pain and vulgarity that faith, spirit, THE WORD is here. Dwelling with all the crap. Dwelling among the condemned. Not b/c the condemned are any better or worse. there is nothing glorious about beign condemned. But it is quite simply that they don't have all the trappings, the stuff, the power, the pleasures, the control and FAKE freedoms of the outside. Oh God, it feels so good to drive your own car or take the bus to wherever you want to go...to meet whomever you want to meet when ever you want. To go get a good cup of coffee and cook your own food. Heck the joy of going to even a grocery store and buying your own food. ANd oh yes, to get up when you want and walk where you want...to have money to buy the things I want to buy. But somehow this freedom becomes routine and we think WE are in total control. And we forget that most of our "stuff" will rot away or fade. It seems that perhaps for some living on the outside is harder b/c of all the trappings that give us the illusion of control.

Here precious little is in our control, at least the physical things. But the emotional trappings, those are perhaps the sticking point, the pitfalls for the inmate, the condemned. The angers that injustice breeds, the despair and sorrow that forced separation builds. The despondancy that monotony brings. The constant distractions of how to get out of this hell. But in the end we are all asked on whatever level we are able to hear...as Jesus asks us, "What do you want me to do for you?" ANd it seems we are only able to respond when we realize our need...when we lose or give up or are forceably stripped of the pitfalls.

Sometimes when we are caught up in the drama of our lives, the day to day stuff that seems to consume us and we can't even hear that tender ? "What do want me to do for you?" Then sometimes it is only when we step back and put that physical/emotional levels into perspective that we are ablt to rise to the spiritual level which we each possess. But even when we can't hear the ?, for whatever reason, the tender question is always there. "What do you want me to do for you? How can I show you my love for you?"

May 3, 2007
Folks,
The contrast of this place is astounding. From walking saints, to scared "kids" acting tough, to bully guards and incompetent officials. (Incompetent is generous). It is mor elike corrupt and vicious but maybe that is not mine to judge.

I think one reason the contrasts are so evident is b/c of the harsh living conditions. On the outside, the lines are blurred somehow. This is in many respects, a third world country w/in a first world country.

I want you to know other than being pushed from Peter to Paul ( and a few other names I'd rather not use) I am OK. I continue to have diarrhea and a sour stomach. (A small fever 99 down from 101). But what will get me through are the wonderful advocates I have in my fellow sisters who have been here for years and know the system. The staff just make it hard b/c most of the time they could make it easier for us but don't either out of spite or think inmates don't deserve a break.

So I continue to rise at 4 AM, try to go to sick call (which gives you an appt time then sends you back to work) only to be told that sick call is running behind (after waiting 2 hours) and come back tomorrow. I still Must get up by 4 AM...report for count and work and take the abuse when you say you need to go to sick call. It is a totally idiotic system. I only pray the recent inspectors see the facade. this place does not deserve accreditation as a medical facility.

Well, peace to each of you. Please pray for us is my constant plead. Thanks so much to the folks who wrote my friends. They all thanked me with such humble and profuse thanks, it made me cry. Two people told me they read your letters with tears in their eyes. Thing is there are at least a thousand folks here who have th same need.

I love you all and hope you are fine...I'll be home in 40 some days
-Tina
(remember that this is old and she is not sick any longer!!)

some brief thoughts

2007-05-14T19:58:00.000-07:00

These are some excerpts from a letter Tina wrote to a friend..she wants everyone to know as much as possible about the conditions of a prison, so I will copy some of it here.

"I want to tell you all that has happened in this long (it feels as if I have been here months already) and yet short (I have met so many marvelous, wonderful women) week.

On Sunday night, I went to the Protestant service at the invitation of my unit friends. These people came with the minister from the outside. As they came around greeting us inmates, I thought to myself, "I wonder if they know that the y are shaking the hands of saints." You see I realized "saints" are not perfect people, just people whose faith in God is really all they have and that faith "moves mountains." Mountains of despair, mountains of pain and sorrow.

When I see some sisters I share this compound with who are looking at 3, 5, 10 years, life sentences, my heart breaks...How can they do it? It is so unjust. Mandatory minimums, conspiracy laws, lack of federal probation...I could not understand the MAGNITUDE of suffering until I see it, live it with my own eyes and life. The US prison system is the dirty little secret of the United States.

There is no messing around here. I am officially working in the dining room. I wipe tables from 4:40 to 12:30 for 12 cents an hour. I told the officer I did not care about the money, I was working for my sisters here. And you know what, God is leading here. I sang to myself a little song of peace...smiled and greeted people as I wiped up after them, took the trays of the elderly and got food for them. In a word, I wanted to just spread Love!! I told people to take their time when they ate and tried to just make their meal pleasant. Usually officers walk around bellowing "Hurry up" "eat, don't talk" and you RACE through a meal like there is no tomorrow because you don't want to get locked in.

I cut up the sandwiches of two elderly women in wheelchairs. One just got here yesterday. She told me, "I have to get used to this place. I'll be here 12 years." She will die here in 12 years. I cried but hid my tears because I don't want to be put on psych.

I noticed something else while I worked. At the noon meal they have Mon-Fri what is called Main Line. Key captains, Lieutenants, Officers, Doctors, etc. line up and if tyou have a complaint, you can bring it up to them as you get your food. i noticed that they RARELY smile. In face, the staff in general doesn't smile often. Now this is not everyone. Some are decent and seem to care or have some respect. But I would say the majority have a look of contempt as if you are trying to get someting over on them. So overall there is an atmosphere of DEEP mistrust and lack of respect. DEEP, very deep.

And I continue to listen to stories of women...I listened as a woman told me how she had a tubal pregnancy and they would not believe she was pregnant. She sat doubled over in pain at 2 am. Finally they took her to the hospital and she sat there until 9 am, not believing she was pregnant until her doctor here got in at 9 am. Then they did tests and found her fallopean tube had ruptured. They removed one tube and an hour AFTER surgery, they dressed her and sent her back here. 1 HOUR!! They did not want her to stay in the hospital outside b/c they would have to pay."

next letter...

2007-05-04T22:55:00.001-07:00

Postmarked April 30, 2007

Dear Family and Friends,
I hope I am not too boring or writing too much. I just feel compelled to write as much and as often as I can b/c in part it keeps me sane and also b/c I want people to know about the ways of prison.

I spent Saturday mostly in tears. Sometimes the sadness of this place just seems to build up to a tipping point. I work in the kitchen now wiping tables. It is very easy work and I get to talk, briefly, with women here. This is a blessing b/c I meet so many people, wonderful women and I learn from them...a curse b/c I hear their stories and feel their despair and profound sorrow. Folks if you can please write to the "powers that be" and ask them to repeal mandatory minimums and conspiracy laws. But if that did, the prison industry would lose money because I bet half or more of the population would be free. I do n ot exaggerate when I say this. Most of the elderly are here b/c their son or daughter had drugs in the house belonging to the mother. So when one goes down, the all do. Honestly I'm surprised they don't start sending minor children who happen to live in the house to juvenile prison!! THis is the case of Ms. G, an elderly black woman in a wheelchair. She is looking at a lengthy sentence...most probably life b/c of her extensive medical problems of stroke, etc...common sense tells you she is NOT running drugs. My only consolation is tht Ms. S, we all affectionately call her the D.A. of Carswell, can build her case and write her an appeal.

Ms. S is also an older black woman, retired teacher. She has her "spot" in the Law Library. I can't tell you how many people she has helped. She is a beacon of Hope b/c she KNOWS the law and how to use it. Many people come to her to learn about appeal or how to file a 2255. Don't ask me what a 2255 is, I just hear it is a way to get either a reduction in sentence or Freedom!

I think the despair I feel is I look at those with long term sentences and I think "My God, how can they do this?!? Carrie Newcomer has a song called "This Too Will Pass." It is a beautiful song that I sing often to myself especially when I am at the end of my rope and have not had the foresight to put a knot at the end! But I realized that for many, many women here, this nightmare will NOT pass. Oh my how my heart aches as I write this. No really my heart BREAKS! YOu have no idea, I didn't believe till I have seen it with my own eyes. The number of sick and dying...in prison. And MANY of them will be sick and die here, in prison, in a hell hole called Carswell. Why does someone have to live their final days w/o compassion? Why do they have to die w/o their family and friends? I don't want to sound overly simplistic but I think that short answer is GREED. I'll write more on this later.

Someone wrote me a prayer and one of the lines was..."May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be." Folks, I openly question why God would mean for some of these people to be here. How could God want elderly, sick, dying...mothers of small children, the innocent caught in conspiracy traps? How??? Ihave a million questions of God and they are not gentle, loving ones. I know God is loving. I see God here wearing khaki all the time, but I see so much cruelty and I wonder how anyone could be MEANT to be sentenced to Hell for all of their life? WHat could they possibly have done to deserve this and my answer, the only answer that makes any sense to me at atll is NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

I wrote this observation to a friend...Even the guards who have the POWER, who hold the keys and set the tone of how things go...EVEN they stand, often times, slump shoulder as if the culture of cruelty, that pervades this place, is weighing them down as well.

You know, I have seen starving children and abject poverty. I have witnessed children dying of diarehha and yes, it always broke my heart. But somehow all of this seems to be CRUSHING my heart. I wondered why and I think it is b/c I am ONE of the oppressed here in a very intimate way. By this I mean, when I see the horrible poverty of India, while it does hurt to see it, I am not the beggar.. As much as it hurts, it is NOT ME. WHen I worked in the refugee camp, I could leave. I was not the refugee. But here I am #92944-020. I KNOW in a very intimate way the humiliation of wearing borrowed clothes, wearing borrowed boots, sleeping in a borrowed bed. I am an inmate who doesn't deserve some soap and TP in the bathroom or to be believed or to have timely or competent medical care. Here an inmate is trash, pure and simple...In this culture of dehumanization an inmate is NOTHING but trouble, more work for the guard who doesn't want to be there. Inmates on paper have rights but in reality have none and what they want is for us to believe this. TO BEAT us down. But you know where the MOST used place is here besides the diningroom? The Law Library! It is always full! Why? B/c people find a loophole, the appeal that might set them free or reduce their time. These are the folks who always have hope and never give up. They should name that place Hope Chapel.

Pema Chodron says in a book I have here that we should lean into the pain. I think I wrote about this before. THese past two days I have questioned her wisdom. How does on LEAN into the pain w/o feeling despair here? Perhaps I am suppsed to learn more loving kindness as I lean into the sorrow, I am not sure. I am finding it is a choice. I can be more loving ,more compassionate or I can become angry and bitter. I do not judge anyone b/c the latter, the anger and bitterness is so easy to come by. It is an Honest choice, believe me. I think the turn toward compassion at least here is pure grace. I pray for this always. I wonder to myself how do I forgive these officials and this system? A system that holds human beings in such inhuman, slave-like conditions, in some cases, for the Rest of their lives? When we say stop the torture, we need to include this system as well. For this is torture plain and simple. How does one forgive their torturer? Is this possible? To lveo the person by not love their actions? But when the actions are meant to beat someone or someones down so badly, how do I forgive that? At the moment, i don't think my heart is big enough and I am not sure it will ever be. THere is part of me that knows the path to peace leads me to forgive them but i think to myself, if I forgive them am I condoning the torture?

I think back to the book the Hiding Place, how Connie's sister found it in herself to forgive even those who were torturing and demeaning her. She actually loved them. I wonder how one's heart gets that big. In theory, it is easy to say,"Sure, that is the RIGHT way." That is the way of Jesus, but now when I am faced with the Reality, now I know how impossible this seems. But what was Dorothy Day's favorite Scripture quote "With God all things are possible." Now I know she knew the despair and sorrow of prison. She is a creditable person in my book. So I know it is possible to forgive those who oppress. I just hope I can find that grace. I wonder if it is something that comes out of the blue, like a bolt of lightning or if it is a Daily Stuggle, a bit by bit thing...i am not sure. I bet it is the latter rather than the former. I pray for this grace b/c all I feel right now is contempt for these folks. I am sorry I have to say that but it is how I honestly feel.

I am sure this issue of loving our enemies is not just my struggle. It is probably something we all face from time to time or at some point in our lives. Perhaps the grace is just to ask the question and from that grace of asking comes the answer. I am honestly not sure. But it makes me so VERY aware that I am not God. I am just Tina and I am struggling at the moment. Please pray for me, for all of us. I am not even sure what good prayer does, honestly, I question it. But it is all I can hang onto now. ALL the hope I have is in prayer. I remember how God got me here and so I know that part was real, is real.

