Acts of Mercy

Some people who know me and the blog know that for about 2 1/2 years I’ve been writing to someone on death row in North Carolina. There is a Sister who is a Benedictine Oblate with Saint John’s Abbey, where I am an Oblate, who works to make sure death row inmates in North Carolina are matched with pen pals. North Carolina’s system is particularly fraught, and there are a number of men there serving unjustly harsh sentences.

I have been quite lucky in being matched with Robby. He is an excellent writer and a committed correspondent. His letters are sweet and upbeat. I’ve also gotten to know his friend Timmy (the diminutive names seem characteristic of the kind of stunted development that comes with decades in an institution like this). Robby takes care of Timmy, working on his behalf to get him glasses and using their meager resources to put together makeshift burritos for a Super Bowl party.

Early on, it was clear that the correspondence was a kind of job for Robby. It is essential for him to be engaged with people outside the prison, for his sense of being a self in the world but also for things he needs. There is no avenue to make any money on North Carolina’s death row. Relatives, lawyers, and friends send money to purchase everything from aspirin to stationery and stamps. You can’t send anything into the prison, except books (and only books) through amazon.com. I tried including a box of envelopes for him one time with a book of haiku, but the envelopes were confiscated. Four times a year the inmates can purchase food, pretty crappy and quite overpriced food, from a “Food Order.” For this, the friends and family pay an infuriating $6 fee no matter the size of the care package. Robby’s lawyers purchase his order twice a year and I told him I would purchase them the other two times a year.

Last year Robby decided he wanted to offer one of his care package options to his friend Timmy, who is quite a low functioning guy and has not a single contact outside of prison. I said I couldn’t buy for both of them but could increase the amount and buy a single order for either one of them twice a year. The food packages provide them an option when the food being served is actually inedible or, like the Super Bowl or a birthday party, for a special occasion. And again, these orders break my heart for the poor quality of options and the prices.

Timmy’s first order was for six packages of good quality instant coffee ($4 each for $24). I increased the order to eight. What can one do?

I knew my news would be tough for Robby. His aunt, the last major family connection in his life, died last year. In fact, I owed him a letter and in the middle of that first night before the diagnosis, thinking I might be whisked away the next day for a surgery, I did two things. I packed a bag for the hospital and I wrote a letter to Robby, telling him why I might not be in touch for a while.

We have since exchanged two letters. I send him my blog posts and updates with a letter. He and Timmy sent a card right away, and he has written, urging me to hang in there and keep my spirits up, telling me about his mother’s and inmates’ chemo experience. And in the last letter, he wrote this:

I am not gonna send an order form for Timmy’s Summer food package because he and I both want you to get better. That is our main concern at this point. There is not a day that goes by that he and I are not thinking of you and praying for you.

I asked him in my last letter to please send the order– everyone has been so generous to me and it would be my pleasure to be generous to them. But tell me, who is practicing the corporal acts of mercy here?