Everyone here is asking about you and I am referring them to the Montana Academy Web site, so that they can see where you are. Emmylou told me that Montana is every ten-year-old boy’s idea of Texas. They shot all of those old cowboy movies in Montana, probably because the Hollywood actors didn’t really want all that dust up their noses in Texas. You’ve been to Texas. It’s flat. Flat and dry. Montana is really the place a cowboy wants to be—unless he wants dust up his nose.
The beauty of this new letter-writing system is that you have to write me back. I can’t imagine anything better than getting a letter from you. When you write I want to know all about the place. The kids (Are the girls as cool as you hoped?), your teachers, what you are reading, what you do in the evening, what you have for dinner—the important stuff. I would be terribly worried about you if I hadn’t seen it myself and met the folks who run it. But I had such a good feeling about the place. I felt that it might become your kind of place eventually, too. Not that you want to hear that right now. So in your note you can tell me all of your complaints, too.
Last night we sent John to Whole Foods with $70 to buy food. He came back with the weirdest assortment of stuff—and he didn’t even spend all of the money. That’s the problem with Whole Foods in his mind: there’s nothing there to buy. He bought some blueberry-flavored granola, some ground beef, three apples, some fancy cheeses and an assortment of barbecued, pre-cooked turkey drumsticks. He forgot to get juice, which is why we sent him in the first place. Now if we’d sent him to Safeway, he would have spent $30 more than we’d given him and come back with the double stuffed Oreos, but this way no one is happy.
Max is coming out for just one week in June. Jane and John will be home, too, so I expect that we’ll have wild and noisy evenings keeping track of everyone’s whereabouts.
Dad said that he had a really good time with you when you went to Montana and that you were in good spirits and telling lots of funny Montana jokes. (What is a Montana joke?) We were both so worried that this would be a hard transition. It sounds like you were a real trouper.
We love you like crazy, Will. We love you and miss you and I’ll write again next week, and I think we even get to talk to you by phone sometime between now and then. Meanwhile, please know that I think about you all the time and wonder what you are doing this very moment and hope you are feeling brighter about your prospects on Planet Earth.
Mom
Will’s first letter home from Marion, Montana, May 2001:
Mom…
Hi. School and everything is o.k. Miss home a lot. I’m getting my second phase thing in a couple of days. No real advantages except a couple of things. Actually probably a whole bunch of things. I get to go off campus on weekends and stuff. Less boring hikes, more candy and stuff. I’ll probably be on student council because they get to go out to some place every Tuesday and get soda and candy and cookies and good food (it’s some kind of restaurant place). Also, they don’t read my mail (they were supposed to on the first phase but they didn’t even do it then). So you can send me mail from my friends. If you talk to Maga and Pop tell them thank you for the books. I like them a lot and am actually reading them. Also if you could send some books up here, that would be good. Actually, I just need more coloring books. I’m running out of coloring books and getting tired of the ones I have because I’ve already colored all the good pages. That would be greatly appreciated. Well, this place is kind of dumb. People are nice, but there’s a lot of stupid parts. I’ll talk to you soon. Love you. Say “hi” to everybody.
Will
Bob’s first letter to Will, from San Francisco:
May 11, 2001
Hey, Woo—
Seems like a long time, since I dropped you off, but I guess it has only been nine days. I wonder if time is passing quickly for you up in the mountains. Mom called me right up, after you spoke to her on Monday. She said she thought you were doing pretty well—at least that’s the way you made it sound. I hope so. I’m sure there will be lots of times when you wonder how you ever wound up in such a different world. Hopefully there will also be times when you see some interesting possibilities.
I’ll be talking to you either this coming Monday morning or the one after that. (The school literature and Dr. Malinak’s messages don’t seem to agree on whether we talk to you once a week or every second week.) I miss hearing your voice. But I also feel certain that you’re right where you need to be for the moment.
We got your letter yesterday. Thanks for the update on how things are going. Max and Melissa were also real interested to see what you had to say. I remember that Greg Windham had warned us, the morning you arrived at the ranch, that some kids on your team had gotten into trouble and they were deciding what should be done as a result. So you guys were put on a lockdown, eh? Must have actually been in your honor, Woo—especially the baloney sandwiches. Glad you’re past that now. Glad too that there are some girls around, and at least one familiar face. What a coincidence that is.
Next time you write, let me know a few of the details of your day to day life. How has it worked out with your evening munchies, for instance? Is there a way to get a snack after taking the medications at night? Also, what time do you take them in the evening? With dinner? Or later? Do you guys do that regular reading session the way it says in the school literature? What have you been reading? Do they have good stuff in the school library? Or should I send you some books? Also, do you ever get a chance to get in any hoops? In the afternoon or after dinner? How is that court in the barn? Any home court advantage yet?
News here is pretty scarce this week…
I’m working really hard. Traveling a bit. Painting bookshelves at home with the game on in the background. Same exciting guy as always. Trying to make some plans for our first visit with you at the school. It will just be Mom and me, and we’ll be talking it over with you ahead of time.
