Prison Letters I

I was in the house this afternoon and heard the hose turn on. It's too cold for water balloons, so I went out back to see what was going on. Dawn was out there washing an old beige Toyota Camry on the parking pad.

"Hey, is that your car?" I asked.

"Yeah." She got it last week. Her dad got for $300. He had actually sold it but she told him she needed transportation to her Saturday morning science class at Kelly, and he got it back and gave it to her. It's got a problem with the steering but he's fixed it up as best he could, I gather.

We talked for a little while. She is being more serious about going to school and coming home at night by 10 p.m., at least on school nights. She is thinking about going to Washburne after graduation but her GPA is too low to qualify for scholarships. I suggested she might want to do a year of regular coursework at Daley or Kennedy-King (I bet she'll place into remedial classes) but said she should talk to Alfredo.

She and her mom were going to visit Julian at Cook County Jail--today is his visiting day. They can take a letter in and hold it up to the glass for him to read, so I ran in the house and wrote a quick note.

Dear Julian,

I hope you are doing OK. I pray for you a lot. Sorry I haven't come to visit--it's hard with work. Talk to your brother Joey. I'm worried about him. I'll write again soon.

Love and God bless you,
Maritza

Dorothy wrote me a letter from Cook County--I got it earlier this week. I haven't decided what to do about it, and right now it's buried in papers so I can't find it. The first thing I thought when I read it was, "I have to post this." So when I get through sorting out paper around here I'll post it for you all to read.