Personal Narrative: Leavenworth County Jail

Seven million three-hundred thousand Children nationally are affected with parents having to be in jail for days, weeks, months, and even years. For ten days I was affected by my father being in jail at Leavenworth County Jail. To some, this is nothing but to my family this was a big deal. Not only was he gone for ten days, which was longer then he’d ever been gone before, but we had to take him there and watch as he walked away from his wife, his kids, and his freedom. My father choose to be gone from December 13 until December 23 of 2014 that way he could be home for Christmas. Every night my father called and every night my mom and my three little sisters anxiously awaited by the phone in the kitchen along with my grandpa patiently waiting

I was wrong. Like always the call came in and I could hear the impatient arguments upstairs from my sisters and my mother trying to calm everything down again and create some kind of order like she did every night before however on this night I heard something I didn’t expect. Out of nowhere I heard my mother yell my name and I knew that was a sign to get upstairs immediately. When I got within sight of my mom she handed the phone in my direction and told me my father wanted to talk to me. As I slowly walked over to where my mom was sitting I dreaded the conversation that was about to happen. As soon as she handed me the phone I said “hi” and after a long silence I finally heard my father’s booming voice through the phone. “Hey sweetheart, I’m sorry to hear about you and your boyfriend.” When I heard this I couldn’t help but fight back the tears. Crying was never acceptable so I already knew better then to let him hear me cry. After I shrugged off his comment I then, for the first time I can remember, heard him tell me “I love you”. Once I heard this the tears fell from my eyes like water through a broken flood gate. I handed the phone back to my mother, ran to my room, and cried. How dare he do this to me? I knew he didn’t mean it so why would he tell me this empty “I love you”? After I thought about it for a while, I realized that he said it in a loving way, the same way I have heard him tell my sisters and my mom for so many years. I began to cry harder and continued to cry tell I finally fell