Well, I bet Beth who types this all up and you all who are reading this are tired of my ranting.

One beautiful thing I saw today...the sunrise. ANd you know, the sunrise glints off the razor wire making something that is meant to maime and kill beautiful. And then there are the women I talk with as I wipe the tables. I get so much, so many little hopes as I wipe their table and get a smile, a hello from them. Someone today asked me to sing "This Too Will Pass" to them. I did right there in the dining room. They asked me if it was a prison song. I said, yes...

With much love,
Tina

update and a letter

2007-05-04T22:50:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone.
I created this listserv yesterday b/c when I tried to send this brief sequence of events, half of them came back and my email account was disabled per a breach of contract on bulk mail. Oops! So I am sorry to those of you who have been waiting for news. Below is that message from Cynthia who talked to Tina yesterday morning. I have not received any updates since. Following is one of Tina's letters that I received this week.

This is the most current info on Tina that I have. She got sick from food poisoning on Tuesday night.

This might be rather scattered and disjointed because Tina
talked fast and time was running out on the phone to say all or wait till
I wrote everything she said. At any rate, Tina wanted you to put this
out on the blog, or whatever you do, so people know what goes on inside a
prison ... (in our country this is). The following is what I quickly
wrote but had no time to clarify with her. My impression is that most of this has already been said in some
way...but it's difficult not to do what she feels is important.

9-12midnight Tuesday --- she vomited and subsequently was very weak.
1am ---went to Medical Surge...was handed a bowl to throw up in
Waited 30 minutes
had fever---nurse said no she didn't have a fever---then "yes, a little
fever"
She got two regular Tylenol
Went to bed---had to report at work at 4:30am
Medical did not give her any paper regarding her condition so the
supervisor said "If I don't have word from Medical, you are not sick."
At 6:30 am she was sent to Med Surge again climbing 4 flights of stairs,
stopping often---no one was on duty.
Returned by elevator to work; was told to leave by supervisor; returned
to her compound (where she sleeps) still with no papers. {papers are
essential otherwise guards on duty do not believe the person's word or
condition}
Went by wheelchair to Med Surge--- to PA on second floor, to Unit
officer far away---her blood pressure was low
Got a day off---went to bed
Next day---up at 4am---begged to go to sick call again, etc., etc.

"There is cruelty and bullying in here."

April 26, 2007
Dear Friends,
At mail call I get so much mail people think I am some celebrity. I tell them I am just lucky and that so many people who are praying for me, are also praying for all of them too.

Some folks wanted to know what this place is like...here are little details...The locks on every door but none on the inmate bathrooms are Monster locks which are opened with ENORMOUS keys. Each "officer" has a set of huge keys on a chain which is attached to a chain that goes around their waist. You can hear a guard coming for miles. It is the way you know to scatter if you are someplace you are not supposed to be. Of course I am NEVER where I'm not supposta be, right!?!

Small things here like there is NEVER soap in bathrooms. When I complained about how unsanitary this is, I got a smartalec remark from the staff. And I have learned in the first week if you find a bathroom with toilet paper, (these too are rare) you'd better take some extra b/c there is usually never TP when you really need it. I am now used to using TP only when I need it! Sorry if I grossed you out.

Then there are the lines...OMG the lines...they are long and often schedules conflict so if you are supposed to get soap and you are waiting by the laundry well, they may or may n ot open and if they do, it will be late. TYhis will cause you to weigh if it is better to WAIT or miss soap to go to a call-out (prison talk for an appt.).

There are three washers and dryers on our unit for over (we just got new people) 250 women. My wash time is 12:00 midnight on Monday. I have 45 min. to get it finished. I have only 3 bras and 6 underwear, 3 pants and 4 shirts...so somethings HAVE to be worn and worn. I do stink! I try to air things out. I only have time for ONE load of wash so when I HAVE to do sheets and blanket (I think I will wait till they stand up on their own) I will not be able to do clothes that week unless I can get some friends to put some of my clothes with theirs...

The thing that ABSOLUTELY breaks my heart...the elderly here and the sick. Very old women behind the fence! I think to myself, there is NOTHING they could have done to warrant this treatment! I think the "prison industry" is greedy! I know this is a medical facility but it is sooo very much a prison where comfort, compassion, care is so short.

In this department, too, I find the small things are all I can do and so vital. For example, if I hold the door, or say hello or ask someone how they are, these seem like HUGE miracles..It is the little acts of kindness that seem to catch people by surprise and I can only hope and pray it lifts someone's spirit and in turn they spread some kindness which ripples out all over this hellish place. Honestly, here kindness, love and faith live side by side with despair, pain, loneliness and suffering. I see it everyday. Faith in God is all most of these women have. When I say that, here is what I mean...Imagine you are poor or lower middle class...you can't afford a lawyer so you have to settle for a public defender who, in many cases, does the bare minimum to fulfill his/her obligations. They don't tell you options or appeals and heck, most of us, no matter what our socioeconomic class, don't know the law. So you get sentenced to 10 years or 5 years or 20 years or more. YOu come to Carswell, where strip searches are common, degrading attitude of the staff is the norm. You are "trouble," a "bother." You are told as I was told..."All questions are DUMB so don't ask any." (I am not lying). YOu are always "guilty," "faking," "a pain," you always wear khaki brown or at night sweats. YOu follow a myriad of picky rules and if you violate ONE, just one, you can go to the SHU (security housing unit--like solitary confinement, punishment). You live behind two fences topped with razor wire and rolls of razor wire in between. YOu work hard each day for 12 cents an hour while the "supervisor" stands over you to make sure you "Do your job." And you do this over and over and over again for 10, 20, 30 years of your life. Meanwhile. your children grow and do all those "first" things you dream about seeing...the baseball games, prom, driver's license, graduation, first boy or girlfriend...and the list goes on. In essence, life goes on without you while you sit in a place where the red tape bars you from the smallest of pleasures, where you wear "borrowed" clothes...where you are told what you can buy, where your mail, both in coming and out going along with your phone calls are listened to, read, and censored.. For 10 or 20 or 30 years or LIFE!!! Do you get the picture? YOur life is in a 10 ft. by 10 ft. room you share with 3 other women, your clothes, and all items are in a tiny locker or a grey box under your bed. Honestly we take turns getting dressed unless I get dressed in my top bunk. For 2 months, three months, six months, you might be able to do this with hope...but for 10 or 20 or 30 years!?!? My heart aches here! It aches so much. One woman said, "Don't ever forget those you leave behind." OMG, how could I? I am #92944-020 an I live with #05467-140 and #48621-046...One week seemed like months, 10 days and I feel as if I am forgetting what the "outside," the "free world" as it is called, looks like. Do people really get to drive wherever they want? Oh yes, that did happen once.

Even scraps of tape used to reseal envelopes get reused. It is reused to tape pictures in the lockers, but God help you if you tape them on the outside of the locker door, they are gone and NOT returned. So for some, like the man born blind in the Gospels, Jesus is all the women at Carswell have. They are the condemned of our society...They have the extraordinary faith b/c it is all they have to give hope in the midst of despair. Jesus asks them, in the monotony of the day by day, month by month, year by year sameness, "What is it I can do for you?" And so many with ALL OUT humility say, "God, give me hope, keep me from despair." I tell you I am HUMBLED. I shake the hand, stand in lines, walk the "track" with SAINTS everyday. I am so blessed to be with them. Yes there are angry women here, fakes, liers, frauds, and cheats...But I have found if I show any kindness, the smallest kindness, like holding the door, it is returned to me a hundred fold. Honestly, I do not fear any woman here...and this is a total mix..violent and nonviolent, innocent and guilty.

I so want to put up on my wall by my bunk Gustavo Guttierez's words "The least human being has ABSOLUTE value and hence an ABSOLUTE right to be loved, whatever the price may be." I know I would be yelled at to take it down.

Many of you have asked what I need?? Well, I go through stamps and phone money like water, but I have money or can get it sent...what I need most is you all to hold us up to the light. TO hold to the light those who are suffering here. For the elderly in wheelchairs. But most of all, please pray the "Free Public" Americans who are not behind the fence, that they come to understand and care. THat we understand how human beings are being used to make profits for the "prison industry." Yes, prisons are big business. Conspiracy laws and mandatory minimum equal profits fo this "industry."

I am think about Negro spirituals. During slavery times, they gave hope to people, many just like prisoners herer...in my head one runs just now...
"My life goes on in endless song, above earth's lamentations. i hear the real though far off hymn, that hails a new creation. No storm can shake my inmost calm, while to that ROCK I'm clinging. Since love is Lord of Heaven and earth, how can I keep from singing?

With much love, Tina

tina's current situation

2007-05-03T18:50:00.000-07:00

Hi all,
This is the most current info on Tina that I have. She got sick from food poisoning on Tuesday night.

This might be rather scattered and disjointed because Tina
talked fast and time was running out on the phone to say all or wait till
I wrote everything she said. At any rate, Tina wanted you to put this
out on the blog, or whatever you do, so people know what goes on inside a
prison ... (in our country this is). The following is what I quickly
wrote but had no time to clarify with her. My impression is that most of this has already been said in some
way...but it's difficult not to do what she feels is important.

9-12midnight Tuesday --- she vomited and subsequently was very weak.
1am ---went to Medical Surge...was handed a bowl to throw up in
Waited 30 minutes
had fever---nurse said no she didn't have a fever---then "yes, a little
fever"
She got two regular Tylenol
Went to bed---had to report at work at 4:30am
Medical did not give her any paper regarding her condition so the
supervisor said "If I don't have word from Medical, you are not sick."
At 6:30 am she was sent to Med Surge again climbing 4 flights of stairs,
stopping often---no one was on duty.
Returned by elevator to work; was told to leave by supervisor; returned
to her compound (where she sleeps) still with no papers. {papers are
essential otherwise guards on duty do not believe the person's word or
condition}
Went by wheelchair to Med Surge--- to PA on second floor, to Unit
officer far away---her blood pressure was low
Got a day off---went to bed
Next day---up at 4am---begged to go to sick call again, etc., etc.

"There is cruelty and bullying in here."

listening...

2007-04-30T17:17:00.000-07:00

April 25, 2007

Dear Family and Friends,

Right now we are ono Lockdown. I was getting a dental intake and so I sit here in the dental chair for what is going on an hour and 15 minutes. Thank God I have a book and paper and pen!

The dentist was very professional. He did a good job.

Later in the day:
I walked and walked and walked today. It was a beautiful day. A cloudless deep blue sky...a full wind. Last night I went to bed under a tornado watch. We are the highest floor of what we call "the projects." I asked the officer on duty, "Should we go to a lower floor?" I was told to SHUT UP. He then came back, after locking us in and said, "Listen ladies, you think you are all something...let me tell you while you're here you are NOTHING!" He then proceeded to take away our microwave and the TV times. I don't microwave much, just water for (gulp) instant coffee. (Guess what! I am extremely grateful for instant coffee) and I don't watch any TV so it was not a big deal for me but what got me was someone calling all these women NOTHING! I also have a tough time with having someone tell me when I have to go to bed. Basically, when we have to "go to your house," you can only really go to your bunk. In a 10 ft. by 10 ft. cinder block room with 2 sets of bunks, a small built in table and 4 short lockers stacked 2 by 2...there is little room for 4 women to move around.

I bought myself a light to read by because at 10:30 we MUST turn out all lights. Sometimes I am not ready to sleep so I turn on my little book light and read. I must say I am entirely grateful for the books. They keep my sanity. Prison life is all about waiting.....Lines are long and sometimes even after you've waited for an hour or more, you will be told the person or service you've been waiting for is not available. So I am learning patience. It is one of those graces I am short on so I guess I am learning. But I always keep a book with me or a pad of paper and a pen or pencil. ALWAYS!! I can't bring these things into the dining room so the big baggy brown pants and shirts are good for something.

I saw my shadow this morning and I thought "Wow! I don't even look like myself." The short, short hair and baggy clothes...I just thought for a second, "Who is that?" It is so important in prison to remember who I am. It is far too easy to forget, to be hammered down. But keep on praying, walking and listening to people's stories. Somehow listening to their stories, really listening, I see their pain and feel it but in feeling the pain, so too do I remember both the pain and joy.

