It's chronic: so close to the end of the Advent season, and my annual letter still not done. Relying on your charity, I'm going to grind out the events and observations of the year just past pell-mell, hoping thereby to get this off to you. An ulterior motive to the recounting - for me - is that it sort of ties up the year with a bow, enabling me to start off fresh with the the heralding of our Saviour's birth celebration and the beginning of the New Year.

Looking back over this year's notes, I see many rough spots, many times of great trial and turmoil, a number of then-overwhelming questions and uncertainties. But, after all, they pass and new opportunities seem to arise from the dust and detritus off all the hectic times, all the bumpy events, all the questions which challenge traditions of thought and practice.

You might recall that I gave my "normally terminal wish" before I got into details. I won't make that mistake again! As one replied, "terminal" seems a somewhat morbid word for a Christmass greeting. Turned out to be too close to the truth for comfort - more on that later.

May you have a Christmass of gratitude for past goodness, overcoming present difficulties, and looking forward to a New Year full of reward and joys! The following narrative comes with my love and warm good wishes.

I wrote last year's letter in November, on a peaceful weekend with friends in Newport, Rhode Island. My host, also an institutional chaplain, happily recognizes that we, too, need rest and calm, gives me a room with no agenda. Before going to Newport, had a noon Thaniksgiving meal at the jail. All of us there had our palates stimulated and our waistlines enlarged by a master chef detained with us for several months. Fortunate that his case was resolved; else, we 'd all be candidates for rigid diets.

After that feast, out to the folks' in Needham with Jessica for a repeat dinner - I obviously had cause for delaying the Newport Thanksgiving eats for two days! Only then did it begin to strike me how Jessica has entered full-force on the inevitable but difficult trip towards full maturation. Though both her mother and I recall our own growing processes, we see it to be a rather solitary road, full of unprecedented ruts and detours for each person who gathers the courage to take it.

Have had much thought and talk about this emergence into maturity, a perilous second birth which most adults push to the back of their memory, as it can't but be a hard time: starting with total acceptance of parents' values, a passage through rejection of all, on to assertion of self-values and goals. "Youth is too good to waste on the young"? I think not. Rather, youth is too perilous for the young; they need our active. sensitive, securing, and subtle support. Problem here: we must nurture and secure them at the very time their full emergence will have to pass through rejection of us and hostility towards our values. Grim statistical evidence of the difficulty of this second birth is the fact that suicides are second only to "accidents" as a cause of teen death (and how many "accidents" - vehicular, drug, and other - are in fact the result of emotional circuits overloading and burning out?). No, we can't take this trip to maturity as proxy for the young, nor can we but encourage - or push - then along the way. Our best comfort is that most productively functioning adults have come far in their own trips.

Assisted the Samaritans in writing a proposal to get their suicide intervention quarters in the basement of a church renovated. Fortunately, the proposal did not get through, for the Boston branch is moving in '79 to new quarters, designed specifically for their confidential reassuring work in a secure, comfortable location. Though their present phone lines receive over 50,000 calls a year on their 24-hour service - along with the steady flow of visitors who come in to abate their feelings of loneliness, despair, and futility - a frustrating number of callers hear a busy signal. The new center will have more phone lines and a more adequate facility for the drop-in. Why, it's even planned that the center will have heat in Winter and cooling in Summer, thus reversing the present center's climate.

I mentioned last year helping an elderly French-speaking inmate to get his case in court resolved, that he might end his days in peace. Surprise: as we ended our last session in court, with him being given a light probation, he thanked me for my translation efforts - in impeccable English! Me conned? not possible . . .

Let's root for those canals, dentist. Back to B.U.'s School of Graduate Dentistry, preparatory to getting three teeth crowned, though even the most recent Popes are forsaking their triple crown. In fact, the visits to the dentist afford me one of my few opportunities for total relaxation. Many years ago, a dentist introduced me to dental hypnosis, with the post-hyp suggestion that brings me under any time I sit in a dentist's chair. With no pain being sensed, it's quite a pleasant rest.

Last Winter, the question arose at the Jail about how much time I was spending on work for the institution. Had the question not come up, I wouldn't have realized that - especially due to the LIFELINE program - I'm now spending 50+ hours/week on jail affairs. Good of me? Not really, for I'm clearly getting out of that work as much as I'm putting into it. Almost invariably, no matter how down or worn I might feel after a day of work at Wentworth, I end up exhilarated by several hours' dealing with the detainees, the officers & staff, the LIFELINE volunteers and clients at the jail. No comment here on how a specific inmate might behave on the street, or the merits of his case, or about the "justice" delivery system. Rather, within the jail, the various constituencies do a generally adequate job of adjusting to, coping with, and hopefully growing in the temporary family of the jail. Yes, the jail is a short-time location for the detainees, but the repeat visits of the majority keep the family rather constant.

