Family, Friends It has been a long time since I have written and Cindy asked if I would jot some things down. It has been rough here the last few days. It seems that these times of unrest and deep sadness happen about a week ahead of some sort of milestone. Cindy has been greatly affected and it is difficult to watch someone who loved Erik so well feel this way. I know this will pass shortly if not already. The Anniversary coming up is his release from jail 1 yr. ago on Jan. 26. Erik had been looking at 7-8 yrs. in prison but ended up getting 90 days in county jail and 1 yr. probation. During his time in jail I would put minutes on my phone so that he could call and talk to us. It seemed like we would talk once a day for 15 minutes and I can still hear him say, Hey Pop, hows it going. You have no idea how much I miss hearing him say that. The phone system would tell you when you had one minute left. Once that would happen and we would start wrapping up the phone call. Most importantly he wanted to make sure he told me, Love Ya Pop. The closer to release date the conversations changed. I would be trying to nail down details of a care plan, agreeing on rules and giving him reality based expectations of life after jail and life in recovery. Sometimes he would talk about it, other time he would be irritated about something in the jail and sometime he was excited like a kid at Christmas. That last day he didnt eat anything because he hated the food and he also gave all his belongings to other inmates. I was at the jail at midnight to pick him up, when he walked out he turned to the jail and waved goodbye to his fellow inmates. They would stay awake and beat on the windows when they saw him walk out. I gave him a hug, gave him a warm jacket and his cigarettes and when he got in the car the first thing he did was show me the tattoo of our names over his heart. He was smiling ear to ear. He then proceeded to tell me about the tattoo machine he made inside jail. He made it sound so easy and he just laughed about. I was amazed and proud of how he made something good out of a bad situation. My hope is that the machine is still being used and hidden from the guards. He was the hero of his pod and said he would walk past the cell that was the tattoo studio on any given day and the guys would call out his name and he would smile and chuckle to himself. Its quite something when you can talk about your son with pride about his jail time. We then headed to Waffle House for our celebration meal. It was glorious, I was with my son again and the biggest thing of all was, we had HOPE. This was the best I had ever felt about this, and this wasnt our first rodeo. I told him I would give him a safe place to live, a job, food and all the love he needed. It wasnt perfect but it was all we could give him. Sometimes thats the thing that hurts the most, losing him when it seemed like it was really going to be better this time. In the end he really won and we were left with this new life we had to adapt to. This will never feel normal to me. Sometimes I still lose my breath when I realize this isnt a bad dream. There is no guarantee that this year will be better than last year. It could be worse. Its out of our control. Totally. There are a lot of people that have it worse than us. This is nothing, but its enough. I am glad that I got to pick him up from jail and see that look of freedom on his face. He knew that feeling was fleeting and all kinds of torment and hell were around the corner. He fought it the best he could. We joined him in the battle and stood with him. We will always be thankful for some great life that we shared with Erik those last few months. I take every tear I shed for Erik very seriously. They are the most honest tears that have ever run down my cheek. I cant wait to see him again someday and cry tears of joy.
Posted on: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 04:05:58 +0000