Please continue to hold to the light and in prayer the women here. I will tell you the story of Ms. B. She is Native American. She is 51 but looks like she could be 65 or more. She has a colostamy and a second "exterior" bag for a stomach. She was, she says, in the wrong place at the wrong time. She was in a hotel room with her son when a drug deal went down and it was a sting. She fought the charges b/c she said she didn't do anything wrong. The judge, she said, denied the polygraph test twice. In the end she got 34 years which is basically a life sentence. I saw her today. She told me she is afraid she has an infection at the site of the colostamy. She asked me for some paper and a pen (this should be, according to Carswell rules, made available to her). She cried as she said she wants to chronical what is happening to her in case she dies. She wants to get her version of what happened to her out to her family. She is so scared of dying here. All I could do was listen and pat her on the back. Little comfort but it was something. She told me she has to take her pills in the "outside bag" stomach and flush it with water. When she came back she said the physician's assistant told her she was "too much trouble" and that she'd wish she would hurry up as the PA wanted to beat the storm that was brewing. Ms. B. said, "Ms, I have 28 pills to crush and flush. I'm sorry I'm so much trouble." I feel like crying as I write this. Please pray for her that she has peace. She is so scared.

And the stories go on and on. Maybe each time i write I could include a story. I will not violate any confidentiality but I want to share the stories. Somehow each of us can resonate with something, some part of a story. We feel some of the same emotion and we understand.

I am fasting today until the 27th for the SOAW legislation. So many people here listen to the story of what SOA/WHINSEC is about. Not one of the women who listen turn away. Most shake their heads in disgust. I have given lots of information and while most folks are not surprised, they are disgusted. Lots of them have been messed around by the Federal Gov't so they understand. One 78 year old grandmother told me that the Feds win 98% of all cases. She said, "Not since Hitler's Germany has a gov't won such a large percentage of the cases." She went on, "AND they are proud of it." THese two women believed b/c they did not do what they were accused of, if they took it to trial, they would be found innocent. Instead, they were given more time and lost their cases.

AND SO IT GOES!!! On and on and on. I do not despair but I am so sad for them and for us all...More later and with grateful love and prayers-
Tina

P.S. I am starting a new book called, "Kitchen Table Wisdom: Stories that Heal" by Rachel Naomi Remen, MD. I want to quote something that seemed to stick out at me..."Suffering-whether physical, emotional, spiritual, or often the case, all three--can be a doorway to transformation...our personal suffering is sometimes worsened by the lack of communication and community. Illness (and I add imprisonment) often intensifies these feelings of isolation. Telling stories can be healing. We all have within us access to a greater wisdom, and we may not even know that until we speak out loud. Listening to stories can also be healing. A deep trust of life often emerges when you listen to other people's stories. Ordinary people living ordinary lives often are heroes."

I find this to be so very, very true. I find hope in stories. I find courage and truth and pain and despair all in one, rolled together and shaken down.

In solidarity and prayer I remain-
Tina

Tina's FIRST LETTER FROM CARSWELL

2007-04-27T10:45:00.000-07:00

Here is the first letter I have received from Tina. The envelope is postmarked April 25 and it is the 27th, so the time between her writing this and my receiving it is about a week. I am not sure, though, that she wrote this all in one day due to her mention of 5 days at one point. Anyway enjoy! I got the feeling that she is doing quite well.

April 20, 2007

Dear Friends,
It is Friday of the first week but one week is not yet complete. It feels as if I have been here for months, MONTHS. Prison is not a NICE place. The system is hard. Women suffer so much despair being separated from their children, their family, spouses, friends. And then there is the "system." I now understand more about Civil Rights and the unfreedom of slavery than I ever could have known. The treatment of second-class citizens, the separate facilities (inmate bathroom dirty, no soap, no lock...) vs. staff bathrooms--many places are Out of Bounds. Lots of tiny, silly, insignificant rules meant to keep people off balance. And the list goes on. Our unit consists of a two-tiered concrete block unit which holds 250 people. You cannot imagine how the noise bounces off the walls. THe "system" is meant to punish. Inmates are looked upon as a step lower than people who deserve respect and dignity. And so people tend to act as they are treated.

But I have found that there are so many, many good and decent folks who are forced to reside here. Ms. Gail, Irish, Griffent, and Saundra have taken me under their wings. As I wait for my money to clear (Day 5 and no money yet) they have lent me tennis shoes as the RHINO black steel toe boots have left blisters on my feet, coffee to relieve the caffeine withdrawal headaches, shower shoes so I don't get staph infections from the shower and thermal tops so I don't freeze to death in the ice box called our unit. They are angels sent by God. Carrie Newcomer has a song called Geodes. Some of the lyrics are "God walks round in muddy boots, sometimes rags and that's the truth, you can't always tell but sometimes you just know." Well let me tell you...God walks around here in khaki brown pants and khaki tshirts. And while this place is filled with despair and sorrow, it is also filled with compassion, care, and love. Peace is one thing notably missing though. I am making peace cranes and some of the women love them. You see, anything you give someone in prison, from a piece of folded paper, to a book, to a kind word, all these things are like gold...there is that much physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual depravation. Honestly, even the refugees in a sense have more Freedom...

There are two rows of fences to keep us in, complete with razor wire and electric but the compound where I walk morning, noon, and night is wonderful. I must have put in 10 to 15 miles already. Perhaps I am like a hamster in a cage and I'm running on that wheel that goes no where but my mind dreams as I walk and I am outside in the fresh air and away from the noise. It is where I find peace...A commodity in short supply at Carswell.

There are many people, elderly women, severly ill women who live here. My heart goes out to them so. I ask myself "why ask an elderly person to spend their last years in a place like Carswell?" There isn't anything they could of done to deserve this treatment. But I find touching that there are younger women who push them in their wheelchairs, who massage their neck and arms. See what I mean about God walking around in khaki brown?!?

I am trying to practice Tonglen, a Buddhist breathing practice/meditation here. I received a book called "When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times" by Pema Chodron. She has a chapter or two on Tonglen. She writes, "People often say that this practice goes against the grain of how we usually hold ourselves together. Truthfully, this practice (of Tonglen) does go against the grain of wanting things on our own terms, wanting everything to work out for ourselves no matter what happens to the others. This practice dissolves the walls we've built around our hearts. It dissolves the layers of self-protection we've tried so hard to create. Tonglen reverses the usual logic of avoiding suffering and seeking pleasure. In the process, we become liberated from very ancient patterns of selfishness. We begin to feel love for both ourselves and others; we begin to take care of ourselves and others. Tonglen awakens our compassion and introduces us to a far bigger view of reality."

I find when I do Tonglen as I pray, my heart which is always on guard here, again softens and this allows me to experience God's very real presence in the women I am with. This is not a mental game or a spiritual gimmick. My Friends, this is as real as your hand in front of your face. As real as your need to breathe. It is SO SO SO very easy to shut down here. I mean you see so much pain you just want to protect your heart at all costs but in protecting you lose your own peace. I f my heart hardens I become despairing, depressed and in much more pain. But if I breathe in the pain, the suffering, the despair I see and let the breathing out be peace and kindness and compassion, then my heart remains soft and I am at peace. Yes, it opens one up to more pain, because you can't help but feel the pain here, the very walls cry out but somehow this taking in the pain in my breath and releasing peace and compassion in the exhilation...strangely enough, this is healing.

Please write when you can. I can't tell you how much I look forward to mail call. Just a line or a postcard is so, so, so very encouraging.

I am writing everyday, letters, journal entries, prayers. Writing is keeping me on an equal balance. The deprivation is really no big deal. I am, day by day, not missing more and more things. Each day I meet a new person and i try to smile and give a kind word, especially to the elderly or sick or to some who seem desparate. And people, I find do the same for me. I feel the humanness that the system seems to try to suck out of us when I meet someone's eyes.

I will write more later.
~Tina

Peace,
Beth

Quick correction

2007-04-26T16:50:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone.
I just wanted to let you know that I have not yet talked to Tina or received any letters. (There actually might be a problem with my mail delivery at the moment). I would think that we should here from her in the next couple of days, as that window of about one week of processing is closed. Until then, the solidarity in mind and heart will keep us going!

One correction to the last message: For those of you in St. Louis looking to attend the potluck to break the fast tomorrow, the directions were slightly wrong. Just a note: turn left onto Newstead, at the light, when going east on Manchester, after crossing Kingshighway.

Reminder about the Close the SOA Fast: Hungry for Justice!

2007-04-23T10:12:00.000-07:00

This message comes from a friend of Tina's. She wanted to remind everyone of the fast to close the SOA and to invite those in the St. Louis area to a potluck to break the fast. For more info on the fast, go to www.soaw.org.

Blessings to Tina! We are all thinking of her.

I just wanted to remind everyone on the list that we are planning on fasting in solidarity with Tina as part of Hungry for Justice, the national fast to close the SOA. The fast is this Wednesday-Friday. We are also planning on breaking the fast together on Friday evening, starting at 5p.m. until 7 p.m. at CTSA. It's a potluck and we would love and welcome anyone who would join us!

CTSA: Center for Theology and Social Analysis

1107 S. Newstead (turn left onto Newstead, at the light, when going east on
>Manchester, after crossing Kingshighway.)

Together in spirit

2007-04-17T13:40:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,
This morning, I talked to Tina as she was on her way to have breakfast with supporters in Texas. There are many peacemakers there who will try to visit her during the next two months and they were gathering this morning before she reported at noon. She wanted me to let everyone know that she made it down to Fort Worth yesterday and is doing okay today. There will be some time now when we will not hear from her in writing or on the phone and I know that this is difficult. I want to remind you that if you simply quiet yourself and listen deeply and with love, your spirit will be right there with Tina as she adjusts to a new reality. As soon as I hear from her, I will post news here. Know that we are together in the love of God on this journey.

Here is Tina's address again:
Christine M. Busch-Nema #92944-020
FMC Carswell
Federal Medical Center
P.O. Box 27137
Fort Worth, TX 76127

Also, do not use a return address label--write it on the envelope itself! Do not try to send money or stamps.

Peace,
Beth

Bound together we leave for Carswell...all of us together.

2007-04-15T22:58:00.000-07:00

God’s life and our lives are bound together, as a vine with
branches
> >as a body with members. So corporate are we that no one can give a
cup of
> >cold water to the least person in the world without giving it to
[God]!
> >
> > - Rufus M. Jones
> > from “The Double Search
> > This thought strikes me. strongly.....Every good work, kind deed,
> >encouraging word...all is given to God as well. Kind of blows my
mind...I
> >am sure I will be the one receiving the cup of water from my sisters
in
> >prison...and God will too. We are all so interconnected with Grace
and
with each other. In fact, I think I take each of you with me to Carswell.

The fear we are spoon fed tries to keep us isolated
and
seperate but it is all an illision! It gives me such comfort to know
we
are all, each of us connected with each other and ultimately and
intimately
connected with God. I don't feel so alone.

My wish is that this connection is strong within our hearts and
minds.

Folks, it is very late and I am leaving very early this morning for Fort Worth.

Today I prayed with the Scripture passage about consider the lilies of the field...and how much more God cares for us and loves us...so we don't have to worry. this gives me such peace. I know going to Carswell is a gift. Not that I relish going. It is so hard to be away from my kids and Sandeep, but somehow, I know..really know deep down in the depths of my heart and soul that all will be well and God is there. I don't have to worry or FEAR any one or any thing. God goes before me and all around me.

An SSND gave me a medal that says on the back in Latin, (she had to tell me what it said because I didn't know) "Do what ever he tells you." Kind of blew my mind again. I know it all sounds weird and doesn't make sense in this terror filled, "national security at all cost" world. I know I sound naive and off my rocker. But I don't think I have ever been more sane. So I go with peace and in peace. Please hold my children and husband and family in the palm of your hands. It is hard for them to understand as well. But I love them with every fiber of my being.
Peace
Tina

Reverence

2007-04-02T12:19:00.000-07:00

Reverence is a gentle virtue; it is also strong. Reverence is a tender virtue; it is also tough. Reverence is a patient virtue; it is also persistent. Reverence bears no ill will toward others; it is able to bear the ill will of others when necessary. Reverence is a virtue that prepares us well to belong to one another; it reaches out to thise who have given messages of not wishing to belong.

When we approach others with gentle reverence, we bring gifts and share theirs with us.

- Paula Ripple

I found this quote of Paula Ripples so true. It is sometimes hard to do but it is always worth the effort, I think. I am finding these days that opposites live side by side. Joy and sorrow, peace and anxiety, hope and despair...This is what is real. what is not so real is either trying to always feel good or always think everything is bad. There are lots of grays in this world...at least for me.

