Christmas in a cage - Death Row Holiday

 - Written bij Mike in December 2009 -

Growing up in a large family Christmas was always celebrated in the traditional Norman Rockwell style with many brothers and sisters both older and younger than myself, the excitement and anticipation of Christmas began immediately after Thanksgiving, when dear old dad would pull out all the holiday lights from the cardboard boxes concealed in the attic and spread them out across the floor as us kids would compete with each other to find any burnt out bulbs that needed replacing. Once that task was completed, it would be an honor to hold the long strands of lights as dad balanced precariously on a ladder nailing them along the roof overhangs, then as if by magic seemingly always just at the right moment as darkness began we would all gather to watch as they came to life. In that moment of unified silence the Spirit of Christmas became one with us.

                                           

Then would come the tree. Never but never an artificial tree, not in our house. Even in the years when there would barely be enough money for food, there was always a large freshly cut evergreen tree, with the scent of pine filling the room. Boxes of beautiful antique ornaments handed down through the generations would be carefully unwrapped and meticulously placed in just the right spot with rows of tiny flashing multicolored lights accented by a million strands of silver and gold tinsel, almost each strand carefully dropped over the branches by us kids leaving the lower part of the tree with significantly more than the harder to reach upper branches, but no body even complained.

This majestic Christmas tree would always be up no later than the first week of December and then brightly wrapped boxes would begin to appear beneath the tree. That was the Christmas tease that has tormented children through the ages… What could possibly be in these beautiful boxes? Of course, children being children, we would all find a way to ever so very carefully steal a peek in that one of two particular box with our name only to almost without exception discover that the box contained nothing more than clothes. Silly kids – we already knew that only Santa Claus brought the good stuff and that wouldn’t happen until Christmas Eve.

                                           

Each Christmas Eve all of us kids would be herded off to bed early and given a stern warning that soon Santa Claus would be near and he’d know for sure if we weren’t sleeping. Of course we couldn’t sleep but each of us in our own way did our very best to pretend to as we each fantasized about what Santa might leave us. The hours would pass slowly – very, very slowly – until the early morning hours when dad would open the bedroom doors, releasing us from our rooms with the excited announcement that Santa had come and we would all rush into the living room and stand in awe at the piles and piles of presents that had been left beneath the tree.

With so many kids all anxious to rip open these gifts, controlling the chaos was the first priority. With the barely contained excitement of a child himself, dad would reign over the distribution of the presents, picking one box at a time and loudly calling off the name of each. In that large circle all our eyes would be gleaming in silent anticipation as we each awaited our name to be called. Then quickly pouncing forward when it was, to claim our gift and retreat behind the lines to rip it open. Soon enough the living room would be overcome with haphazardly discarded boxes and wrappings but nobody seems to really notice.

No matter what each of us received in that moment of time it became our entire world. Of course there would be the obligatory clothes, which were inevitably piled neatly to the side, to be collected later. Although we seldom got the toys we really wanted – apparently Santa Claus had a cash flow problem and couldn’t afford the most popular toys – what we got quickly made us forget about what we thought we wanted and the joy of receiving those gifts overcame any disappointment.

                                                

Looking back, I can’t recall even being disappointed at not receiving what I thought I wanted, as what I got always seemed to be even better. That’s why I knew even long after other kids my age gave up that Santa had to be real; dad couldn’t possibly afford all those wonderful presents. Only too many years later did I realize how much he would willingly sacrifice each year to make Christmas special, working long hours at the steel plant and even pawning off his few prized possession as nothing was ever allowed to break the sanctity of Christmas.

Soon after all the gifts were unwrapped we would be forced to set them aside and retreat back into our rooms to dress in our Sunday best then pile in the station wagon for a drive to the Christmas service. Even the thought of resisting this ritual seemed silly – marching into church as a family each Christmas morning was as much a part of Christmas as Christmas itself even of we didn’t fully understand the spiritual implications of Christmas at that time. But even as the priest administered the solemn sermon, already our thoughts were on the fest that would soon follow.