I think about you all the time. And lots of other folks are asking for news. You’re on a forced vacation from your regular life, and I hope that you are already finding some logic in making the most of it. Do something for me…
Every day in your journal or someplace write down one reason why you are glad to be alive that particular day. Kind of like what we used to do at the dinner table—make everybody say one positive thing. And Max would always try to think of something about Buster and you would always come up with a joke. It doesn’t have to be anything big, by the way. Probably most days it won’t be big. But you of all people could probably learn something from this. And it might be kind of interesting to see whether the things you list change as the weeks go by.
There are lots of such reasons, by the way. Lots. And there’s nothing more important than knowing what they are.
Love you a lot,
Dad
Okay, so we were forewarned the transition would be difficult, but I was unprepared for the vehemence of Will’s opposition when we returned to Montana for our first parent visit in mid-June. The plan was to retrieve him from campus and take him with us “on pass” overnight anywhere within driving distance of the school—anywhere in the Flathead Valley.
Bob and I could hardly wait to see him. He and his team leader, Greg Windham, had drawn up a “pass agreement” for his overnight, a privilege afforded students who had reached “Moon Clan,” the second of five developmental levels.* Will and Greg came up with three goals for this first pass, which they articulated in writing:
have fun
no revisiting why they sent you [to Montana Academy]
honesty
Will, Greg, and Bob signed the statement below:
I agree to these conditions and rules, specifically and in spirit, and I agree to follow these guidelines rigorously and without putting my parents in the position of chasing me, or reminding me, or defending these rules, which are the Montana Academy rules, and not for debate with parents. I understand that if I fail at this discipline and truthfulness, torments of an appropriate rigor will follow.
<
br /> “Wow,” I thought as I mulled over the pass agreement. “That’s a little heavy…Torments of an appropriate rigor will follow?” Obviously, a staff member with a predilection for the medieval was having a little fun with the written rules and regulations. But we were hardly an hour into the visit and our first destination, Taco Bell for a couple of bean burritos, when I realized that we were in for a rough ride.
We had booked a hotel in Big Fork, a small resort town on Flathead Lake. We planned to have a good meal and take Will bowling. But the atmosphere between Will and us was negatively charged. Will was by turns sullen and uncharacteristically furious. He lashed out at us for sending him to Montana and asserted he was fed up with his doctor, therapists, and teachers.
“I’m getting nothing out of the place. The kids there are ridiculous.” His classes were “inane” and he vowed he would “never tell Malinak [his psychiatrist] a fucking thing.” On top of that: “The food sucks,” “I’m already sick of this ‘Native American’ shit” and “I hate hiking; it’s hot and boring.”
Oh, did I mention he was homesick and wanted to leave immediately? We argued for hours and got nowhere. At turns, we cried. Bob and I even threatened to go “by the book” and return him to campus before his allotted pass was over.
“Will, you’re doing exactly what you need to be doing right now to get well,” Bob insisted. But Will didn’t buy it. The visit was a bust. (Although, he had accomplished one of his written goals: he was honest.) None of us was happy by the time it was over.
“Oh, Willy, smells like you’re having brownies for dessert tonight!” I exclaimed enthusiastically as we walked through the kitchen to remand him to Greg at the appointed hour, Sunday afternoon. Will shot me a withering glance, as if to say, “Mom, you are so full of shit.”
Bob and I drove away from the ranch in silence. By the time we were over the first ridge, we were both weeping.
From Will’s journal, June 2001:
I am in no way a spiritual person. I have no concrete beliefs about God, the afterlife, or any of that. When I try to imagine death, I really don’t know what to think. Being in Montana, there’s plenty to look at. Some places I can see for what seems like miles and miles. I can see mountains and trees on those mountains and birds in those trees and a lot of other crazy shit that I never really thought I’d appreciate. When I see all of this, as strange as this may sound, I associate it with death…I see all those birds flying around and horses running around far in the distance and it all seems so free, so perfect and free. Maybe it’s this freedom, this lack of worry and concern that ties it to death in my mind, but when I see things of such overwhelming beauty, I actually feel…I don’t even know how to say it, connected I guess. I feel like, if I had died, I would be part of it. I don’t know if I would be one of those birds or horses, but I would be part of the whole thing.
I’ve come to realize that I should be dead. Considering the magnitude of what I took, in addition to the tranquilizers I was given while they tried to subdue me…I believe I should be dead right now. I hadn’t really added it all up until very recently, but I am now realizing that I really should have died that night. Please don’t perceive this as me wishing I had died that night because I don’t. I can say in all honesty and sincerity that the moment I woke up was one of—if not the single most—happiest moments of my life. Every day of this “second” life I stop and appreciate how incredibly fucking lucky I am, even more so recently, having come to the conclusion I shouldn’t be here.
[But] the time since I woke up has been a nightmare. It has been, in all honesty, the worst [time] of my life. Weeks of throwing up out of nervousness in a mental hospital, more arguments with my parents than I remember having in my entire life, saying goodbye to friends again and again, [being] reduced to tears over something I was so absolutely sure and positive about. It was shitty, simply put, and infinitely shittier knowing it was entirely my fault. I don’t really know what I want to say about it. I feel like I should apologize for it, but at the same time, my feelings are so torn about how everything was dealt with that I don’t really want to. However, you should know that, as much as I might joke around and mask my feelings, it was in no way a good time and I am incredibly sorry for starting it all.