I want to bring a spirit of reverence with me as I go to Carswell. I may not always be reverent...but I want to be... I think the only real enemy I face there is fear. Fear makes us do and say things we normally would not say or do. Fear takes away our ability to freely give...to freely lay down our lives in service or out of love. There is a part in John's gospel when Jesus says, "No one takes my life, I FREELY give it..." This is how I go into Carswell...I FREELY go realizing no one can force me if I freely lay down my life. I think love gives us the capacity to lay down our lives freely. Fear on the other hand, takes that freedom. Fear demands we close down and hold tight...Fear demands and commands and takes.

Yes I am afraid to go to Carswell. But I also have this faith that Jesus goes before me...so I am not as alone as it seems...

More later. and thanks for you supportive prayers and concern

Carswell Address and tips for mailing things.

2007-03-15T11:25:00.000-07:00

Hello,

I don't think I left my address on this blog yet. It does not seem as if I can get this designation changed. I am OK with this. If there is some small miracle that it does get changed, I will welcome that but if it does not change, that's OK too.

Anyhow here is the address and mailing information.

I wanted to give you my address as it seems this will be the only way we will be able to communicate after April 17 till June 18...

Please address envelopes like this

Christine Busch-Nema #92944-020
FMC Carswell
Federal Medical Center
P.O. Box 27137
Fort Worth, TX 76127

If you send a paperback book...you must put that on the envelope. I can't receive any stamps, food, etc...pretty much only letters, photocopied things, some newspaper clippings...No hardback books. Hardback books must come from the publisher or from Amazon or the book store.

Please don't send any money here either. It will not get to me. (I am not asking for money, just want you to know they will take anything that is not just letters)

They will open and read all mail. Don't worry about what you say. I can not imagine they reading line by line everything and I really don't give a damn what they think about me...so please write what you want to say.

Do not put stickers or tape on the envelope. No return address labels...evidently you are supposta be able to conceal drugs under these things. Why the stamp is not a source of concern is beyond me! Just handwrite your return address on the envelope.

One trick a former Prisoner of Conscience told me is to have folks put a little number on the back corner of the envelope to sequence the letters. The guards are in charge of giving out mail. If I have done something to piss them off or if they just don't feel like giving out mail that day, they can throw it away. If you sequence the letters by putting a number on the envelope or on the letter itself, then I would know if I am receiving all my mail or not.

There is a "satellite camp" at Carswell. If I get changed to this "satellite camp" I will let you know somehow. The address is the same you just have to put Satellite Camp under FMC Carswell.

In a few days, I will post some articles about Carswell. It really seems as if it is a hell hole for women who are desperately ill. Seems like a place where folks are starved for compassion. More later.

Tina

2007-03-11T06:28:00.000-07:00

Sylvester Brown wrote this article about me going to prison and the SOA/WHINSEC. I am copying it to share it on this blog.

Mother hopes message of unity outlasts prison term
By Sylvester Brown Jr.
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Sunday, Mar. 11 2007

Kirkwood resident, home-schooling mom and former nun Tina Busch-Nema has been
busy these past few days making preparations for her family. I was forwarded an
e-mail Busch-Nema had sent asking family, friends and other caring individuals
to cook meals for her husband and three kids, ages 6, 9 and 10. Perhaps, while
she's away, she asked, someone might help clean the house, tend to her garden
and lawn and drive her youngest child to school.

Busch-Nema, 48, received notice Wednesday that on April 18 she must report to
FMC Carswell, a federal medical and mental health center for female offenders
in Fort Worth, Texas, to begin serving her two-month sentence.

In November, Busch-Nema joined more than 20,000 demonstrators for a protest
vigil outside the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation
(formerly known as the School of the Americas), at Fort Benning, Ga. She and 15
other protesters were arrested and charged with criminal trespassing after they
crawled under a chain-link fence and onto the grounds of the U.S. Army base.

The annual protest marks the anniversary of the Nov. 19, 1989, massacre of six
Jesuit priests, a Salvadoran worker and her daughter by mercenaries, some who
allegedly trained at the school.

Some organizations and critics claim the government-funded school has a long
history of supporting anti-communist governments and training mercenaries and
dictators in the techniques of torture, repression and intimidation.

Government officials have acknowledged that some students trained at the school
have been implicated in such crimes but insist the school only serves to
educate military personnel and police forces aligned with cooperating Latin
American nations.

As far as Busch-Nema is concerned, the school symbolizes the conditions she
experienced in her "other life," as a sister of Notre Dame for 11 years.
Throughout the 1980s she served as a missionary in Central American villages.
In 1988, while preparing for her final vows, Busch-Nema asked to be assigned to
a refugee camp on the border of El Salvador and Honduras. It was there she
heard stories of kidnappings, murders, rapes and machine gun bullets fired from
helicopters into the bodies of adults and children as they fled violence from
civil war in their countries.

"It was the first time I saw so much death, so many starving, dehydrated
children and disease," Busch-Nema told me as I sat in her kitchen Thursday
evening. Yet, she added, among the devastation, there was beauty.

"I fell in love with the people, their culture, their customs. They were plain,
generous people who invited me to their huts and sometimes unselfishly shared
their only chicken for our meal. Every morning the kids would call for me to
come out and play," said Busch-Nema, recalling how she'd dress up like a clown,
perform puppet shows and play soccer with village children.

She closed her eyes when describing the day in 1988, while walking on a
hillside between camps, that she ran into a group of armed mercenaries. She
heard the "clicks" of the automatic weapons they pointed at her. She closed her
eyes, fell to her knees and prayed. After long moments, she opened her eyes.
The soldiers, Busch-Nema said, were gone. But the terror remains.

"At some point, the desire for peace outweighed my fears," Busch-Nema said,
explaining why she took part in last year's protest at Fort Benning.

"With the wars, human rights violations and torture at places like Abu Ghraib,
I fear we've lost our souls," she said, referring to the prison in Iraq known
for abuse of inmates.

Although Busch-Nema left the sisterhood to get married and have children, the
mission she discovered remains, she told me.

"The convent helped me see the world through spiritual eyes. I learned it's not
about me. As a Christian, as a world citizen, I have a responsibility to look
beyond my little spot in this world."

Busch-Nema doesn't regret her actions but admits she's worried about her
children and husband (who she asked that I not name), as she prepares for
prison.

"I explained to my kids why I did what I did. I told them how we each must work
to fill the world with humanity."

They had the conversation during a pizza run Wednesday night, Busch-Nema told
me. She chose a certain CD for the short trip. She sang a part of the song for
me — the part she hopes her kids will remember in her absence:

"Wherever you rest your head tonight, remember, we're always one family … let's
hold tight."

Prison Assignment and Report Date

2007-03-09T16:42:00.000-08:00

The letter came yesterday. I am to report to Carswell FMC in Fort Worth, TX on April 17th. I am in shock at the moment. It is a roller coaster ride. Up and down...More downs right now than ups. This is 700+ miles from my home. So I won't get visitors. I am not feeling sorry for myself. I am just sad. Shocked and sad. To some of you who read this blog, you might be tempted to think I got what I deserved. But I have concluded that no one should be a number. No one should have their "number" keyed into a computer and have a computer decide their lives. I have a short two month sentence. What about the poor person who has 2 or 4 or 8 or a lifetime sentence??? My God, I could not fathom the despair they must feel! My blood boils when folks say, "they deserve this." Hell NO! No one deserves this!

More and more I see how much I am not a person to the BOP Bureau of Prison. This is not right! Not for me, not for anyone! People deserved to be treated as people. If someone thinks prisoners are not people well we are back at the time when slaves were not thought of as people but property. It is how the BOP thinks about prisoners...Property. They announce when you walk into the doors for the first time, "YOU ARE NOW THE PROPERTY OF THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS" I am not kidding! To them I am #92944-020...nothing more. And what would someone learn if, day after day, they are refered to as a number? Their self esteem goes down the drain.

People can say, "You broke the law and deserve to be punished." Yes, we have a system of punishment. No rehabilation...No help to be a better person. I am sorry if I am on a war path here. I don't mean to be. I now know how powerless inmates feel, how dehumanizing the prison system is set up to be.

It just makes me sad.

PeaceMaker's Potluck....An evening of community and great food

2007-02-19T07:01:00.000-08:00

There are two words that seem to be a thread that weaves everything together...THANK YOU. Honestly, I am in awe of each of you. I watched last night as this great cross section of folks, young, old and every where in between gathered around some great food. Your offers to help shlep kids, cook meals, set up phone lists and pray with me truely overwhelm me. As I think about the evening it bring tears to my eyes. So much life-giving hope was offered in a world so often devoid of any hope. I found my fears of the unknowns lessen and my courage bolstered. How could it not be?

I would like to thank each of you personally but I forgot to have folks sign in. If you would, could you please either leave a comment with your e:mail address or send an e:mail to cbuschnema@yahoo.com and give me your e:mail address?

As soon as I know of the report date and place, I will post it. I will also post the address and my "number". That "number" needs to be next to my name on all mail or else they will disgard it. In prison, people are numbers. Another step to try to not see people there as people.

Also, a number of people asked that I post any gaps in coverage with the kids. I will look at the schedule and in a couple of days, post any glaring needs i can see.

Please know that there really are no words adaquate to tell you how grateful I am. I am just humbled beyond belief.

Tina

It looks like March 21st is report date...where I am not sure

2007-02-14T05:32:00.000-08:00

Well, now folks from the SOA 16, the group I was arrested with, are getting their report dates. Melissa got her call yesterday. She is going to Pekin on March 21st.
I suspect I will get the call soon.

Beth my friend wrote up a story on the weekend of the trial from a supporter's point of view. I am so humbled at the love, care and tenderness that she and Cynthia gave me that weekend and continue to give me.

Here is the story...

A loss of innocence…

These were some of the first words Cynthia shared with me about the experience of being down at the protest and the trials. We constantly lose innocence, over and over again, as we learn about more injustices. I certainly learned how true her statement was through the course of the weekend’s events. I knew that it would be difficult to see nonviolent peacemakers sentenced to prison, but I never guessed how much it would touch my heart to sit in that courtroom. I went focused on supporting Tina in whatever way she needed and came away knowing that it was much larger than the hugs and prayers.

Arriving on Friday morning in Columbus, Georgia after hours of travel beginning at 4 AM, I found myself in the company of many wonderful peacemakers. We quickly formed a community of understanding and sharing in the mutual experience of having a loved one in the group of defendants. As more people arrived to join us, we welcomed them with open arms. The defendants spent much of the time preparing for trial and voicing personal concerns while we learned the basics of supporting them and ourselves. The many details of daily life are what we will be left with when they leave, while trying to juggle communication between family members and friends.

Before I left Milwaukee, I had called Tina to be sure things were going okay and that they had arrived safely. The first news I got was how the toilet in the hotel room had overflowed almost immediately upon their arrival and that the room was very tiny, with hardly any space for my sleeping bag on the floor. I found this to be quite true as we settled in on Friday night, after a long day of meeting new faces, many group discussions, planning Saturday’s peace vigil, and finally dinner.

With so many peacemakers gathered, it was fitting that we do something in solidarity with the March on Washington, where many of us would have been if the trial were not occurring. On Saturday morning, we all went down to the gates of Fort Benning where the protest is held every November and held signs calling for peace, justice, troops to come home, and the closure of the SOA. We sang and laughed as many, many cars streamed in and out of the gates on this chilly morning. Most cars seemed to fly past us, but Loretta slowed some down by walking back and forth across the street and others slowed out of curiosity or concern for safety. Every wave and peace sign from motorists brought cheers. It felt like a big group of friends that had just gathered together for a weekly peace vigil, other than the police coming at us from both sides: city police and military police that were waiting just beyond the fence.

After a 5 AM wake up call from someone’s alarm next door (it sounded so much like it was right there in our room and I kept thinking that it was a car stereo blaring!), Saturday was another day full of meetings and discussions, shared questions and concerns, and the beautiful building of community. I miss everyone just thinking about it. We were from all walks of life, faith backgrounds, ages, genders, sexualities, states, and viewpoints, with a common belief in justice and hope for peace. It was a long day of learning more and more about prison life and the details that must be covered before entrance. I personally treasured the times in between meetings to get to know these beautiful people. I had heard that sometimes the supporters who come do not really agree with the action their loved one took and are there because they feel that they have to be, but I found that everyone there really was supportive. The one person who started out the weekend not in support at all was Julienne’s husband. He must have arrived late Friday afternoon. He did not come when Julienne did and at one point was not coming at all. But when he did come, he came in a separate car so that he “would not get sucked in.” Throughout the weekend, Tina and I laughed and laughed as he did just that. Even by Saturday night, he was in. He showed the discovery video that the Army had sent to Julienne because she did not file some paperwork that the others did and he was so excited whenever something new would happen. At a couple of points, the screen went blue and he jumped up and said that he would fast forward it and that “there’s more to come, folks!” Once he even said “the best is yet to come.” The icing on the cake was when he got up during the Festival of Hope on Sunday night and added his own political quotes-- I believe something about Bush or Rumsfeld. Being from the UK himself, it was quite interesting to hear his views. We got many laughs out of his antics and how he fit in beautifully by Sunday.