Attended an inaugural meeting of an Institute on Law and Psychiatry, convened to create dialogue between the professionals in the two disciplines. Seemed to be an excellent concept: the two areas - mental health and criminal justice - have much to learn from and teach each other. Something must have been lost in translation, however, for there never was a second meeting. We're fortunate to have a caring, realistic, and approachable person as psychiatrist at the jail. He joins our LIFELINE meetings periodically, engaging in true dialogue with the detainee volunteers about how he and they are responding to specific events of despair, frustration, odd behavior. In one typical instance, our attention turned to one of the troubled new detainees the LIFELINErs had been concerned about. The doctor said that, indeed, the man was in need of attention: by the time he interviewed him, however, the doctor said the LL people had given the distressed person what he most needed - equal-level befriending and concern. This sort of interchange does much to reassure the inmate volunteers that their work is valuable. It seems, in fact, to provide one of the few opportunities they have ever taken to reach out with concern and compassion to hurting brothers.

Began to get some indication before starting last Winter's trip that something strange was afoot: I lost all my paychecks for the balance of my vacation time. Though they were eventually replaced, it began unprecedented difficulties for the trip. Then, on my way to the dentist, got to talking with a fellow bus passenger: turns out he was planning to arrive at the same hotel in Rio I was scheduled to reach in mid-January. Then met another subway rider, who recognized my bracelet to come from the Sikh sect in India's Kashmir; he too was hoping eventually to travel to Manchu Picchu, the first scheduled stop on my itinerary in Peru. Finally, ran into one of the exchange students I had crossed the Atlantic with 22 years ago - he was scheduled on the same flight as I, New York to Lima, on Christmass day. He was fortunate to miss a connection, never got aboard.

Had a happy cerebration of Christmass with Jessica and the family on the Eve, then into the jail to stay the night. As this was the first Christmass that LIFELINE was in operation, we were much more aware than in years past of the forceful depression that overwhelms people in jail (staff as well as detainees) at holiday-time. Though I was somewhat apprehensive about leaving them all for my early-morning flight to vacation on the 25th, the fine work being done by the detainee LIFELINE volunteers comforted me, as did one of their comments that they needed my vacation; else, I 'd get even more burned out.

So, off to Logan, on to JFK, for a five-hour wait for my plane south-bound to Lima. Not having slept the night before, I looked forward to shut-eye as soon as aboard. Waiting for the flight (delayed by a malfunction requiring an equipment change) at Pan Am's Clipper Club, I made my customary "Xmass Greetings" conference phone call to Jessica and the family, As never before, however, I also called several friends to say goodbye. How come? Finally aboard the flight (not Pan Am, by the way; I'm not free to give the name or the airline), I was soon asleep. I woke at 5 in the afternoon, as we were transiting the Bermuda Triangle, on the ceiling of the plane. "Oh well," I thought to myself, "we're dying. So glad I had a good day with Jessica - she'll remember me well. Good I've paid all my bills. Too bad my camera's on the floor: I've never taken a picture while dying (the plane was like a popcorn machine, people bouncing in every direction, sailing through the movie screen). Oh damn, I'm going to be with God and my teeth aren't brushed "

Such were the thoughts of a dying person, as we were sucked downwards. I later learned our plane had lost its power at 35,000 feet, hiccuped two times as it tried unsuccessfully to restart the engines, finally two miles straight down later (no extra charge for the detour), in only 10 seconds for the whole plunge, we caught power again. On to an unplanned stop at Miami to drop off the 23 with broken bones, some quite severe. En route there, recalling the value of equal-level befriending, I was trying to calm some hysterical passengers and stewardesses; a later-admitted hysterical steward approached, knocked me out with a punch to the jaw. That was more difficult for me than the scrape with death, being K.O.ed while trying to be helpful. Took me back to the time, when as an 8-vear-old I tried to stop my big dog from attacking a tiny dog: the tiny one bit me!

At Miami, called brother Bill to report I was okay, in case the news should report the mishap; then I passed out, though my only physical sign of difficulty was a fully-bruised right side and a sore jaw. Back aboard, on to Lima, connected immediately with a flight up to Cuzco, high in the Andes. Deboarding at l4,000 feet, I was promptly on all fours; it takes new arrivals some time to adjust to the rarified air. At Cuzco, as at the lost city of Manchu Picchu, I was impressed with the incongruous juxtaposition of Inca ruins from the last millennium, Mayan poverty and gaiety, and the omnipresent evidence of centuries on Spanish hegemony. As my guide in Cuzco had a jail chaplain brother, was able to visit a Peruvian prison - would that our plaintiffs for change in U.S. prisons could witness (though we have so far to go) how much more humane our system is.

