When I was in prison…You visited me

From Judy Tretheway’s web log

My programs on B Yard last Wednesday were cancelled. A couple of serious incidents had happened earlier that morning and while everything got sorted out…nothing was happening.

Thursday morning I was able to get into C Yard. A couple of my serious students have been on lock-down since the first part of March. I have been priming myself to go and visit them in their cells, and today seemed to be the day…

After class I called the Cell Blocks to get permission to come and then went first to visit B. He is the guy with the keen interest in the I-Ching and we were studying # 10 “Treading the Tiger” together. Unfortunately, he had lost his I-Ching during a cell search. He was very surprised to see me and it took us a bit to find our rhythm talking together it front of the guards and guys back in their cells. We only had 5-10 minutes because we were holding up the showers for the rest of the guys. He had been continuing to practice and had a couple of questions about some moves. I shared some handouts on meditation techniques and the Tao de Ching verses he had missed.

He had used the Freedom Within Handout I had given him and written out for some Buddhist information. He had questions about getting distracted during meditation. I had not seen his teaching materials, so coached him from a general point of view…keep turning around and starting over…that’s all any of us can do … he wanted to know how to build a good habit…oh more time would have been nice … But we had to part …

While we were talking we enjoyed plenty of good eye contact, and most of what seemed to be communicated was non-verbal. Myself, it was a deep privilege to be received as his teacher, and to trust his own take on the encounter would be guided by god.

The other man was in a Cell block on the other side of the Yard … I stood at that door knocking for quite some time … waiting … knocking … finally a guard walking by told me to rap on the door with my keys … that worked … the only guard I could see was talking to a couple of men, he told me I could go up to R’s cell door …

He was inside watching TV, his neighbors playing music and talking. He was very surprised to see me. We tried to talk through the Plexiglas, but I could not hear anything. He gestured to the crack at the edge of the door. When I stood there we could each see another’s eyeball, and hear a little better. I could hand him some of the class handouts (Chapters from Roger Jahnke’s the Healing Promise of Qi. He remembered my husband’s surgery and wanted to know how he was. R. had been teaching his younger cellie some of the movements before he got transferred. Now he has a cell to himself and told me that he is practicing. They have no idea how long they will be “down”.

Why I make these things such big steps … I don’t know … once the first one is over and the big uncertainty decommissioned … I can claim the bigger picture of the divine dance we are all stumbling through in our own ways … and proceed with all the smaller uncertainties …

Old Folsom was locked down… No program there. One program out of four this week. Better luck next week.

Thank you to all of you watching over me. I can feel your presence.

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Ways to Support: Program support funds for handout materials, books and music. Funds for the printing and mailing the Freedom Within handout. Support for my vision of a Contemplative Practices calendar to distribute inside for 2006. Donations are managed and tax-deductible through Sacramento Friends Meeting CA 95833 Please indicate “For Judy’s prison ministry.”