All day and night on Saturday, Tina was struggling with her plea, weighing all of the possibilities and consequences. On Friday night, we thought that she had it decided and was ready to talk to a lawyer the next morning. Well that only led to more questions. Eventually, sometime Saturday night, she had it figured out. It was all the pieces of: if I say this, will it make the judge mad so that he does not listen to my request for probation, if I plead guilty, am I saying that I believe that I did something wrong even though I do not, can I plead guilty to speaking up for my brothers and sisters…and on and on.

A later start on Sunday was a welcome relief. We had time to pray together and breathe before a day that felt full of finality. There were a couple of workshops in the morning and after lunch, one more question and answer session before an interfaith service. I could not sit through one more discussion of prison so I talked to some folks, helped to set up a bit and then caught the end of the evaluation part. All of the talk about these amazing nonviolent peacemakers and what they will face was weighing on my heart. It was not even that I thought that prison sounded scary or terrible, just that there is something inherently wrong that we were gathered having these discussions, that we had to say goodbye for whatever time the judge decided.

Joining together many different faith traditions was wonderful and refreshing. Cynthia shared a meditation, we broke bread, heard a Native American prayer, Virginia sang a hymn, Rebecca shared a Jewish prayer, we blessed each other, and then gave the sign of peace. If only our weekly services could be so inclusive!

A walk in the windy sunshine and mild temperatures, compared to Milwaukee, made the afternoon welcome. I just had to stop and listen to the wonderful women I found myself with: Gail Phares, founder of Witness for Peace, Sue, one of the women who organized the 1,000 Grandmothers Campaign, and Virginia, whose son Grayman crossed the line—as Tina said, an earth mother. It was one of those times when I just stopped and thought: what am I in this group? So much wisdom and love is here. What will I be like at their ages?

It was great to spend time with Virginia. She is the one who first got me thinking about going down for the trials. We sat across from each other at the dinner on Sunday night after everyone got off the bus and she asked if I would come back. At that point, I had no idea to because I knew that it was less than a week after the start of the new semester. It haunted me those months and eventually, two weeks before, led me to buy a plane ticket. We went for coffee together after talking on our long walk. She is a person who makes you feel like the most important in the world all the time—you can say anything and know that it will be met with kindness and understanding. I got to hear how she was raised to always speak for herself and hold up her beliefs. Her father used to have discussions with his kids where he would even hold a point that he did not believe in just to be sure that his children could stand up for their beliefs. It made me wonder again how I got to where I am, not having had any of these key childhood experiences of justice, at least consciously.

I returned to find Tina, Cynthia, and Liz in a heavy discussion about Pekin, where Tina will likely be placed. Cynthia and Liz both spent their sentences there and so could share much of their experiences. Being accustomed to quiet and time alone, I tried to enjoy the empty hotel room, but my mind wandered too much to read or write. I called Raquel, but she needed to call me back later. It was all too much for my heart to process and all I could do was sit for a few minutes at a time. I kept wondering what the morning would bring, how I would finish my schoolwork, and what this all means in the bigger scope of my future.

Soon it was time to gather for dinner and the Festival of Hope. Cynthia’s friend has a daughter who goes to school in Columbus, so she joined us. Melanie is from my hometown of Des Peres, went to the same church and everything, so it was funny to meet her there. I started to fill a plate and Raquel called. I had tried to call her on Thursday, as I was on my way to Mary’s house at the start of this journey, but was not even able to leave a message. I was thinking about her a lot, since Tina did this in honor of her brother, José Eduardo Lopez. They were both mentioned in her statement so I wanted to be sure that she knew when the trial was and let her know that I was there supporting Tina, since it was such a last-minute decision that we had not spoken about it. She assured me that they were and would be praying. Then we talked a bit about how things are going with discernment and she warmed my heart with her support and care. It is these key wonderful people who keep me going on this road when everything seems to be full of disappointment for now. Meeting the sisters there who are such workers for peace and justice made me very aware of my own feelings and journey; I wondered again where I would be when I was their age.

During dinner, the order that the defendants would appear in, if the judge allowed things to go as planned, was posted. Grayman was to sing his statement and the lawyers had wanted to put him at the end so that if the judge was not happy with him, the others’ sentences would not be affected. Tina did not think that he should be hidden in the back, but instead set the tone for the day. Little did she know that bringing this up would place her second, after Grayman! Well, I suppose that may not be the only reason, but it did not matter why when she saw her name on the list! At some point, we also got our tickets—they would hopefully ensure that everyone’s supporters got into the courtroom for their loved one’s trial. If Cynth lost hers, I was ordered by Tina to tear mine in half. We HAD to be there!

The Festival of Hope certainly was just that. It was full of laughter and some tears, as nuns impersonated the “Pentagon Pimp” (Judge Faircloth) and grandmother con-to-be’s, Tina shared her poem, “Crossing the Line,” we had some sing-a-longs, an example of juggling to balance life, Rumsfeld quotes, and many other opportunities to sing. A true celebration followed by a song of strength, laying our hands on the defendants. Another round of strong, loving hugs sent us out for the night, to join together again in the clarity of morning.

Though we were exhausted from the day, the adrenaline of the coming day was already flowing through us. Tina was definitely feeling it and the hours passed as we tried to rest. Sharing the pictures of the evening brought back laughter but the weight of the morning was there in the air. Eventually, we got sleepy and started to settle in for the night. I thought that Cynth and Tina were ready to sleep, so I went to shower. I soon heard voices and wondered if it was them or just someone in a different room, since the walls are thin and the rooms so close and small. I came out to find them telling jokes about prison and Cynth’s nicknames. We soon lapsed back into the seriousness of the day (as it was midnight and we had to rise at 6 AM) and talked for quite a while. It all ended at about 1:30 AM, after a healthy, hearty laugh about what would happen if everyone after Grayman also got up and sang their statement. Tina would go first, then Margaret, and so on until Alice at the very end. The thought was enough to break the tension for awhile and made us wonder what the neighbors were thinking! The headlines afterward would be priceless, the Singing SOA Sixteen or something similar. Really, what would they do? It’s free speech, right?!

When the alarm went off, there was a collective groan; well maybe more than a groan. It took a few minutes for us to move, to say the least. 7:30 was the start time in the lobby, so we had to get going. I had to pack up so as to be ready to leave no matter how long the trials took, but it was like moving in a fog. 9:00 was so close now. A few false starts and one big hug sandwich with Tina in the middle later, Tina and I got some breakfast where me met the other folks. It helped to see smiling faces. We eventually made it out the door with only our keys to the room and ID’s to get into the courtroom. Tina had all of her paperwork and money. We joined the crowd in the lobby.

Taking white crosses like we bring in November, we organized the defendants at the front and started out on a procession to the courthouse. In true SOA Watch style, Virginia sang the names of those killed and disappeared in Latin America. Wanting to run from the cold air, we did our best to stay solemn and slow. A few waves and car horns spurred us on as we turned the corner down the home stretch of 12th Street.

The press conference started as soon as we all made it onto and around the steps of the courthouse. Maybe it was just the cold getting to me, but it was all so surreal. The five defendants spoke and we quickly turned to being filing through security and up to the courtroom. After the defendants were all in line, a Federal Marshal decided that the post office was becoming inaccessible and that we had to wait outside until he let us back in. S. Kathleen tried to point out that we had our system of tickets all worked out, but he wanted to try his way first. This was my first experience with a real trial or with the control of federal agents at all, having only done a mock trial in eighth grade at the Old Courthouse at home in St. Louis. It again did not feel real at all. Waiting in line and through security just to be with a loved one is so wrong.

Within a few minutes, he said that ten people could enter. Cynthia and I were right up there, ready to go. Shaking from the cold, I made up to the third floor and outside the courtroom doors. Those few minutes in the hallway with Federal Marshals and soldiers passing by was enough to make me really nervous. We eventually got into the courtroom I have heard about so many times and got as close to the front as we could, disobeying an order to start by filling in the back row first. I wondered as we did that what it meant about the whole experience. Starting out by disobeying seemed significant to me.

Sitting there waiting, I got warm, but continued to shake. Cynthia and Judith traded spots so that Judith was next to the window and able to take notes if Cynth sat up in her spot. We were told that if they saw her pen, they would take it away. Once again, I wondered what this meant for the day. Here we were in an establishment that our tax dollars run, hiding harmless activities like writing down the words and sentences (as in judge’s exercise of power) of friends. Once the defendants came in up in the front, it all seemed more real in a very strange way.

We all stood just before the judge was to come in and so were already standing when ordered to do so. This was to avoid having to stand “for him.” All of the usual legal proceedings ensued, wordy jargon, etc. Then Grayman was called to the front. He was pleading no contest and was the first to appear of the 16. They went through whatever legal words had to be said and then he was able to present a statement. He did, in fact, sing the whole thing. It went something like, “if you’re looking for weapons, you’ll find them behind the fence.” That was the chorus, if you will, with similar statements and testimony in between. Tina was right—a beautiful way to start out the proceedings.

When the judge proceeded to give Grayman only 30 days in prison, I believe that the supporters let out a collective sigh of relief. Relief that the singing had not made the judge completely angry and so harsh on everyone for the rest of the day. Virginia was crying just behind me, though I could not tell if it was out of happiness, sadness, pride, or everything all at once.

Tina was next. My blood pressure rose even higher, making me shake harder than I thought possible. I could do nothing to control it, as I could not get my mind off of the injustice of it all.

I tried to pay attention to every word, but most of it faded away as I waited and waited for those words of “your sentence.” As I could not see much with many taller people in front of me, I looked often at the church steeple so close outside. Something seemed strange about it: injustice in that room and so close, the symbol of perfect justice. I had to wait quite a long time, shaking all the while, as Tina eventually gave her statement…during that, all I could do was say to her in my head: Breathe. I knew that she was afraid that she would cry in the middle of it and I was afraid that she would get going too fast and make the most moving part seem trivial. I bowed my head, closed my eyes, and sent all of my strength to the front of that courtroom.

Hearing that judge say that he would defer sentencing until he had heard the rest of the group tore my heart out. I could not believe it. One more way to exercise power. It did not even seem legal to me. Somehow, those other statements could affect everyone’s sentence and that is not right!

Margaret and Phil were called forward and gave their statements, returning to their seats to wait in the thick air of tension. Josh was next and the last of the group. He had decided to plead not guilty and to represent himself. The judge tried to convince him that he needed a lawyer, speaking of the problems that could occur. He must have been afraid of Josh appealing, causing a mistrial, and then retrial. Eventually, Josh went on and represented himself and gave his statement.

Then the whole group of four was called up to the front once again. The judge announced that he would now sentence the defendants. Bill Quigley, Tina’s attorney, asked if they would be able to make a statement about special circumstances at this time. He agreed. Next, I was surprised because Tina had told us that Bill was going to explain her situation and ask for probation. Instead, Tina started talking. She told the judge that she has three children and that though she has a community of supporters who will take care of them if she has to leave, it would obviously be better to be with her children for those months than to be in prison. Without blinking an eye, or so it seemed, since I could not see, he went right into sentencing her. As if she had not said a word, he sentenced her to sixty days in prison.

My immediate reflex was to cry, even though we were all glad that it was not the typical three months. But Grayman’s thirty days had given us hope for probation for those who needed it for family or health reasons. I buried my head in Cynthia’s shoulder and tried to stay quiet, still shaking. Virginia’s hand had been on my shoulder, sharing her peaceful spirit, through the whole sentencing, with someone else’s hand on the other side. The community we developed through the weekend was now a family.

All I heard of the other sentences was the amount of time in prison. I was more aware of their families and supporters around me, groaning inside at each sentence stated. I could feel their pain and it became part of my own; we wept for each other.

I am not sure if all of the sentences were finished or not, but at least Tina’s was when she remembered one more thing that she had wanted to do. Before she left, her three kids had hidden surprises throughout her suitcase. One of them was a drawing Charu, the youngest, had done of an Indian girl. Tina’s husband is from India and they adopted Charu from India after the older two were born. She had planned on giving this drawing to the judge before the sentencing but forgot. So she handed it to him and told him that her daughter had drawn it. The judge said immediately that if it had any monetary value, he could not accept it since then it would be a bribe. Tina assured him that it did not and he accepted it. Her point was that either way he sentenced her, probation or prison, it would make a point: giving her prison and then having something tangible from the kids would make him think about what he had done, sending a mother away and if he had given probation, he would realize that she got to be with her kids. At least it made him stop for that one moment.

