This thanksgiving I am thankful for special friendships.
The reason people become friends always intrigues me, it varies enormously and is not necessarily due to common traits or shared experiences. I am reminded this Thanksgiving of one of my most unexpected friendships. It was with an inmate in the federal prison for women in Kingston, commonly known as P4W.
Hearing I was to spend a week in Kingston, my neighbour Janet Jardine, asked if I’d drop in to meet her long-time friend, Jo-Anne Mayhew.
Janet’s introduction was “She’s the same age as you, grew up a few houses away from where you live, has two daughters, is smart, has a good sense of humour and likes to write.” Janet, as a teenager was Jo-Anne’s babysitter. Janet had not revealed that Jo-Anne was serving a life sentence for murder.
The news took me aback, but Janet assured me the murder was an accident and Jo-Anne was working toward trying for a pardon.
I wrote to Jo-Anne to introduce myself and checked with authorities about the federal prison visitor rules. After being warned that filling out a three-page personal form, being searched and frisked, were all normal procedures, I thought I was prepared.
On my arrival in Kingston as I climbed the steps to the imposing domed limestone building, P4W, I was uncertain and nervous.
Entering through gates and locked doors, greeted by officious guards with each one aggressively questioning me as to the purpose of my visit, I was finally sent to the “reception” desk where I was instructed to fill out the necessary forms.
All details about my family, my living conditions, my job, my purpose for visiting, each small detail was documented. My purse and coat were removed, my pockets searched, and all personal items taken by a guard were locked away.
I did not get to see Jo-Anne that day. I was politely advised if I were deemed a suitable candidate at some point I would be notified.
As a citizen of good standing bringing positive vibes into a negative situation, where a quick computer check would clear me within a few days as I had explained I was only in the area for a week, I expected to hear quickly. That was not the case.
A month later, after I had returned to Cambridge, my acceptance was granted. This really bugged me and made me determined to return to visit.
By now Jo-Anne and I had exchanged several letters. I’d sent news of Cambridge; of people she had known before she married and moved to a farm in Nova Scotia.
She in turn explained to me that the guards kept control by authoritative intimidation, her letters were always redacted, with more information blacked out than revealed. Just part of what I learned about the rules and regulations of the prison system.
On a Thanksgiving weekend I was to visit again and given a time slot. After the security check, the frisking, the personal items taken and locked away, entering through two more locked and barred doors, I was finally in a sparsely furnished common room seated beside other inmates with visitors, to await Jo-Anne’s arrival.
Jo-Anne was a vivacious, slim, attractive woman with short blonde curly hair who smiled as she sat beside me. I was her first visitor since her incarceration two years earlier.
After years with no contact other than inmates and prison officials Jo-Anne could not believe her luck in having a visitor. She wanted to share her story so I could decide if I wished to continue the association, she feared I might not wish to return.
The story was difficult to listen to. Her husband, who she dearly loved, was abusive when he drank. They both had alcoholic tendencies.
One day, when both were drunk and arguing, her husband came lunging toward her and she picked up his gun.
When he came closer, she pulled the trigger and, as he fell to the floor, Jo-Anne then passed out. When she came to several hours later, she found to her horror she had killed him. Then she called the police. A series of bizarre events followed, resulting in a life sentence. The story had a few gaps as Jo-Anne admitted she had been hazy.
My friendship with Jo-Anne became a close one that lasted more than a decade.
She was an avid letter writer, constantly trying to improve conditions for the inmates and working on her pardon.
Contraband rules dictate only five postage stamps at a time may be gifted to prisoners, so Jo-Anne always needed stamps which I’d include with every letter.
One time I did not notice two tucked under the five I mailed and received a scathing letter from the warden returning two stamps telling me I should know better. This ridiculous rule did not identify what monetary value the stamps should be, any dollar amounts acceptable if not more than five!
Being a freelance newspaper columnist, I wrote about the situation, adding Jo-Anne’s address and asking if anyone chose, to please send her stamps.
Within the next two weeks more than 29 letters were received by Jo-Anne, each containing five stamps. What a great feeling of accomplishment it brought me to have “beaten the system.”
Over the years, this dear friendship taught me so much. We had our differences of opinion, but we always respected the other persons views. We dealt with Jo-Anne’s frustration about the slowness of response, her patience, endurance, about lack of justice, about human nature.
For over a decade I visited, attended her prison wedding, her graduations, her halfway homes. Finally, a pardon came for Jo-Anne which took nine years. It had taken hundreds of letters and interviews to secure.
Sadly a few months later, Jo-Anne was diagnosed with ALS but was able to return to her beloved home in Nova Scotia, re-unite with her daughters and meet her grandchildren. Within a year she died.
I miss her.
As I said, you never know exactly when or why some friendships are formed, but lifetime memories of dear friendships are valued. They give us something for which to be thankful, especially appropriate to recall at Thanksgiving.
Wishing you a good Thanksgiving and hoping you have family and friends for which you are thankful.
