Note: Many apologies from the writer’s wife… I had difficulties getting this posted until now, so it is very late. This should have been posted in early January.
“But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” – Romans 8:25
My cellie watches a TV program called “The Cleveland Show.” It’s a spin-off of “Family Guy.” If you’ve never seen these shows, that’s probably a good thing. They are crude but funny, insulting but occasionally pointed, degrading but occasionally thought provoking. If you can get past the base nature of the humor without turning off the television, then you might even laugh out loud.
On this particular episode of “The Cleveland Show,” the teenage son, Cleveland Junior, has been selling candy bars to raise money for a troubled youth orchestra. He finds out that it’s all a sham run by troubled youth to fill their own pockets with money, as they take advantage of people’s generosity to a worthy cause. As a result, Cleveland Junior loses faith in humanity and becomes jaded, angry, and cynical.
Junior’s older sister see the change in him, and describes it to another sibling this way: “Junior carried around a little candle of hope, and wrapped his hand around the flame to protect it from the winds of negativity. And everywhere he went, he had that light of optimism with him, as naive as it was. And now it’s gone. And not only is Junior worse for it, but we are too.”
And my cellie said, “That’s you cellie!”
“What?” I asked.
“That’s you,” he said again. “Your little candle. Mr. Sunshine. Never let anything get you down. Never have a bad word to say.”
It’s funny how people see you. This past week was a tough week for me. Not only are the holidays a hard time in here, but I received a setback in my appeal process. And not only did I learn about the setback, but it was also a minor story on the local TV news, which was viewed by many of my fellow inmates.
Yet even in the midst of this tough week, my cellie still sees me as the guy walking around with my little candle of hope.
Where does this hope come from? Am I just genetically predisposed to optimism? I don’t
think so. Because anyone who has spent any time with me knows that I can be a critical son of a gun who can deliver a blistering evaluation of almost anything I find annoying or disagreeable. Just get me started on corporate greed, the word-faith movement, or the DOC’s supposed “commitment to families,” and I become a nit-picking, sarcastic, hypercritical wisenheimer. (But even then I tend to temper my negativity with humor and laughter.)
So I can only attribute my hopefulness to a higher power. Take today, for example. I went to the law library to do research and tried to print two cases from the computer terminal. I then stood
beside the printer and waited patiently for a library worker to print my cases for me from the PC that functioned as a print server. I could see two library workers talking to each other. And talking. And talking. After several minutes I waved my hand to get theirattention. After another minute or two, one of the inmate workers came to help me.
“It’s not working,” he said.
“What’s not working?” I asked.
“The printer. It’s not working.”
“When will it be fixed?” I asked.
“Do you want me to lie to you or tell you the truth?”
“Lie to me?” I asked. It was a question as I wondered why he would offer to lie to me.
“Fifteen minutes,” he said, taking me to be requesting him to lie.
“But that’s a lie?” I asked.
“Yah,” he said.
Suddenly the guy seated at the computer behind me said, “Excuse me.” I turned to look at him, thinking he wanted to ask something about the printer as well. But that wasn’t it. To understand his response, you have to picture how small the law library is. Eight computers are lined up on a table with chairs pulled up to it. So you sit shoulder to shoulder while you work. The printer is at the end of the row of computers, with no real room to stand. And so I was squeezed together with the library worker in a very small space.
And Mr. Excuse-Me said, “Your ass is in my face.”
I apologized and moved away from him, taking a step towards the library worker. This put me face to face with him, and I asked, “SO what’s the truth?”
“Two or three days,” he said, backing away. “Don’t be mad at me. I’m just the messenger.” Apparently he thought my stepping closer to him was a sign of anger, instead of just moving away from ass face.
I get to go to the law library one time per week. With the holidays of Christmas and New Year’s, it could be weeks until I get back to print these cases. I tried to not be mad, but I couldfeel my frustration pulsing in my temples. So I gathered my things, left the law library, and headed back to my cell.
I sat down at my steel desk, and there was by Benedictine Daily Prayer book. I had
only gotten halfway through Lauds (morning prayer) when the CO had called line movement, and I had left for the law library. I had been reading the scriptures for Advent Week 3, and had left off in Isaiah 30, “And the Lord will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst and tempest and hailstones.” Pretty heavy wrath of God stuff tostart the morning.
But the second reading for the day, where I picked up, was Romans 8. “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.” And just like that, my little candle of hope was burning again. The reading ended with, “For in hope we were saved. Now, hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” And by thatpoint my hope light was blazing.
God knew what I needed to hear, and knew exactly when I needed to hear it. There’s a song from a few years back called “Go Light Your World.” It talks about taking your candle and lighting up thedarkness around you. My little divinely fueled hope light is not just for me — it’s for my cellie and everyone around me, as I do my best to let it shine.