Within a few hours we were home again. The Christmas Spirit filled the house with a joyous mood as Christmas carols played endlessly on the record player and our attention turned from the gifts we already received to plots of pilfering the table piled high with cakes and candies laid out for guests that might drop by. With military precision us kids would band together and recon the living room then slowly sneak our way towards that table and careful not to let our presence be known, our little heads would pop up quickly as our hands reached for that morsel of sweet goodness and then a quick retreat would be made.

                                                  

As all the dishes of cookies, candies, and cakes would slowly disappear the smell of Christmas dinner would fill the house. Without exception Christmas dinner would be provided with abundance in the traditional style with all the trimmings and the family would gather around the expanded table and eat. This was the one meal when no matter how dysfunctional the family was the rest if the year, we were truly family for that one meal. But then it would too soon be over and that one special day became only a memory.

These memories continue to be my Christmas and have become my ritual. Merle Haggard once sung a song about a man turning 21 in prison doing life without parole. My own ballad would not be that much different. I’ve never had another Christmas since leaving home. At 46 years old, this is now my twenty-sixth Christmas in a cage; the past 23 Christmas’ have been spent condemned to death in a cage on death row.

It is the Christmas of the past that remains my Christmas of the present. Being condemned to death I am not allowed to celebrate Christmas in any traditional sense. In the early years I would anxiously await the Christmas cards from family and friends, then hang each upon my cell wall and share the Spirit of Christmas with the few who chose to remember me. But as the years slowly passed the cards became fewer and fewer, even most of my brothers and sisters have now long forgotten me and given me up as dead. Although I remain blessed by a few special friends who make a point of sharing their Christmas Spirit with me, the friends too slowly drift away and become fewer and fewer.

Many years ago when I first came to death row we were allowed to celebrate Christmas and it was something we looked forward to. Each December we would be allowed to receive two packages from the outside world containing various necessities such as winter clothes, a pair of shoes, cosmetics and toiletries, and even a nice watch or ring. Then the Christmas meal would be traditional style, real turkey with all the trimmings and various pieces of cakes and pies. But then conservative politicians found out about the “special treatment” given to prisoners at holidays and made political careers by campaigning against these things. One by one every holiday privilege was eliminated and out of vindictive malice and spite the Spirit of Christmas was banned from prisons.

                                               

Where I once proudly displayed the few cards I’d receive on my otherwise barren grayish beige wall, I am now prohibited from doing so. Up until a few years ago I had a photo of a beautiful Christmas tree I’d tape to my back wall above my sink until one Christmas Eve a guard made an issue of it. I was ordered to remove it, but refused. A few hours later as I was taking a shower that guard went into my cell and removed that picture – ripping it into small pieces then throwing it into my toilet. That one small semblance of Christmas I so cherished was lost forever as that Spirit of Christmas was overcome by malice and spite.

Now each Christmas becomes more depressing as I become even more isolated from that world outside. Too often my thoughts now turn to my own kids and grandkids and wishing I could spend just one Christmas with them. All my own children are now grown, but I can only imagine the joy on my grandson’s face as he anxiously rips open the brightly wrapped box containing the small gift a friend so generously sent in my name.

Then I think of all the others here and in prisons across the country who like me can only think of Christmas’ past, as the Christmas of both present and future no longer even hold the hope of what the true Spirit of Christmas is about. I remain blessed by the few cards I will receive, but know that many others around me won’t get a card at all. There will be no Christmas sweets and treats. There will only be the same cold, barren walls and the sound of silence as each of us retreat into our own dreams of what once was and most likely will never be again.

So, this Christmas I ask you to remember what the true Spirit of Christmas really is as we gather to celebrate the birth of a men condemned to death for our sins, that through His condemnation each of us equally were given the gift of Hope. If those of us who claim to be Christian cannot actually be Christians on Christmas, then when can we be?

                                           

What would Jesus do of He were to celebrate Christmas today? I’d like to think that He would reach out to the lowest of the low and share hope with those condemned to death; that in the true Spirit of Christmas, in the true Spirit of Christ. Especially those condemned would not be forgotten.

To both friend and stranger equally the same, I say… Merry Christmas!!!