Finally all of the sentences were set and the defendants left the room. Then we were dismissed and had to run down the stairs very quickly so that the next group of supporters could all get into the courtroom. If everyone was not in when the judge came in, they would not be allowed. Cynthia and I somehow walked back to the hotel to get everything: all we had with us were room keys and ID’s. First were the phones: she called Rita, I called Rose. That finished, we took the car back to the courthouse and wondered where everyone was. We checked the coffee shop we saw and no one was there. There were a few people from our group on one corner and they helped us realize that there was another coffee shop behind us! We had expected the processing after sentencing to take much longer, but everyone was already gathered, sharing stories and coffee. Another celebration, as some awaited their turn in court. I met more amazing people and heard stories of their travels. Faith Fippinger, who Cynth had introduced me to in November, and who had told us about her recent travels in Iran, was there and had more stories to share. A man with her was from Veterans for Peace. Faith’s stories and truly free spirit about where life will take her next made me wonder more about my own life, where I will have been at her age.

When lunch arrived outside, we all gathered on the corner outside of the courthouse. The sun was bright, the air chilly, and everything felt raw, open, vulnerable. Something had changed in me in that courtroom; somehow, the world looked different. A loss of innocence? I think so. I knew it all before, but to see is to believe so often and it took being a witness to the injustice for it to fully affect me.

We ate our lunches and shared more stories, while the next trials hung heavy around us. Tina wanted to go back in for the trials of her friends, but my heart was hurting too much—I really did not think that I could sit in that room any longer. I had no idea what it was, but something hurt too much and I did not want to back there. But I had come to support Tina and that is what I needed to do. Tina, Cynth, and I got through security, to the room and into the seats, but were told that there were family members who had not gotten into the courtroom, so we left and went back to the hotel to rest. This was better for me anyway, as I had a long trip back to Milwaukee later in the day.

There was not much chance of sleep for me, but the quiet was good. All I could do was sit and think about the day. Cynthia read and Tina emailed for a bit before we all tried to sleep, Tina and I with hands entwined. The most helpful or comforting thing all weekend for her was to be connected to one of us—whether holding hands, hugging, or just a hand on her shoulder. Most times, this was all I could do. I had no perfect words, no wisdom from experience, only me and all I had to give was love. And in some ways, I think that was all she needed. Tina knew what she was doing, why she was doing it, and what the consequences could be. All she needed was to know that she is not alone, that we are with her and that all of the people of Latin America she is speaking for are with her.

I still am not sure about what it was that made my heart ache that day. The pain of the people affected by this terrible place called a school, the pain of families who must say goodbye for months and accept prison time, the pain of a world yearning for peace, the pain of creation crying out for love? All of it came to my mind and I do believe that this weekend was truly a “loss of innocence,” a fresh realization of the reality of the issues with which I am daily involved.

And so we spent that afternoon resting together; a prayer, really. Holding the morning’s events in our hearts and just being there for each other. What is prayer, truly, besides being present to another?

some quotes to share...

2007-02-10T15:41:00.000-08:00

Melissa, one of my friends who climbed the fence at Fort Benning sent these quotes. Also the rather long one is from a friend...all have helped me, touched me, inspried me. I pass them on for whatever it is worth.

Also, I wanted to put out the reminder that the PeaceMakers Potluck will happen on Feb. 18 at 6:00 at Hartford Coffee Company. This is on the corner of Hartford and Roger...Roger is right off Arsenal between Grand and Kingshighway. Please come and celebrate this wonderful group of peacemakers. I will have a calender there and a list of needs...while I am gone.

The first person of our group got her report date. Alice Gerard will report to Danbury Federal Work Camp on March 21st. The lawyers assure me that I should expect my letter with where and when to report sooner than later. It seems we usually get processed within a week or so of each other. I think there is more anxiety over not knowing and waiting than knowing and planning.

Anyhow, here are the quotes...hope they inspire your heart.

Tina

The quote from Mary Mondello...
"Almost a hundred years ago, the philosopher Fredrich von Hugel described how we progress towards God. He wrote of an initial institutional stage, followed by a critical stage and culminating in what he called a mystical stage. By "mystical" he didn't mean magic or heavenly voices, but rather this: age make us realize that we have seen it all, and brings us to know that good and evil, like the wheat and cockle of the parable, coexist not merely in countries and institutions, but in each of us. Pitch darkness and pure light are seldom the order of the day, but we learn to live with both, light emerging out of darkness. We do the best we can, and are ready to renounce the seductions of having the perfect formulations of reality, or the perfect formula for everyone's life.

In the mystical phase we still carry with us the institutional phase: we still love the sights and sounds of worship well carried out, and the sense of participating in a great body of believers. We have not left the critical phase behind, but carry it with us: we use our heads about our religion, and have no illusions about the weaknesses of Jesus' followers- after all, Peter, the first Pope, had to live with the memory of denying the Lord publicly, again and again. But when we have argued about all the great questions of human existence, especially the mystery of evil, we realise that we rely more on the gift of faith than on clear-cut reason."

Quotes from Melissa: "It was here in jail that Sri Aurobindo had significant spiritual
experiences, he became aware of a divine inner guidance and also
realised
the omnipresence of [the Source] even in a darkened prison cell."

chant like, gathering momentum:
A prison, a monastery a cloister, a cave
prison ~ monastery ~ cloister ~ cave
prison, monastery, cloister, cave
prison monastery cloister cave
prison monastery cloister cave

http://filmforum.org/films/silence.html

watch this clip... the Source is with you

"I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable,
I
tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free
because
I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do."
~Robert A.
Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

"No charter of freedom will be worth looking at which does not ensure
the
same measure of freedom for the minorities as for the majority." M. K.
Gandhi

"My patriotism is not an exclusive thing. It is all-embracing, and I
should
reject that patriotism which sought to mount the distress or
exploitation of
other nationalities." M. K. Gandhi

"The spirit of resistance to Government is so valuable at certain
times,
that I wish it to be kept alive." -Thomas Jefferson

a list of needs while I am gone

2007-02-06T05:27:00.000-08:00

Ok, now I am getting practical. I figure if I am am lucky I have about three weeks before I get THE LETTER! The letter telling me where and when to report to begin my two month prison term. I will be the first in my family, I think...I hope, to go to prison. Maybe it is a badge of honor as well as a source of embarrassment for some. At any rate, I am thinking of what I need to have happen so the kids will be OK when I am gone.

Here is a list...

Charu school rides....She goes on Tuesdays from 9:00am to 3:30pm
Wednesdays from 9:00am to 12:30pm
Thursdays from 9:00am to 12:30pm
She can go with another family to play for the afternoon on Wednesdays and Thursdays but would need a ride sometime in the afternoon on those days. If someone feels brave and wants to coordinate a list of rides, this would be a great help.

I am planning on having my mom, Inez Bocklage and Doris Arteaga rotating to live at the house. Sandeep leaves early in the morning and returns home around 6 or 7 in the evening. I thought if someone was here even if the kids are away, then it would be safe for them to be dropped off after classes or play dates. I will put on a calander when Alec and Sarah have co-op classes so they can get a ride. Also if anyone is interested in play dates, I know they will be as well. I will post their work for the before I leave. They will know what they need to do.

Meals: Sandeep is not good about asking for what he needs. He, like most men, I think, will say he is fine. But I really worry he will feed the kids, either frozen Indian food or their favorite when I am gone, Butter bread and warm milk! This scares the hell out of me. If they could get a meal a couple of times a week, they could live on the leftovers for the other days.

I am thinking of hiring a cleaning service come every other week when I am gone. This will be about four times in all. Sandeep will try to clean the whole house every week but I think it will be too much for him as he will also have laundry and child care on weekends...Laundry he will insist on doing himself.

Sandeep is a social creature but he is also a proud man...I know he will be fine. I just don't want to wear him to the bone. He loves to be with the kids so I don't think weekends will be anything for him. If someone wants to take them for ice cream or to the park or City Musuem or something like that every once and a while, I think they would feel special.

Also, (now I really pity the poor person who takes up this challenge)I will need someone to put letters up on the blog and out on e:mail. this means you will have to read my HANDWRITING. Sorry I have really crappy handwriting. I try but I flunked it in grade school. the only class I ever flunked! Honest! I will provide the how to get onto the blog and a list of e:mail addresses to get letters out to. I plan on writing at least once a week... Maybe a book comes out of it, eh???? Letters from Federal Prison??? Seriously, I just want to write but there is too many folks to write to individually. so I hope to use this blog and e:mail to try to keep in touch.

I think that is all I can think of. I really am so grateful. Honestly there are no words to express my grateful heart. I will be well. I am taking a writing class when I am in prison. That should keep me centered.

tina

A poem: Yesterday My Friend Chose Prison..by Bill Quigley

2007-02-02T05:41:00.000-08:00

Dear Friends,
I am so proud to say MY LAWYER wrote this poem in 2004.. He is such a wonderful person! He is gentle and compassionate. None of the lawyer jokes apply to him. He said it was the night after a bunch of folks had reported to prison...he was in his bed and could not sleep. He said after beating his pillow a few times he got up and put this poem down. I cried when I read it. I didn't cry because of having to go. I didn't cry because it maybe hard. I cried, I guess, because I am just an ordinary person with lots of doubts, fears and angers...and somehow with all of that, God chose me. I know this sounds crazy, but I am grateful. Not grateful that I have to leave my husband and kids for a couple of months but grateful that God saw fit to use me somehow. And so it is for each of us. God uses us to bring goodness to the world. When we love our kids with this fierce "tiger" love, when we stand up for a friend, when we go to a homeless shelter and strike up a conversation. When we visit someone in the hospital. When we write that letter to the editor or call our congressperson...in all ways, in all times we bring goodness to the world and add one more drop to that communal bucket which will, by the way, overflow...I am positive of this.

I ask your prayers for Sandeep. Please hold him gently in the light. Ask God to give him peace. I am so sad to see him so scared and hurting. With all my heart and soul I love him and wish him peace and courage.

In the coming days, I will put a list out of what I can think of as far as support while I am incarserated (I know, I have to learn how to spell that word. never thought it would describe me.) If you think of something that I might miss, any thing at all, please leave a comment or e:mail me at cbuschnema@yahoo.com I am not thinking real clearly somedays...forget what I said just the day before in some cases... In another post I will print the statement I read to the court. It changed a little from what I printed in the earlier post...evolved those final days, I think.

My love and praysers are out there for each of you. I can not tell you how much your notes and e:mails mean to me. Give me hope and strength when I feel I can not go on.

Yesterday My Friend Chose Prison
Dedicated to the SOA prisoners of conscience by Bill Quigley

Yesterday my friend walked freely into prison
Chose to violate a simple law to spotlight the evil
of death squads and villages of massacred people that we cannot even name
mothers and children and grandparents butchered buried
and forgotten by most, but not by my friend.

Yesterday my friend stepped away from loves and family and friends
was systematically stripped of everything, everything
and systematically searched everywhere, everywhere
was systematically numbered and uniformed and advised and warned
clothes and underwear and shoes and everything put in a cardboard box,
taped and mailed away

Yesterday my friend joined the people we put in the concrete and steel boxes
mothers and children and fathers that we cannot even name
in prison for using and selling drugs
in prison for trying to sneak into this country
in prison for stealing and scamming and fighting and killing
but none were there for the massacres
no generals, no politicians, no under-secretaries, no ambassadors

Yesterday my friend had on a brave face
avoiding too much eye contact with the stares of hundreds of strangers
convicts, prisoners, guards, snitches
not yet knowing good from bad
staying out of people’s business
hoping to find a small pocket of safety and kindness and trust in the
weeks ahead

Last night my friend climbed into bed in prison
an arm’s length away from the other prisoners
laying awake on the thin mattress
wondering who had slept there last
wondering how loved ones were sleeping
awake through flashlight bed checks
and never-ending noises echoing off the concrete floors and walls
some you never ever want to hear

Yesterday my friend chose prison over silence
chose to stand with the disappeared and those who never counted
chose to spend months inside hoping to change us outside
chose the chance to speak truth to power and power responded with prison

Though my heart aches for my friend in prison
no one on this planet is more free.

