Tuesday, September 10th, 2002

Hi Leonard!

Well, I'm finally getting my next public address installment to you.  It takes a while to get access to the typewriter, so the letter spans a bit of time.  I'm going to try to call you soon.  I have a question for you- Do you have a scanner or a way to get art on the the web?  I'd like to have you scan in some of the art I've done in prison for everyone to see.

So what's all this ruckus about insufficient funds?  I wonder if it's just a ploy to be able to raise taxes, a scare tactic if you will?   Just today this prison facility alone hired 10 more guards and possibly another 10 are coming.  Fed cuts, yeah right!  You see some twisted games played from in here!

Well, I hope you and all yours are doing well.  It looks as if we'll be at war within the next 2 months.  It's a planned distraction that will be the backfire of the millennium!  It's a powder keg waiting to go off out there. 

And I'm just a spectator.  Watch and see what happens!

God Bless,
Love, Brian

permission to reprint granted

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Thursday August 15th, 2002

From one blown about by the wind that no one may know by what power he is moved and to what place he goes -

Greetings from the backside of razor wire and gun towers. I do believe I'm learning all about 'might' and it is not in the strength or power of the rifles, shotguns, micro- wave motion sensors and 'radios, radios everywhere' in this paper-based reality I'm caught in. Might is in the power of overcoming.

I have such difficulty comprehending how or why anyone would want to lock up another human being? When I am leading many peoples I will turn the prisons into hospitals and into communities of value. I make that promise right now so hold me to it :)

Here in this place I am gaining vision. I am beginning to see purpose in our plight, but it is painful to endure this cross. Oh God if You would only take it away My own pain is all consuming but I choose to also bear that of some of my brothers in here. At least I can share that and pray with and for them.

My heart has been troubled as of late. God is revealing to me what an ungodly place my heart is, full of deceit and unfaithfulness. I wonder why He allows me to exist, why would He want to call me His own? And yet to question His choosing me is yet more arrogance on my part and so I remain silent. But my heart is rent.

Yesterday I was working on the serving line in the chow hall serving up bananas and potato salad. Two officers stood directly on my left hand, one male, one female began talking to each other about their children, what they were doing with them and how their children acted etc. I was overcome with a grief I cannot express in words. My mind and body shut down, I started shaking and was unable to perform simple tasks like handing a banana to an inmate. I told them they were talking about their kids and I couldn't handle that but they said they were distracting me by talking. I said no, it's because I miss my kids so much and they laughed at me. I looked directly at them and said "I'm serious, I had my kids taken away." They just backed away from me like I was diseased. It took me 30 minutes to recover. Never in my life have I experienced this kind of shut-down, I'm always in control and Mr. Cool, Level-headed Brian but I can see I'm loosing it.

Amazingly this morning another inmate came up to me and sat with me on the grass and spoke of a similar experience. A song came on his headset that is about a child being taken away from a father. He started telling me how the video of that song had caused him to break down in county jail (it did the same to me every time I saw it in county). I then told him about yesterday's episode and his experience was exactly the same, it's simply a crippling grief. I hope all this ends soon, I'm weary and need rest. Ruth does too and so do our girls. "Father please have mercy." This letter may jump around but that's only a reflection of how I feel these days, chaotic and lacking purpose. Yet I do know there is deep purpose in all this.

Friday, August 16th, 2002

Well, I haven't really given a report on my new surroundings here in Eastern Oregon. I was carried here to EOCI (Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution) on the 22nd of July in a white state van, but not the one I'm convicted of robbing the state of Oregon of :) I enjoyed the views along the Columbia Gorge and listening to music as well as talking to other inmates. I sat next to the guy I mentioned above who had the grief episode like mine. Come to think of it, we also rode together from county jail to intake!

Strolling into this prison was really a breath of fresh air for me, freedom of movement, even outdoors! Trees, green grass and the structures themselves, stucco with red roofs, some genuine and others faked aluminum. The facility was a mental ward (and in some ways still is) built around the turn of the century but has now been converted to Oregon's cheapest incarceration outfit.

They're quite proud of cutting corners and costs as that's the first thing they bragged about in orientation, how little this facility cost compared to the others statewide. Duh, it was already built! Just to throw a few figures at you, the DOC proudly keeps the cost of food per inmate down to about $1.86 a day. I won't go into detail on how that's done for the sake of those with weaker stomachs. But I will say that working in the kitchen, I've seen some 80's expiration dates!

There are up to 1600 inmates in this facility at any given time. It is situated in a small valley in the city of Pendleton, northeastern Oregon. Most of the buildings are four stories high. I am on the second floor, and from our bathroom window I can see the freeway and the surrounding dry grassy hills. From the yard which has a softball field, large weight pile (best of all Oregon facilities) horseshoe pits and 1/4 mile track running the perimeter you can look out and see hills in two more directions. Also to be seen is a tree line along a river bank where a pair of nesting ospreys fish and feed their young one. Running behind the yard not 20 feet from the razor wire-laden fence is the heavily traveled Union Pacific mainline. On weekdays, trains go by as often as every ten to twenty minutes. The trains amazingly are controlled remotely from Omaha! But a conductor can usually be seen with his arm resting on the window sill. Everything from nuclear waste to military equipment can be seen rolling by.

God could not have put me in a better prison, for this one is well suited to my tastes. There is a large greenhouse (which I've not seen yet) where herbs and flowers are grown and then transplanted to the grounds or sold to DOC's profit. One inmate caught a three inch praying mantis the other day and then released it in the garden to feast upon the many insects there.

The prison is divided into two practically separate facilities, East and West. The west side is devoid of trees, has a poor view from its yard and houses the more hard-core prisoners. There are more fights over there etc. I am on the east side which is much easier going. I'm in a dorm where there is much more freedom of movement (west side is all cells) but the tradeoff is less privacy. 

