(clicking)
- [Michael] When you think about the first time we met
what do you remember?
- I remember, I couldn't stand you.
(laughing)
The first time we met remember we played king ball?
And me and my sister and that girl across the street
we had a nice game going on.
Here you come.
When you got in the game, you just started slamming
the ball and you beat us so bad.
I was so mad.
And I remember, oh my god I can't stand him.
Who is that anyway?
Because we had never saw you before, you know?
And anyway, that was my first response to you.
- When I think back to that day,
it's hard to believe that y'all lived
that close to us that you would think
that we would have seen y'all
in one of the neighborhood stores,
somewhere but y'all had been around it
for five years we never saw you.
And you were so pretty.
That's why we stopped.
But the way we played King ball,
that's just the way we played.
- Yeah you told me that before.
- On our block the girls played the same way,
so it was amazing that it was so, the game wasn't as
- traumatic for us?
- More contentious, really, I mean,
more competitive, I should say.
That was a nice day.
For me, it was a nice day.
- What are your top three favorite memories we share?
- The birth of our daughter.
- Yeah, yeah, that was something.
- You're working one morning,
it was a nice fall day,
and I knew something was was
strange because you was pacing back and forth.
I knew how far along you were
and you just pacing back and forth.
And I said, "Debbie you ready to have a baby?
You stop pacing for a second and nodded your head yeah,
and just kept on pacing and then
at some point you just laid down and had her.
So that was, that was definitely one of the memories.
Very memorable moment in our life.
And then, of course, seeing you released from prison
after 40 years, and I'm watching all these events
from prison myself, because we have the same sentence so.
- So many of them it's hard to name the top three ain't it?
The wedding, what about that?
(laughing)
- It's hard to beat that day too.
Being released from after 40 years is hard to beat also.
- Yeah, really.
That's probably the top.
- And that's the other thing,
because I didn't have a chance to see
- Oh, okay.
- As you had him while we were both in prison
when we first got arrested nearly a months later.
So I had never got a chance to be with you know,
but of course we communicated throughout our time.
- Oh, yeah, that was another moment, huh?
- So this is the first time I got a chance to be with him,
outside of prison visits.
- Lot of good ones.
- That's a tough top three.
That's something I'd have to.
I couldn't do in a year, I don't think.
- That's more than three.
- So throw them in a pot.
Throw them all in a pot.
- Yeah.
- What's one experience you wish I never had?
- Well this, again that's hard to give a one.
There's a few things.
Experience I wish you never had in prison,
40 year sentence, unjustly.
But mainly being torn away from my children
and certainly having your son in prison.
- I knew that was gonna be.
- And then, if that wasn't bad enough,
having to give him up in two days.
So and traumatic experience of trying to raise them
from prison and, daughter, our daughter,
our kids from prison.
- Yeah.
- And all the challenges that presented.
So yeah, wish you had never had to experience that,
being in prison in the first place.
And our being separated.
- Yeah, that's about it.
I agree whole heartedly.
Your turn.
- What do you think connects us?
- To be honest, I really think
what connects us is true love.
I really do.
I mean, I'm not gonna lie.
I feel like because your love was so strong for me,
that's what made me,
made me love you the way that I do.
And so that connection is there like that.
But also a lot of things connect us.
The work that it takes to be connected and stay connected.
Our children connects us.
And despite the fact that we haven't been in their lives
for years, there is always something to keep us connected,
to draw us together, to keep us talking,
to keep us making decisions,
to always have to be there for them,
always have to do the best, very, very, very best
that we could do, even though we were from a jail cell.
And it would it would get faint at times,
but because we wanted to stay connected
and because we always want to be together,
we just, we made it work.
We make it work.
The work that it takes to just have a relationship,
as in any other relationship.
You have to work so that we can make what we want possible.
- Yeah, I think, I don't know what people would think
when they think about prison,
and each of us doing such a long sentence.
And they may feel that it's a natural thing
to stray, to go somewhere else, to look somewhere else.
But to me, that's like saying,
"Well, I'm gonna betray my brother, because I'm in prison."
So it'd be the same thing about your spouse.
Why would you think of betraying a spouse
just because you're in prison any more
than you would your brother, just because you're in prison?
- Right.
- And, I think people see that
that relationship is different.
But loyalty is one thing.
- Yeah and people don't realize
that you can still stray in prison.
Just because you're behind bars does not mean
that you don't have access to the things
that you have on the street.
Alcohol, drugs, women, men, it's all there too,
just like on the street.
So prison don't keep you from doing the things
that you would do on the street
that causes a relationship to go bad.
- Takes the same commitment, the same work.
- Yep, 'cause for real, the streets are the prison really.
When do you feel closest to me?
- I have situations with my family.
I have sisters, we have challenges.
Half my family's gone now, since we've been in prison.
Sometimes with the restrictions we have
about travel, whenever we get the chance
now we have them over for dinner.
We go down to their house.
I appreciate it when I want to spend more time with them
and maybe you have plans of your own.
You don't mind putting your plans on hold sometimes.
Then when I'm entertaining them, or the kids, the girls,
you make sure things are put together
and you cook splendid meals
and whatever you think they might like,
you spread the house with their pictures
and that's really helpful to me, because like sometimes
I'm really laid back or reserved
and I don't talk much, even at home.
- Well, that's part of it too,
because I feel like, they're your daughters.
And I love you, so I have to love them too.
And that's just the way I've always felt.
They're a part of me, because they're a part of you.
And it's real.
That's the way I feel like it has to be
in a relationship because if you don't,
it's just going to be constant chaos,
or constant confusion, conflict.
So I want to love them.
I want to love them too.
And that's just how I feel.
I open my heart because I love you.
And that's the way I want to feel about them too.
And I do, as well as our two that we have together.
Still a part of our lives too.
And that's how I feel.
That's how I feel.
- What do you see for us in the next five years?
- Oh man, what I see for us is definite success.
Success and in meaning that our family
is gonna be a lot closer.
We had a break, because of what we went
through being in prison 40 years.
And so that stretched the vibration
that tore the family, some, somewhat, a lot.
But what I see in the next five years is that step.
That's what I see.
I see it now.
I see it coming now, especially when it comes to our family.
The people around us are relatives.
And I think it's gonna make a statement to others.
I think it's gonna help others.
Because this has been a really challenging,
challenging path that we've been on,
and I think it's gonna be an example for a lot of people.
I mean, if we can do it, certainly people will use
that as motivation, to help bridge gaps between whatever,
whether it be a marriage with a man,
with your partner or your children
or other relatives or other people that are,
or relationships, friends.
So it's all encompassing.
And that's a part of our belief,
that everything is encompassed in everything,
it applies to everything.
It's no really no separation in life.
It's just, if it applies to us it can apply to
children, brothers, sisters, father, son, everything.
But I see them five years as being great years for us.
Okay, what does my love feel like?
- What does it feel like?
It feels great.
It does.
You referenced a couple questions ago.
There's no interference and there's no, but that's,
those moments of interferences,
what gives you those challenges, and that makes for a great
result I think.
- Yeah, for sure.
- You have fights, the ones who have
the greatest challenges are the best ones, right?
- Yeah, afterwards.
It don't feel like it then, but afterwards, yeah.
(laughing)
- Those are the ones that are most
- Memorable and that connects us,
like makes us closer really.
- So we've had our challenges and you know
it's gonna be hard to interfere any longer,
you know what I mean?
- Yeah.
- People gonna have a definite challenge
when they come mess with this relationship.
Tried and tested champions.
- Champions, yeah.
Agreed.
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Thanks a lot.
Thanks for joining.