8
CALIFORNIA ROCKET FUEL
In early summer, I got a call from Megan’s mother.
“Will’s been in touch with Megan. Apparently he called her from a pay phone when he was on a field trip.” Megan’s mother intercepted Will’s call.
“Thanks, Virginia.” When I hung up the phone, my hand was shaking. “What on earth does he think he’s doing?” I wondered. Yet another wrinkle.
On a trip into Kalispell to go to the movies with his team, Will had tried to reach Megan from a pay phone. Also, we learned, he was writing to her—surreptitiously and against Montana Academy rules. Since at this stage in the program all of his incoming and outgoing mail was monitored, we were surprised that he somehow managed to smuggle letters to her.
Will, bucking the system? It was out of character for him to flagrantly challenge the rules. Maybe his behavior fell into some grand design—maybe it was a good sign he was acting out, defying the regulations, rather than drawing further into himself and sinking deeper into depression. Or maybe I was delusional for trying to put a positive spin on his actions. But I was chasing shadows; I wanted signs of forward motion, hints of progress. Not this.
Whatever Will’s motivation, both Bob and I were alarmed. Bob fired off the following reprimand to Will:
Will—
Mom just called me to say that she had learned that you had been sneaking letters out of school. And finding a way once to call up Megan, as well. (Don’t know how you managed that one.) Now, I can well imagine why you would want—or even badly need—to try to get in touch with your gal. But I would also urge you to think about what that represents in terms of your commitment to the program at school. Don’t try to play around the rules. It may not seem like it, but they have really good reasons for the way the program is set up. It’s hard being away from your friends. But you need this time for yourself. You and your friends and your girlfriends are great, but none of it was working well enough to keep you alive. That is what this time is about. This is as serious as any problem in your life will ever get. Open your eyes, Will. Give yourself a chance to find a slightly different understanding of the world. Nothing could be more important.
Love,
Dad
No doubt Will was hoping to forestall a permanent breakup with Megan, but his desperate focus on the stunted relationship undermined all of our efforts to get him immersed in the program.
Show me a teenage boy who is expert at communicating emotion, and I’ll show you a kid who is about to pick your pocket, con his way out of an assignment, or scheming for a lavish birthday gift. In therapy Will and Dennis Malinak covered the same ground time and again, discussing the importance of honesty and communication; honesty in relationships and honesty in owning up to one’s true feelings.
Will had spent his young life trying to please everyone, to play the “good” kid. So when it came time to acknowledge mistakes or shortcomings—or anger or pain—he failed and failed miserably. He was paralyzed when it came to confessing the hurts and injuries that pile up like landfill during the trials of adolescence.
Megan finally called the question. Recognizing the folly of holding on to a long-distance relationship as they both struggled to regain footing, she wrote him a profoundly insightful and moving letter.
Letter to Will from Megan, July 2001:
Dear Will,
Let me preface this letter with a little explanation. First, I’m sorry this is so late. Everything was sketchy with your mail and stuff and I heard you were in trouble. I’m also scared to send this off to you because you probably hate me for getting you in trouble or whatever, but it was my mom who called your mom and got the whole ball rolling, so to speak. I’m also sorry for the lack of se
nse this letter is going to make. I’m still a little confused as to how I feel about all this.
This isn’t really a break-up letter because it doesn’t really feel like we’re together anymore. I’m not really zipping along in my love life now that you’re gone. I just sort of put everything on hold. I’m obviously not over you in the least but I’ve had many epiphanies relating to our relationship.
First of all we were entirely dependent on each other. Especially in your case. You refused to talk to anyone else about your problems, and even what you told me was minimal. I feel like my presence really hindered any progress that you would have made in therapy.
I also feel like your dependence may have turned me into a stance, not a person. I think you needed me or someone there and it stopped being about me as a person. The night you tried to kill yourself we had been together for hours and I don’t think you need a reminder of what we did. And during that time we were breaking up and I was seeing other people. You had to know that your trying to kill yourself would be a slap in the face. I’m not presuming to tell you that I was the only reason, but you had to know the repercussions of your actions, directly towards me at least. I don’t know, it just doesn’t seem like something you’d do to someone you love. Even now I still blame myself for what happened and that will probably never stop.
What I’m trying to say is that I can’t go through a situation as painful as your suicide attempt ever again. I honestly wouldn’t make it. I had a complete relapse when you were in the hospital. It was so scary to almost lose the most important person in my life, and especially since a lot of it was my fault. I’m not sure that I trust you not to hurt me like that again, at least the way you left me.
But I’m not ruling out the possibility that you’ve changed for the better. I’m just scared. I don’t even know if you still feel the same way about me. And I don’t know how to describe our relationship as of now. I really want to hear from you, so even if you’re pissed write back. How do you feel about this relationship and me after some time away? Answer the question. Please try to communicate some legitimate feelings about everything because I’d love to sort all of this out.
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