Letter from Evan

I got a letter from Evan.

A real letter written with a pen on a piece of stationery.

He says (among other things), "...I mean [location deleted] is sooo Huge to me. I'm the youngest guy here by almost 10 years and I at moments want to leave so bad, not because of the porgram so much but becasue I miss small town people and also how liberal you all are here on the other hand Im the only one who hates fox news..." [I make a lot of typos, but in this case, this is an accurate quote.]

It is funny...he left a small red town in a rural red state, and he is now in one of the largest, bluest metropolitan areas in the country...and he misses our liberalism.

He included in the letter a business card from the center which had phone number and email address. I called to ask if I could email letters to the center. I know he cannot get onto the internet, but would they print my letters. They said yes.

Then the man on the phone said he was a great kid who wanted to be "out in front" of everything...always said he already knew whatever they told him. I said, "Yep. That's Evan." They said he was homesick and they would break the rules and let him talk to me for just a bit. They called him over to the phone and told him that he had 3 minutes.

He thought of course that I was his social worker, who else would be allowed to talke to him on the phone? It was touching how glad he was to talk to me.

He says he has to go to AA meetings twice a day (these are in town and he has seen a couple of famous people there, but of course he can't tell me who) and have group sessions daily at the center. It is tiring...but he does have cable TV in his room.

This might not make sense to some of you, but I felt happpy because it was still him. He did not sound like a stranger...just a homesick boy who had been sent away to a camp or something.

In case you were wondering, the letter and conversation was before the phone call from his mom. Did not have to debate whether to tell him about that.

He's going to be okay.