The Long Walk

  I love the color orange.  So many delightful things come in this happy, bright color.  Pumpkins, flowers, some birds, orange juice.... I've learned it also is the color of County Jail outfits.  Nothing can prepare you for seeing your loved one in an orange jumpsuit.  Such a happy color given to such a sad institution.  We visited Toby one time while he was in county jail...well the first time.  I had never visited a person behind bars.  Would I get to hug him?  Would I get to at least sit by him?  Can we bring him things?  Will I get yelled at for not following the rules?  Will we get down there (2 hour drive) and they will tell us we can't see him?  How long do we get to visit?  Will it be long enough?  Too long? We faced a weird glass window/mirror when we walked in.  The deputy behind the glass could see us but we couldn't see him.  It felt very wizard behind the ...

  A Brick to the face is really the only way to describe how I felt when my daughter in-law called on a cold December night.  I'm always amazed at people that can remember exactly the date and time their life changed forever.  I can't do that.  I can tell you I was sitting in my favorite chair watching a movie with my absolutely wonderful husband when the phone rang.  It was our daughter in-law.  Oh Fuck here we go again.  Toby (not his real name) our son and her must have had another fight.  Hubby had the phone on speaker and in a split second our life changed forever. Toby had sexually abused their 4 year old daughter.  Sound disappeared.  Vision got cloudy.  But it felt like having a pro baseball player throw a very large brick strait at my face or perhaps better put, to my heart.  In that one sentence, I knew life would never be the same.  With that one phone call, my life, their life, our families ...

  I didn't really know what to call this blog.  I do know that this has been and will be a "long walk". I'm not even sure I should be blogging about it.  It's such a taboo topic in our world.  The topic causes the most emotion...even in strong masculine men.  It's primal.  It's gut wrenching.  It causes people to say things that they never would normally.  It causes such a visceral stomach twisting reaction in almost everyone.  I wanted to write a blog though because so many are affected when something like this happens.  So many families are imploded and destroyed and just changed.  Yet because the topic is so 'Ick" and causes such a visceral reaction in the regular population, there is so help for the families.  There is very little sympathy.  Don't get me started on books...there are no books on how to help a family, an individual or a parent when this happens to them.  Yet it affects the whole family.  I know...