Back in Missouri

2007-01-31T14:29:00.000-08:00

Hello,

I pulled into our driveway at about 11:30 or 12:00midnight. It is so good to be home. The kids seemed to be great. Alec presented me with a white plastic bracelet that said "ONE". He was so proud of that. Charu had a picture taped underneath the counter...just where I had left a note for her. Sarah had made me coffee and left a note that said it was in the "micorave". It is so wonderful to see them and even more comforting to know I could be gone and we still keep in touch and connected. They are doing well. Please pray for Sandeep. I think I am an embarrassment to him. I know it doesn't sound good to have your wife going to prison. I hope and pray that someday, he might be able to understand and at least respect my decision and action.

Last night as Cynthia and I were driving back, we had to stop for gas in a little place in KY. In the bathroom of this tiny store was a beautiful picture of a ship amid huge and magistic blocks of ice...the caption was this..."RISK A ship in the harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are made for." At that point I just laughed and much of the dread I was feeling at coming home melted away.

I am so very, very grateful for your prayers, support, love and comments. I can feel this support when I get scared or uncertian. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that all shall be well...God's loving faithfulness is the only thing we know with absolute certainity...the rest is up for grabs. I also wanted to especially thank Cynthia and Beth who were my support folks during the trial prep and hopefully after. I felt wrapped in a blanket of love. Honestly, they took care of physical needs, emotional needs and prayed with me to give me strength. I did not feel alone or abandoned. They are angels!

Again I want to invite each of you to the potluck. It will be a Festival of Hope and peace, no doubt.

I am not sure of what I will need yet as far as support for the kids and Sandeep. I will keep this blog going as I go through phase four and five, as Cynthia called it....Phase four is reporting for prison and phase five is leaving prison. I will have someone post on the blog and someone post on an e:mail list. I won't have access to a computer. I have terrible handwriting so I do pity the person who takes this job, important as it is.

One final note. My dog, Thunder Bolt, is laying on the bed here by me. He snuggles close. I think he must of missed me as well. It is so comforting to pet his soft ears and big blocky head.

Going to court in a couple of hours

2007-01-29T01:49:00.000-08:00

I would hoped I had more time to write but it is not so. It is about 5am and I can't sleep. In a couple of hours I will be marching down to the court house. Yes I am a bit nervous but deep, deep down Iam at peace. I listened to a woman speak last night about how her husband was tortured for 2 and a half years in Gutamala...then he was thrown from a helicopter alive to his death. The soldiers who did this, it was found were trained at the SOA and paid by the CIA. She was to be a witness at our trial but the judge would not let her testimoney into the court! Yes, this is the American justice system! I love my country. It is the only country I truely know but this part I am ashamed of.

I want to hold my head high, I want to speak and act with love. It is my highest desire. I am no hero. I am just a woman, a person. But when I hear these stories and meet these people, how can I do any less? How can I not care? Even the worst thing that can happen to me,,,is nothing by comparison.

Whatever happen, I am fine with it. I will ask for probation as I did not cross the line for a particular outcome, but if I get jail time that is ok too...I can only say that because of this vast commmunity of peace makers in St. Louis and beyond who walk with me...Definately not a journey I recommend one take alone!

I am going to try to sleep an hour or so.

Please hold me in the light. and come on the 18th of Feb...it will be a Festival of Hope...a Festival of Peace!

Tina

Sunday...after a looooong Saturday

2007-01-28T04:33:00.000-08:00

I am sorry I didn't write yesterday...between talking with lawyers and listening to workshops about prison life, I was just too beat. When I finally got back to the room, I just crashed...talked to folks for a little bit and crashed into a deep but disjointed sleep....This bed is really small, and soft and well...though Cynthia is a great friend...I miss Sandeep.

Cynthia found this quote of Shelly Douglass I think it sums up what yesterday was about very well...she says, "Going to jail, doing civil disobedience, isn't all that special or threatening. It's just something that has to be done in a world where insanity is legal. Civil disobedience is a fact of life. I hope we learn to accept it gracefully."

I will try to write after the Festival of Hope tonight. I am well and feeling fine. I will petition the Judge Faircloth for probation but we shall see what he says.

I am holding this whole community of peace makers to the light with love.

The White Rose Society

2007-01-26T06:58:00.000-08:00

I am waiting for Lizz Brown from the "Wake Up Call" to call but it does not seem like she will. I went to the website given to me by the media person of SOAW about Lizz Brown's show...It is called The White Rose Society. I looked up this White Rose Society. It was first named as the non-violent resistance of a few students in Germany during WWII. They produced some leaflets for the German people. As I read the first one, I put the words "American" people in and changed Hilter to Bush...It was striking the message......I will cut and paste it here. It is rather long, I apologize for that. I wanted to pare it down but it resisted paring. So be it...

The Leafets of the White Rose Society

The Leafets of the White Rose Society

The First Leaflet
Nothing is so unworthy of a civilized nation as allowing itself to be "governed" without opposition by an irresponsible clique that has yielded to base instinct. It is certain that today every honest German is ashamed of his government. Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will befall us and our children when one day the veil has fallen from our eyes and the most horrible of crimes - crimes that infinitely outdistance every human measure - reach the light of day? If the German people are already so corrupted and spiritually crushed that they do not raise a hand, frivolously trusting in a questionable faith in lawful order in history; if they surrender man's highest principle, that which raises him above all other God's creatures, his free will; if they abandon the will to take decisive action and turn the wheel of history and thus subject it to their own rational decision; if they are so devoid of all individuality, have already gone so far along the road toward turning into a spiritless and cowardly mass - then, yes, they deserve their downfall. Goethe speaks of the Germans as a tragic people, like the Jews and the Greeks, but today it would appear rather that they are a spineless, will-less herd of hangers-on, who now - the marrow sucked out of their bones, robbed of their center of stability - are waiting to be hounded to their destruction. So it seems - but it is not so. Rather, by means of a gradual, treacherous, systematic abuse, the system has put every man into a spiritual prison. Only now, finding himself lying in fetters, has he become aware of his fate. Only a few recognized the threat of ruin, and the reward for their heroic warning was death. We will have more to say about the fate of these persons. If everyone waits until the other man makes a start, the messengers of avenging Nemesis will come steadily closer; then even the last victim will have been cast senselessly into the maw of the insatiable demon. Therefore every individual, conscious of his responsibility as a member of Christian and Western civilization, must defend himself against the scourges of mankind, against fascism and any similar system of totalitarianism. Offer passive resistance - resistance - wherever you may be, forestall the spread of this atheistic war machine before it is too late, before the last cities, like Cologne, have been reduced to rubble, and before the nation's last young man has given his blood on some battlefield for the hubris of a sub-human. Do not forget that every people deserves the regime it is willing to endure.

Georgia! Peachtree country

2007-01-26T05:22:00.000-08:00

We are here. Butterfly stomach, weak knees and all. Actually it is so good to see everyone. I can not begin to tell you the breath, length and depth of goodness among the other 15 of the SOA 16. Wonderful people...I believe some of cream of the crop...Sorry, I'm full of corny sap this morning.

Got a call as soon as I got in from the media guy at SOAW in DC...the Liz Brown? show wants to do a radio interview...more butterflys and upset stomachs...I am trying to read through the materials and get my act together.

I am working like hell to just stay centered and let God have the reins on this ride. The kids sound wonderful. They love looking for the "treasure" messages I left taped under things, and beind stuff. Now trying to get hiding places for 21 messages was in and of itself a feat. Then I had to remember what message went with what hiding place, went with what kid! My already addled brain went into overload and a must of wasted 20 envelopes.

Thank you so very, very much for all the prayers. I realize how much being held to the light lifts one's spirit and also banishes the shadows that try so very hard to creep in. The shadows that tell me how stupid I am for doing this, how scared I should be, how ill equiped I am to speak. But I then remember this is not my business as much as it is God's and then I just let go...and let the lignt shine. Please pray I keep that attitude in the coming days.

Jam packed day of meetings and such so I will try to write when I get a moment.

A flood of letters

2007-01-23T06:14:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my daughter brought in the mail. I was sorting through and found these letters addressed to me thatjust kept coming...six letters in all. I was astounded. I read each one. They were from the sisters at St. Martin de Tours convent. Each one offered support, prayers and warm wishes. One person told me about how she prayed the rosary and at one station she looked up to see the face of Jesus and she said she saw my face too...she said she saw both Jesus and I carrying the cross. That we both hadlistened to God's call and followed through even though we both knew it would not be easy. I was so touched because at one point on this journey my spiritual director, who is well versed in the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius, told me the third week of the exercises was about walking with Jesus to Calvery. She said it is just the natural consequence of following the Gospel...the cross. I just found this sisters words comforting in a strange kind of way. I guess I thought, "Well, at least I am in good company."

Actually, I realize more and more that this is really not a huge deal. This whole action, trial and sentence is really not about me at all. I just happen to be one of the folks walking along the road. Honestly there are really no big deals. Just little steps by little steps that we all take as we decide to follow this Gospel.

Once when I had just entered the SSND community, a sister, who knew I had this burnig desire to live out the Gospels, wrote to me. I will never forget what she wrote, she said, "May the Beatitudes you dream about be etched in your heart." That was over 20 years , yet it remains my strongest desire though I really can't say why.

And Carl Laughed

2007-01-20T21:07:00.000-08:00

I see this blog as kind of like a chronical of a small piece of this journey...all the signposts that amazingly happen, just happen in the strangest places.

Tonight I went to a play called And Carl Laughed. It is an orginal play about Carl Kabat, OMI. It was put on by the theater group at Clayton High School. Now about the play....First of all, who is Carl Kabat? Well he is a priest. I bet he is a thorn in the side of his religious community. He is currently in prison for his act of civil disobedience here in Missouri. He dresses as a clown, breaks into nuclear missile silos, hammers on them, pours blood on them and then hangs a sign and waits for the authorities to arrest him. He has done over 17 years of jail time for his actions. He is 73 years old. Those are some of the facts. Now about the play...laced with orginal songs, creative dialogue and a masterful use of five gallon buckets (Carl's suit cases) this group of highschool kids from a wealthy school district, did an amazing production of the life story of a priest who has lived in the slums of Brazil, the Phillipines and Federal prisons through out the US... They artfully protrayed the tension between Carl's carefree spirit who laughs and plays the fool and his Gospel filled heart that cries with the poor,and sees the folly of the nuclear missiles. You met this man, both clown and priest who calls us all to be "fools for the Gospel". Hopefully these students and their director understand how their art is an act of peace making which calls us all to greater responsibility for our neighbors and our world.

Come to the Peace Makers dinner and hopefully you will meet them, (I invited them to come) because peace making happens in so many and varied ways...not just in acts of civil disobedience, but in the songs, the acting, and the message they gave.

A Force More Powerful

2007-01-20T08:07:00.000-08:00

I watched a the second part of a dvd called "A Force More Powerful". I highly recommend it. Looking at examples of Non-violent resistance and how it caused change, they look at the non-violent resistance in Denmark during World War II, the Solidarity movement in Poland, and the downfall of Pinochet in Chile. It is fasinating to see the different processes used in each situation. Historically, socially and politically as well as the spiritual components, you see how non-violent resistance is "a force more powerful."

I also found it was just what I needed as I prepare for this trial. I realized this trial is not so much about my defense. Really, there is nothing I need to defend. It is more giving voice to the changes needed to end torture and violence. I know some folks see what I did as "just breaking the law". But sometimes "breaking the law" is necessary because the laws may unwittingly foster violence. Allowing SOA/WHINSEC to exist is contributing to violence, to the unjust forgein policies we have toward Latin America. It is bigger than soldiers murdering citizens, though this is a huge part of it. While I am sure the action of trespassing onto Fort Benning will not in and of itself close SOA, it contributes to the other actions. One thing I learned is that non-violent resistance is a community action. It is not the action or idea of one person but of community. So each person who takes any action for peace, who desires to "disarm" themselves are contributing to the non-violent revolution. There was a priest in that DVD who said, "What is gained through violence, must be maintained through violence." This is so true! We do this in Iraq and throughout the world, don't we? So I wonder, what would it be like if people, lots and lots of people, in lots and lots of cities, sat in front of the Congresspersons offices, in front of military recruitment offices, in front of lawmakers offices in DC. If hundereds and thousands of us spoke in one voice, "NO"...I just wonder! I dream of this day. I hope I live to see it. Because the fear that Pinochet spread to keep people "in line" in Chile is happening here. Fear paralizes and holds hostage while the courage to stand up to the fear iberates. That is the Force more Powerful! May we have the courage to disarm ourselves and our society.