Michael Lambrix

Ghosts of Christmas Past

In the world renowned classic Christmas story “The Christmas Carol”, crabby old Scrooge was visited upon by the Ghost of the Christmas Spirit. Perhaps this tale touches each of us in it’s own way as we too each find ourselves reflecting upon what once was and what might have been if only our lives had taken a different turn at a particular fork in the road at some point so many, many moons ago.

As I write this, it is Christmas day, 2009. A with each Christmas now for over a quarter of a century I sit in a solitary cell on Florida’s death row. It has become a world of loneliness and despair, of overwhelming sense of abandonment and regret that I have become only too familiar with – a virtual hell that neither body or mind can ever truly escape from as once one has descended into the “bowels of the beast” it becomes branded forever on your soul as a never ending nightmare that one will never awaken from.

But the manmade hell of steel and stone have become the only world that I know now and although the eternal nightmare is as constant as the sun rising with each day, on some days it becomes worse and today is one of those days. Today I will again struggle with the ghosts of Christmas and find myself tormented and haunted by what once was and what might have been, if only.

Growing up in a large family, Christmas as I remember was always a traditional event. I can still recall the anxiety of awaiting Santa Claus when I was a child and smile at the memories of threats of getting put on that feared “naughty” list. More often than not for getting caught eating the Holiday cookies and treats that were always prepared and laid out on the dining room table, supposedly for the guest that might visit – but they knew that us kids would find a way to sneak the treats just at that moment when no one was watching, then quickly retreat to a hidden corner to savor the fruit of our labor.

Along the fireplace mantle, stockings would hang empty, each with our names written in glittering gold and to the nearby corner would stand a brightly lit classic Christmas tree, with the antique ornaments and flashing colored lights and ribbon of silver and gold tinsel laced upon the evergreen branches – and the on top an angel with her fragile wings spread and angelic head bowed but always watching from above.

Each Christmas Eve the ritual would repeat itself. Each of us kids would invent excuses to stay up as long as possible but inevitably march off to bed for fear that Santa Claus would not come. And fight it off as we might soon enough we would surrender to exhaustion and slip off to sleep – only to be awoken in the early morning hours with that scream that every child anxiously awaited to hear – “Santa’s come, Santa’s come!!” and suddenly as if on cue all of us kids would jump from our beds and run into the living room and be ready to receive the gifts we waited so long for.

Only now, knowing what I did not know as a child when I still believed in the magical miracle that Christmas was do In now realize just how much my father struggled to preserve the sanctity of this sacred event. When I was still so young the family business was forced into bankruptcy and almost overnight we went from being a comfortable middle-class family in the suburbs of Marin County, California to living on welfare with ten kids crowded into a two bedroom farm house in rural central Florida.

But even when our whole world was turned upside down, Christmas remained the same. Looking back, I don’t know how dad did it. Although we more often than not did not get what we asked for, we were never disappointed with what we got. Now I can only smile and cherish the memories of what once was, and even to this day it brings joy to my heart when I picture all us kids gathered around that Christmas tree, each anxiously awaiting our name to be called as dad plucked one brightly wrapped gift from beneath the treat a time and by the time it was over all that could be heard was the ripping of paper and the unsuppressed excitement and joy of children that only Christmas can bring.

That was the Ghost of Christmas past, the warm memories of what once was but will never be again. Like a wisp of wind they are so quickly gone, replaced by the cold chill of the Ghost of Christmas present and the reality of where I am today.

Now I look around me on this Christmas day and I see only empty pale pastel walls around me. As I sit here in the early morning hours sipping at my barely warm cup of black coffee, there are no sounds of children or the magic of Christmas. It is just another day, a day most of us try to ignore as we don’t really want to remember that today is Christmas – and yet, how could we forget.

Christmas on death row wasn’t always so bleak. But with each year that passed those with nothing but malice and hate in their cold hearts have gone out of their way to take from us even the spirit of Christmas itself. When I first came to death row in early 1984 Christmas was something to look forward to, a time of the year when the true spirit of Christmas penetrated even the steel and stone walls of death row.

