A Visit to OC Jail

I'm still not ready to write much about the how and why Keven is back in jail, but I will share my experience today.  And I just need to write.  Writing is therapeutic to me.

I've visited OCJ many times (probably around 50).  It can be a very tiring and uncomfortable ordeal, or it can go really smoothly.  Usually its somewhere in between.

After parking your car, you walk across the street to the jail.  On the short walk several bailsbondmen/women approach you with their business cards.  I always say the same thing (which is true) "He had no bail".  They always say "Oh, I'm sorry".

Then you proceed inside the jail and through the metal detector.  There is a long list of things you are not allowed to bring in.  I always bring the bare minimum:  tissues and antibacterial gel (to clean the phone with), my license, car keys, and this little red book.

The little red book is where I've written things that inspire me and I read it over and over.  Also in that book are a list of 33 addicts and their parents.  I read the list just about every day and send out my prayers and positive thoughts for them. (side note:  there are 21 sons and 12 daughters, which seems to be a fairly accurate percentage of male/female addicts).

After the metal detector you walk down a long hallway and get in line for your visit.  Sometimes there are 30 people in line, sometimes three, sometimes none.  Today there were none in front of me.

You wait for your turn and give the cop behind the black tinted windows your ID and your inmates booking number.  Sometimes they ask you questions.  Today they asked how long its been since I visited this facility and I said a month or so.

Next you are assigned a number of the window you sit at to wait for your inmate to be sent for the visit.  I totally lucked out today, I had one of the best seats in the house.  First of all, its in the first row so you can see the inmates coming and going which makes the waiting a bit less boring and adds the excitement of seeing your person when they walk around the corner.  Second, my seat was up against the wall which is lovely because that means I only had to have another visitor to my left rather than be in between two people.

The visiting area is very stuffy.  There are long narrow aisles with seats on each side.   There are 25 seats in each of the five aisles.  Sometimes there are two (or more if they have kids with them) people per inmate which means up to 50 people crammed in a very tight space with no ventilation.  Its really awful on hot days.

Today it took an hour for Keven to come out.  I tried to time the visit around his lunch (at 11 am) but due to a car issue on the way up I missed that and had to wait for them to have lunch, get back to the cell, and then be called for a visit.

I passed the time by eavesdropping (well I could not help but hear she was right across from me) a woman talking to her husband who was in a special caged in area for inmates who were under protective custody. They have to keep them separate and its usually because they have strong gang affiliations, they snitched on somebody, or they are child molesters.  This dude was a child molester.  I never saw him but his wife was in her 60's and she was completely supportive of him.  It was very disturbing.

Finally my tall handsome son walked around the corner and my heart skipped a beat.  I just saw him yesterday, but it seems like a long time ago.  This time is different.  This time is serious.  He looked sad.  I've sat on those metal stools with the thick plexi-glass between us so many times.  Today was a tough visit and we didn't even talk the entire 30 minutes.  When I go alone for a visit he sometimes gets emotional, its hard for him to see me.  I could tell today he was struggling to hold back his emotions.

I tried to keep the conversation off of his situation (we discussed it first then I changed the subject).  He told me he's in a four man cell (which is not a good place to be) and that his cellies seemed nice but none of them spoke English so he knows it will be lonely.  He's picked up a lot of Spanish in recent years but not enough to engage in a real conversation.  Oh well, all the more time for him to think about his life.

We said goodbye and I always leave quickly without looking back because if I look back I will cry.  I just close my mind down and walk back out, face the bailsbondsmen again, pay for parking and get the hell out of there.





Peace, Hope and Love, Barbara