For most, Christmas is a time of holiday cheer and being close to family and friends. Regardless of religion, it's a time to be thankful and generous to friends, family, and community. Sadly, this has not been my experience in the past decade, as I've lived within the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Incarcerated since 20, it's around this time of year that I think about the meaning of Christmas. I'll be the first to say that I wasn't the first home to help decorate the tree. Perhaps I was even more focused on presents than relationships. But with age and hardship comes understanding and appreciation. It's as if I'm a rock that has been transformed by many years of dripping water. These days I think that I'm starting to appreciate the true meaning of Christmas.
As I look around my prison, a federal prison in Virginia, I see some of the trimmings of the season. Some of the guards and administrative staff have put up small, fake trees or those little snowflake stickers. There are even a few lights. And, of course, there are the two weeks of movies that will be played on the televisions; strangely very few are of a Christmas theme, including the one for Christmas day. Even the commissary has Christmas items: candy canes, peppermint mocha powder coffee creamer, and the like. But this all seems to miss the point, at least in the mind of someone who has been doing this for far too long.
As I near my 30th birthday, and have only two more years to go, I find myself yearning to be with family. How strange. Before my incarceration all I wanted to do was get away from the house and have fun (sadly, this often meant bad people, places, and things), but now all I want to do is go home and be with my folks; whom I have seldom seen these past 10 years. All I want to do is enjoy family and friends; to be loved and to love.
While I certainly put myself in this place, and accept full responsibility for my criminal actions, I still can't shake the yearning to simply be home. While the mind of a convict is anything but ideal, I think that we can all benefit from this perspective. This year, let's all take some time to appreciate those who are around us and what they mean to us. And if we dare to be so bold, let's tell one another what we think in our hearts, because there is nothing like hearing that someone cares to make the message hit home.
Like men at war, the experience away from home has left me with a sense of what really matters in this world. It's not about all of the things or baubles of the season, it's about what truly matters: family and friends. While there might not be chestnuts roasting on an open fire for me this Christmas, I'll do what I can. And this probably means a collect call home to tell my mom and dad that I love them and can't wait until that day when I can be home, enjoying the people that I've missed all of these long lost years while I've been away.