Date for Peace makers community Dinner

2007-01-19T11:22:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone, I just wanted to jot off a quick note. I had this idea in December to have a dinner where folks who want to support my family should I go to jail, could meet one another. Well, I thought I could pull it off in January before I went to trial and found I could not. So I through out a couple of dates in Feb....someone suggested to ask Hartford Coffee Company if I could use their space. So I called Shannon and she graciously said, "Sure"

Now I wanted to see if Feb 18th when they close I think around 6:00 would be ok? I will bring Indian food and if anyone wanted to bring something to share we could share. I want to celebrate all the peace makers in this community! My action is just one act...there are tons of peace makers who are praying, offering monetary support, who listen to my fears and tears, who have offered to continue schooling my kids and cooking should I get jail time. I want to celebrate all of this because all these actions are drops in the same bucket! No act is greater or more important than another. So let's share a meal, talk, dance, and just enjoy this vast community! I would have this at my house but I don't know how many folks will show up, that is how wide and broad and wonderful this community is. I know there could be just a few or a whole coffee house full but anyhow, I want to honor each of you, gather us all and thank you somehow. So please, let me know either by posting on this blog or emailing me at cbuschnema@yahoo.com to let me know if this is possible for you. I need to let Shannon know before I go to trial, so if you can please respond by the 25th of Jan.

Thanks so much.

Tina

Inviting my fears to a "TEA".

2007-01-18T04:17:00.000-08:00

My mom sent me this piece on Malachi... "Malachi 3:3 says: "He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver." > This verse puzzled some women in a Bible study and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God. > > One of the women offered to find out the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible Study. > > That week, the woman called a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining Silver. > > As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities. > > The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot; then she thought again about the verse that says: "He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver." > She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. > > The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If> the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed. > > The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, "How do you know when the silver is fully refined?" > > He smiled at her and answered, "Oh, that's easy -- when I see my image in it." > > If today you are feeling the heat of the fire, remember that God has his eye on you and will keep watching you until He sees His image in you. > > This very moment, God is watching over you. And, whatever you're going through, you'll be a better> person in the end."

As I said, my mom sent me the above little piece. It seems that just when I am like at the end of the line, not sure which way to turn and wondering if I am really cut out to be doing what I am about just now, then something like this comes along. I think it amazing that God or Grace or what ever you call this spiritual living that is going on all around us, I just think it amazing to be held to the fire. It is an honor when you stop and think about it. Doesn't all feel so wonderful at the time on days such as yesterday, but as a friend says a lot, "All is good."

I wanted to share something that happened this morning. Sarah, my middle daughter met me at the top of the stairs at like 4:30am this morning. She said she couldn't sleep. So I snuggled her into my bed and we talked. She said she had a dream that this person was chasing her and some other girls. She called it a "bad dream". We talked about the dream being about her and not about some "guy". I told her (I was really telling myself too) that maybe what was chasing her is something trying to get her attention. We talked about her scared feeling as the time for me to go to trial gets closer. I told her that feelings are part of her and that she can invite them in to have a "tea" or she can try to shut the door on them and shoo them away, in which case they will keep on knocking to get in because they belong to her too. So sometimes they might "chase" her to get her attention. We talked about "safe" people to talk about her feeling with in case I am gone. The list of folks is as long as my arm. For me, as her mom, I am so grateful to this community of friends who "mother" me and can also "mother" Sarah should I be away. I find my kids teach me so much about life and living. I worry about them, how they will fair and how to take care of them...Then I laugh because really it does "take a whole village to raise a child." We in this culture, with our rugged individualism, live with a myth that we can take care of everything and don't need community...but really, we so need community and we need the "village" to help us raise up this next generation of peace makers!

2007-01-17T15:20:00.000-08:00

I am finding it is the simple things that trigger anxiety or fear. The small thing today is this is the time of year, my mid winter ritual,when I go through seed cataloges to plan my gardens for the spring and summer. As I was looking at lettuce, picking which ones I would order when I realized, "Hey, I might not be here for spring planting time." Gosh this is getting way too real. Small thing, a bunch of seed cataloges...the big things I can see coming, the small things blind side me.

But then as I am fretting about missing tilling the soil with the "new/old" tiller, I get a letter from a friend that encourages me, lifting me out of the doldrums. If I am sent to prison, maybe my kids can plant the spring veggies and send pictures. I think that would satisfy my need to work the earth.

My statement to the Judge Faircloth...

2007-01-17T04:19:00.000-08:00

I think I have what is close to the final verision of my statement to the Judge and JAG lawyers. I guess there is always room to tinker but this is, I think the points I want to make.

Your Honor, JAG Lawyers, Mr. Prosecutor,

When I first began to compose my thoughts for today I was going to share with you my views and opinions of why WHINSEC should close. Then I figured you probably know the argument better than I do having listened to my friends year after year. So I just want to share with you a short story. I think it will illustrate the reason I crawled through the fence, mingled the earth of Honduras with the red clay of Georgia, and carried with me the cross of a young Honduran man, the brother of a friend of mine. His name was Jose Eduardo Lopez, and he is one of the Desaparecidos.

While preparing for final vows in the religious community I belonged to at the time, I asked to join one of our sisters who lived in a refugee camp called Mesa Grande. Situated on the border of Honduras and El Salvador, this camp housed hundreds of children, women and men who had fled the violence of civil war in their own country. Sir, I listened to their stories of how they were shot at in the dead of night as they tried to cross the river. Tearfully the woman recounted the scenes of how the bullets ripped through their children’s bodies as the helicopter gun ships sprayed machine gun fire from the air. Listening to their stories had consequences for me.

I played with the children everyday. Dressed as a clown, I played with puppets and kicked a homemade soccer ball around with them. Their huge smiles and even more huge eyes captured my heart and again bore consequences for me.

Sir, one of the reasons foreign nationals were there was because refugees were being taken at gun point from the camp. Since refugees can not leave the confines of the camp, they had no way to let the world know what was happening to them. Part of our job was to just be present and tell the outside world what was happening. The grief I witnessed when someone would turn up missing had consequences for me.

One day, I was walking from one camp, situated on a hillside to a second camp which was located on an opposite hill. Between the camps ran a long valley. As it had rained the night before, I was paying close attention to my feet so as not to slide down the muddy hillside. I remember how I cursed at the mud, the constant rain and my inferior sandals.

At one point I stopped to see where I was and how far I had to go. Sir, what I saw caused my heart to race. I had accidentally run into a group of armed mercenaries who were a few yards away. I couldn’t run because of the slippery mud and I couldn’t scream because nothing would come from my mouth. The clicking sound I heard as they readied their guns even today sends jolts of fear through my body. I remember the grim look on their brown, sun hardened faces, their muddy boots and their drab green uniforms and hats. At some point I closed my eyes hoping they would not rape me before they killed me. The terror that ran through me is difficult to describe. I thought I would be killed. I didn’t want to die and I had no way to defend myself. When I think of this today, sometimes I tremble inside seeing the images in my mind.

After a while, I opened my eyes and they were gone. My legs gave out and I sank to the ground covered with the mud I had tried so hard to avoid earlier. I can’t explain why they did not take me; maybe they were as surprised to see me as I was to see them. But those feelings of terror, which so many people experience when they face someone with a gun are still indelibly etched into my mind. Facing those soldiers and the guns had consequences for me then and still do today. I survived the terror and I can give it a voice. So many thousands of innocent men, women and children did not survive and their voice was silenced. My act of civil disobedience on November 19 is for me, simply a consequence of living with and loving people.

I would like to close with a quote from Reinhold Niebuhr. He says, "Nothing that is worth doing can be achieve in our lifetime;therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is trueor beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediatecontext of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone;therefore we must be saved by love."Thank you, Your Honor.

This Interconnected Web of Peace

2007-01-16T15:02:00.000-08:00

Today I met with three marvelous women. Diana, Beth and Barb...It is amazing to me how there are no strangers in this journey...Only friends who continue to introduce themselves to me. Old friends call to offer support and new friends introduce themselves to offer support. The word "overwhelmed" in the best sense of the word comes to mind. I am convinced that there are no considneces...just sign posts.

I "found" this book called "Lines in the Sand" at the City libriary. It is written for kids (older ones as some of the poems and stories are a bit graphic). It is writings on peace and war from various folks...international flavors to be sure. Anyhow there is one poem I want to share because it sums up for me what I have been experinecing lately.

13 Ways of Looking at Peace by April Halprin Wayland

"It is a historic milestone of immense proportions. Is has never happened before, never in human history, and it is happening now, every day, every hour, waging peace through a global conversation." paraphrased from a March, 2003 speech by Dr. Robert Muller, former Assistant Secretary General of teh United Nations, now Chancellor Emeritus of the University of Peace in Costa Rica.

Passing cherry blossoms in Washington, D.C.
a cab driver teaches the chorus of a peace song

to the woman with freckled arms from Malibu,
who gives him a big tip and runs up the hotel stairs
two at a time
to write a letter to the editor

who tilts back in his squeaky chair and reads it
by the light from his arched window and then publishes
her letter

which my uncle Chucky reads in Anchorage,
inspiring him to write a peace poem on the blackboard.

which Ruthie reads, whispering to herself twice,
then copies down on a notebook paper,
folds, puts in her back pocket,
and when she gets home, smoothes out and emails

to Renee in Sweden
who !!!!loves!!!! it and immediately !!!!forwards!!!! it
to Finley in Hong Kong, Alice in New York,
Fadi in Beirut, Lyra in Moscow,

and Bruce near Netanya
who reads it at a candlelight vigil by the beach

which is broadcast to Saralee in Buenos Aries
(petting Spartacus, who is shedding all over the bed),

who phones Ross, telling him to turn on the radio,
good old Ross, who is eating soft vanilla ice cream
as he listens,
Ross, who takes out a napkin and his guitar,
and turns it into a song.

"This" Dr. Muller says, "is a miracle. This is what waging peace looks like."

My friends, this is what has been happening this last year. It probably has been happening and I just didn't know it but now I do and darn, if I understand it but the connections, like Diana said today in her example of the spider web vibrations, well, they are endless and wonderous and so varied. Literally, we will disarm the world...one by one, we disarm ourselves which touches the heart of the jailer, or the judge or the soldier or even a President...and the world changed.
We are each part of the whole. Such an important and precious part we are! I am so honored to be part of the journey.

January 15th Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

2007-01-15T12:45:00.000-08:00

I took the Sarah and Charu to the Martin Luther King Day march. We marched about five blocks then took the car up the march route to watch from the street. I want my girls to understand the cost of freedom. So often it seems that freedom means I can do what I want, which is true in some respects. But I want them to know that freedom is not just about being able to do what you want. Freedom is something inside you too. Freedom is what Dr. King tried to live out. I think about that as I face this upcoming trial in GA. The type of freedom Dr. King had is an internal freedom that comes with facing his own violences and disarming himself. Then he could honestly speak up boldly and with compassion and love. He understood that no one wins unless we all win. It is not a battle us against them. It is a matter of disarming myself and living this love boldly.

I am working on my statement to the Judge Faircloth. It is simply a story I want to share. It is the story of facing the guns of the mercenaries and the consequences of love. Stories, especially true stories, seem to disarm folks. We all have stories to tell. I didn't remember this story for a long, long time. I guess it was too scary. Gosh, when I did remember it, I was scared. But I wanted to share this story because it happens everyday...the story of the defenseless facing the powerful. All too often those who are defenseless are silenced. I want to tell the story for all those silenced. There is this vast cloud of witnesses whose names we do not know but who walk with us. I know this sounds a bit vauge and out there but it is as real as your hand in front of your face. It happens everyday...So I don't have anything new or profound to share. The profundity is in the simplicity of the story.

I guess I could go in and lecture the judge, or try to at least. I could tell him everything that is wrong with SOA/WHINSEC. But I think he knows. At least for the past 10 years he has heard the arugment. I will not be found not guilty so this is not about my defense. It is simply telling a story that happened to happen to me and it is a story that has happened to thousands upon thousands of folks in Latin America and throughout the world.

I really pray for the soldiers who pull the triggers, who maime and kill...because the damage killing someone does to your heart must be deep and wide. To live with the screams, the dying, the crying. To see the pain and know they inflicted it. That must be a great burden to carry. I know they did something wrong and the poor person they shot and killed, their family who grieves also has pain and suffering...but the soldier is a person too. They have feelings and dreams and fears as well. I want to try to love them as well. I hope I tell the story to disarm them too.

I will try to write everyday through out these days leading up to and after the trial. I have never been on trial before so I am a bit anxious. I think it's normal. Just so I can move beyond the nerves to calm. That is my prayer.