Right now I'm temporarily in a cell with an old WWII veteran and ex-fire chief. They are painting in our dorm hence the temporary displacement. Jack and I get along quite well as we're both artists and "awake and aware" to the current situation in America. He's been incarcerated seven years now with eight more to go for a juryless conviction of murder. His prosecuting DA bragged after conviction about how he won the case with zero evidence, no body, no crime scene, no joking!

The whole case was based on his wife's "disappearance" and an anonymous note sent to Oregon State Police two months later claiming the author of the note had picked the woman up at a rest area and taken her north to visit friends. The note stated she had died from another man's injury and they dumped the body in the Columbia river. Meanwhile she has been seen in several states, has been using her own SSN and there is even an application for a warrant for her arrest! The worst thing is that prosecutors, lawyers and investigators all knew about these facts Before The Trial!!! They've been putting off his post-conviction trial since 1998. His trial is slated for the 24th of September but I wouldn't be surprised to see them postpone it one more time. There are a number of bodiless crime-sceneless convictions that Oregon doesn't want to upset, so they stall the fore-running cases to keep more prisoners whether innocent or not.

While Jack's case is a sad example of an absolute travesty of justice, there are plenty of people in here who deserve some kind of punishment for their evil done. Prison is not the way though. I've been thinking about the right way to do it. I know God wants me to work such things out so I will know in the future how to do it right.

Thursday, August 22nd, 2002

Hello again! Today I started a new job which does not drain all my time and energy like the first one did. Now I'm working in the kitchen chopping veggies and cooking our food. It's pretty laid back and slow paced, especially compared to the dining room job I'd had for the past 2 1/2 weeks where I had seven bosses for three shifts a day, five days a week. The dining room job starts at 5:00 am and doesn't finish until 7:30pm so you're always going to and from work!

Eventually I should settle into a more appropriate job, they like to use the college grads for their skills which is fine with me. 

Well, I'm doing better than I was there for a while. I'm really behind on my correspondence and I apologize to all you who've written me and not heard back yet. I will respond now that I have more free time again, Praise God :)! I've been going out to yard about every chance I get cause I know winter's kicking up and I should enjoy the sun and fair weather while I can. I'm cold blooded like a lizard and I love my sunshine, but my heart sure is warm, even in the dead of winter.

Monday, August 26th, 2002

There are some things I've been wanting to communicate to everyone but I didn't know how. Well, tonight I was writing a letter to my Ruth and in the course of writing I prayed a prayer which conveys much of what I want to tell. This is about as intimate as it gets, it's a prayer straight from my heart to God and the tears shed bear witness to it's authenticity. 

Here it is: 

"Lord my God, You know the fault in my heart as well as the splendor. You know my impatience and restlessness. I thank you for this discipline. Thank You that here is where You are bringing to pass so many promises. I feel I am at the cross, crossing over into my new life on the other side of the valley of death. I know we are going to see perilous times such as has never been upon the face of the earth. I know that You are with me every step. I have seen Your hand in my life in every detail throughout. Forgive my doubting and remember that I am but dust, Your humble stubborn sheep. Remember me in Your mercy and forget not my flesh and our little ones. You have ordered my steps from birth, keep me mindful. You direct my paths, all of them. You know all that has been and all that is to be. I do not. Reveal to me enough that I might not be overcome with grief. Show me Your Glory that I might not loose hope. You have taught me to walk by faith and not by sight. I have leaned not on my own understanding and perception, but my Hope and Trust is in You. I have not retaliated though I have been thrust clean through. I have not slandered nor lied to the detriment of those who have slandered and belied me. I am trusting that You will deliver me, that You will come and rescue me. Please do so at Your earliest convenience My Lord, for You know my sufferings and my anguish of heart. Who am I but a fatherless sojourning alien, the only son of a widow? I am least among men, frail in body, troubled in spirit, yet strong and solid despite. You chose me My Lord to be a leader of many peoples in a troublous time. Lord, let Your Glory come on the winds, on the rains, on the fires that burn and destroy raising new life in-wake. Do not turn away from this wicked wretch of a man, but lift him up out of his trouble that is too much fear him. Lord I am weak and unable to lift myself from this pit. I see Your Blessings and my heart rejoices, but I am not whole. Restore to me what has been robbed, and more. Say the Word and it will be. I have not placed my trust in riches but gave them up for You. I have not trusted in the strength of man or in his numbers, but gave them up for You. I have not trusted in my wits to deliver me out of trouble, but I lay myself down as a living sacrifice. Please Oh God, be quick to rescue. Make haste and journey out to find me here in this place, to Lift Your people high above the cares of this world as you wash and cleanse this land of the thorns and briers. Many shall perish, but the just shall live to inherit the land. Oh My God, how righteous and true You are! That You would look with mercy upon man and show him favor... Hallelujah! 'And they shall build up the old wastes, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall repair the waste cities the desolations of generations.' Now I know why it is that You have chosen me. It is that I am pure in heart for You My Lord. It's the simple child-like purity in my heart deep down that You see. Keep me faithful when You put me above so many. No not let conceit or pride grip me in my day of favor. With tears of sincerity I beg You now, do not let me turn to the left or to the right, but keep my eyes fixed on Jesus and hold my tiny heart in Your hand close to Your chest that it may not grow cold. Keep me close to Your cheek Oh Lord that I may feel the softness of it and not become hard and callous. Keep me close at hand and do not allow me to stray and I will be a faithful one all my simple days. I love You Lord, You are My Everything. Without You I am less than a worm. I need Your guidance, love and support. Please return me to my place and establish me in the place You have for me. Let Your glories reign over earth now and forever more. Amen - "