This Summer, friends showed slides of Egyptian pyramids, etc., along with mine of Manchu Picchu. The similarities were startling - more in common in the primitive cultures' work with stone (no mortar, cement, nor power mechanisms) than one would expect in cultures separated by oceans and millennia.

On to New Year 's at Buenos Aires. Three of the six people at my table at the Gaucho ranch fiesta on the 1st were vegetarians; I plead nolo to the charge of gluttony, after four mammoth filets of Argentinian beef, consumed feet away from where it's producers' siblings were grazing on the pampas. At the stroke of New Year, by the way, I had been deep under Buenos Aires, on a subway with airline employee and his date to a celebration. An evening festival in the Boca (the Italian artists' quarter of Buenos Aires), but for the tango being danced, made me feel to be back in Provncetown on Cape Cod.

Then up to Iguassu Falls - I'm soon going to wear out the adjectives "fantastic" and "incredible" - at the juncture of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay. After seeing them, Niagara Falls will remind me of Mannekin Pis. Perfectly arranged for the tourist - several miles of walkways over them, skilled boatmen to guide you along their backwaters (no daydreaming now, por favor, captain), the roar of the multiple falls heard 16 miles away. Was amazed to learn last Spring that the drought in Brazil dried up the falls - no fooling with Mother Nature.

Then on to Rio for a week of rest (that's what I had planned, at any rate) on Copacabana Beach. Sorry - the touring of Sugar Loaf, Corcovado, etc., taking all daylight hours when not on the beach (the most beautiful I've yet cooked on), the samba dancers on the beach all night rehearsing year 'round for Mardi Gras. Got another chance to visit a prison, when reporting my mugging and loss of a camera outside my hotel one evening, at a police station. I was lucky, I guess, for the inspector said my description of the assailants matched that of 3 who had murdered a Lufthansa pilot the same evening. He showed me his prison's parallel to LIFELINE: all disturbed inmates are put in a 12-foot cube in the courtyard, there to have their difficulties baked out of them.

All escapes must end: back to Boston's Blizzard of '78. The tension of a jail nearly isolated, a Blood Bank close to drying up, a Wentworth closed during the busiest financial aid season. Add to these the beginning of dealing with the plane accident and the steward's assault, subsequent reaction to a medication given me to help with the struggle, leading to jaundice, mumps, hepatitis (presumptive), flu, pneumonia - the old body sure knows how to rebel against overloads. Finally obeyed the doctor's order for a week of complete rest away from telephones and responsibilities, was well back together eventually. The airline's acknowledgment of their employee's culpability came nine months after the accident, is the source of funding for the soon-arriving trip of ' 78. The hepatitis did end my weekly trips to the Blood Bank and temporarily slowed some of my outside involvements. The whole event has, however, helped me to establish priorities; the approach of death seems to help sort such things out.

Was to spend a lengthy time in England, to present the jail's LIFELINE program to the British Home Office (which runs all their prisons) and to the Samaritans from the Isles. A secretary's rebellious gall bladder shortened that trip to six days, with minimal time to enjoy family and friends there. It appears probable now that the H.O. is going, with the assistance of the Samaritans, to establish trial LIFELINE programs in a few prisons, thence to its widespread implementation throughout the system.

Strange phenomenon with financial aid in higher education - the better I've gotten to know my work at Wentworth, the harder it gets, for there are so many avenues of aid available that we are discovering. Aid to students passing through our four hands has risen from 1.5 million last year to 2.4 million, this.

Jail, I must admit, has become my affective home, especially now that Jessica's away at school. When not at Wentworth, the majority of my evenings and week-ends are spent at the jail, working with the members of LIFELINE and with staff to do all possible to assist our detainees to find alternatives to suicide, that permanent solution to any number of horrendous temporary problems. We don't prevent suicide - the first in our jail in over two years occurred recently. However, after that tragedy, we found that the desperate one's friends had not known of LIFELINE, being recently arrived at the jail, and didn't know how to cope with his despair. Again, the better I get to understand the phenomena of despair, befriending, vulnerability, and shared strengthening, the more exhausting the work becomes. One of our meetings was broadcast on public radio; those who heard it got a first feeling for our work. The Samaritan volunteers who come into the jail for LIFELINE's weekly assessment meetings better know the frustration, despair, and unanticipated strength shown by our detainees.

That's it for another year, folks. Off to vacation after Christmass Eve with family and the night at the jail, grace last year's airline, for a one-way trip West to Boston, via Tokyo, Hong Kong, Macao, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Chiang Mai, through Teheran (hopefully, a brief change of planes there), Istanbul, Belgrade, Budapest, Frankfort, and New York. That should wash out the bumps of this year now ending. I hope to have your response to this note when I get back to Boston in mid-January.