A Life Wasted

Breakdown

I've not written about this time in great detail because I am ashamed of my actions here.  Since I began writing about this time the words wouldn't come to me.  When writing fiction, or even my biography I've never suffered from writer's block, but I've had a great deal of trouble writing about this period.  Nor do I generally have to fight depression, yet I've had to do just that while writing about this time in 1999.  After Rebecca got on to me about picking up the pace I shared this with her as my excuse for not sending pages.  She surprised me by saying that this brief time in the motor home was one of her best memories.  At least it was right up to the point where she saw me get arrested.

When it comes down to it what my family wanted most from me was my time.

We spent a month or so in the motor home.  We traveled some, but mostly we stayed in camp grounds and enjoyed their facilities and each other.  I was nervous about having my family around me while I was a fugitive, but the advantage of having the time together over powered my already poor judgment.  Rebecca is right, it was a good time together.  Despite how wrong I was to have my family with me, it really was a good time together.  As my daughter said, a favorite memory.  For me too.

We slowly roamed because I didn't have a plan other than staying together and waiting to see what would happen when the year 2000 rolled around.  Yet at some point I pointed us west.  I don't recall a specific reason, but late September we drove west.  Just across the Indiana border, in Illinois, the motor home broke down on Interstate 80.  After about ten minutes of working on it I found the problem, which was a loose power cable on the starter when an Illinois State Trooper pulled up behind us.  The Trooper routinely ran the license plate and learned that it was stolen.

The State Trooper asked me to come back to his car and talk to him.  Sitting in his front seat he told me the motor home was on a stolen list.  I said it was a mistake, that it was rented.  He asked for my driver's license so I gave him a fake one that I had made.  It was from a different state so the trooper wasn't overly suspicious when his check came back with no information.  That sort of thing happened back then.  But he wasn't buying the motor home rental thing.  After hearing my story, he said he wanted to me to wait in the car while he asked my wife for her version of the story.

At this point I knew it was over.  I couldn't allow him to ask Mary.  I couldn't allow her to become a part of my crime.  So I told the Trooper I would make a deal with him.  I said I'd tell him who I was and the truth about the motor home if he would leave my wife and family out of it.  I assured him that she hadn't committed any crimes and was innocent, so he agreed to my terms.  I told the trooper my real name, that I was wanted in multiple states and that I had stolen the motor home.  He asked me to get out of the car and he did the same.  I waited for him to walk around the car.  He calmly patted me down then hand cuffed me behind my back.  The Trooper then put me back in the front seat of his car.  (There wasn't a divider between the front and back seats so there wasn't an advantage to putting me in the back seat). 

He disappeared into the motor home for a minute then returned with the canvas bag that held my four guns.  I'd told him about them so he removed them first.  He put the bag in the trunk of his car then returned to the motor home.  He must not have felt threatened by me at all because he still hadn't called for backup.

The second he stepped into the motor home I began trying to get my hand cuffs off.  I don't know what it is, but the moment I am arrested the thought of getting away consumes me.  You'd think it was like this with everyone, but I've asked this question of a hundred guys in prison so I know this is not the case.  The most common reaction to being arrested is one of resignation.  A lot of guys will run to get away but few continue to think like that after the cuffs are on.  Most guys give up when caught.  I don't.

Without explaining how to get hand cuffs off, I will say that the State Trooper followed protocol and double locked his cuffs.  This made them impossible for me to get off without a tool, which I didn't have.  So I looked around the interior of the car for something to use as a pick.  What I found was a hand cuff key.  In the cup holder on the center console was a full key ring, and on that ring was a hand cuff key.  It was difficult to maneuver so that I could reach the key ring, but after a minute of contortions I managed.  By feel I found the hand cuff key, then stopped to look around.  The State Trooper was still inside the motor home talking to Mary, but I knew that wouldn't last long.  My plan was simple.  The police car's motor was still running, its keys in the ignition.  I even had my guns in the trunk.  I would steal the car, retrieve my guns as soon as I was clear, then find a place to hide the car and keep going.

It took another minute to get the first hand cuff open, but then I pulled my arms in front of me and the second was easy.  All the time I was looking for the trooper but he was still out of sight.  I tossed the hand cuffs and keys onto the floor and was about to slip over to the driver's seat when I saw the motor home's rear curtain pull back.  Ten feet in front of me Becky and Kelly looked at me with sad faces.  They saw that I was looking at them so they waved.  I waved back and tried to smile.  Seeing my daughters, their sad faces and their sad wave, all of it brought me back to reality.  If I escaped and stole his car in the process the State Trooper wouldn't honor our deal to leave my family out of this mess.  I was sure he would be forced to arrest Mary if I did as I'd planned.

Disappointed with myself for not considering the consequences to my family before taking off my hand cuffs I reached down and picked up the cuffs and key ring.  I put the keys back where I found it and put the cuffs back on my wrist.  For the first time in my life I followed the heard and resigned myself to the fact that I was caught.