My first Christmas on death row surprised me as I did not expect the kindness and charity of those that came into the bowels of the beast to share with us. The prison would allow church volunteers to come in and then the condemned would be led in small groups into the visiting park (a large fully enclosed dining hall). A decorated Christmas tree would be put up and the tables would be laid out with all sorts of Christmas cookies and treats. Groups of church volunteers would sit in communion with the inmates for just a few moments but in those few moments the love in their hearts became the greatest gift of all. Just as quickly we would be rushed out so the next group could be brought in. As we were handcuffed and led back to our cells the voices of the volunteers could be heard singing Christmas carols, slowly fading away as we were led further and further down the main hall towards the solid steel door that would once again open up to swallow us as we descended back down into death row.

Back then our families and friends could send in two Christmas packages with items such as shoes, or winter clothes or maybe a good radio and like little children we anxiously awaited what Christmas would bring. Even the State itself would go out of its way to make Christmas special. On Christmas morning we would awake to find a bag of fruit with apples and oranges and grapes. Only on Christmas day would the whole wing awake so early and many of the radio’s would be turned in to a local station playing classic Christmas songs in which many of the men would shamelessly sing along. Up and down the floor men could be heard trading an apple for an orange, or whatever, and many would pass out candy bars bought from the canteen and the cold-blooded killers we supposedly were became cheerful Santa Clauses to those we lived among that became our only family.

By noon the holiday meal would arrive and the trustees and officers worked overtime to pass out what the kitchen had prepared, each tray overflowing with the traditional feast of turkey and stuffing with gravy and thick juicy slices of honey baked ham and cranberry sauce and yams and so much more. Then a second tray would be brought to each cell, loaded with generous slices of chocolate cake and pumpkin pie and small plastic cups of thick fudge and dried fruit cups and again the trading would begin as each of us did our best to bargain for our favorite foods and through the day we would each slowly savor every bite.

A few weeks before Christmas the prison canteen (store) would start selling real fruitcake and boxes of chocolate mints and chocolate covered cherries that quite literally melted in your mouth, and large bags of Christmas cookies and candy. Even those who had no money got something as most of us who had enough to buy a few treats looked out for those that had nothing as that’s how it was on death row back then.

But all of that is now long gone. Each little piece of what Christmas once was stripped away until nothing remained. Each year something else was taken. Most often under the pretense of “security” concerns as those who wanted prisoners to suffer invented excuses to impose their malice upon us – especially at Christmas.

What little now remains is but a shadow of what once was. They still allow volunteers to come in as they attempt to share the spirit of Christmas with us, but no longer are we allowed sitting in momentary communion with them. The few treats they are still allowed to share with us are now brought to us at our cells, but each year they are allowed to share less and less. Today is Christmas and yet it is not. There are those who would reach out with Christian compassion and charity to the condemned on this holiest of days, but they are no longer allowed to do so.

Death row has become a different place and no longer is the spirit of Christmas among the condemned. Now each of us in our own way tries to ignore the day altogether. It would be only too easy to say that I myself have become bitter and perhaps that is true. When a man spends a quarter of a century in a solitary cell then bitterness becomes inevitably. I’d like to think that I’m stronger than that but I suppose no man is.

But this really is not about me or what I’ve become as I’m not responsible for the deprivation of even the smallest act of Christian charity that has come to define death row today. Rather, this is about what we have become as a society today, where it is now no longer enough to condemn a man to death for the alleged transgression he or she might have committed. Now as a society we thrive on making the prisoner needlessly suffer and reward politicians who invent ways to inflict even greater deprivation upon those we imprison.

What I speak of today is not about me, but about what we have become as a society. The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once wrote that when a man spends his life fighting monsters, his greatest fear should not be the monster itself, but should be of becoming the monster himself. When we as a society can no longer find that measure of mercy and compassion in our hearts that presumably defined us as a Christian nation, then inevitably we will awake one day to realize that the monster that we once claimed to fight now stares back at us in our mirror. Even as much as I now might be deprived of, it is we as a society that is deprived of so much more.