Duty Over Desire

How many times do we do something because we should do something and not because we want to do something? We all have. We do it on a regular basis. 

What if our sense of duty is over-sensitive? What if we feel we should do something but others would understand if we didn’t do them? Or, maybe they wonder why we do it. 

I keep telling my wife that we need to go see my dad. This is not something I WANT to do. It’s something I feel that I NEED to do. As his son, I feel that I have to go. I don’t really like going but I think I should.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love my dad. I always will. I actually like seeing him and knowing that he’s doing as well as possible. I just hate going to where my dad lives. I don’t like having to spend more time traveling to and from than the time spent sitting in a visiting room with him. If he lived closer, such as Florence, it wouldn’t be such a big deal to visit him.

Here is the usual trip to see my dad and why I dread it every time. We’ll leave early on a Saturday morning. We spend about three hours driving to the Az State Prison that is south of Yuma, almost into Mexico. When we get there, we park, empty our pockets of everything except ID and about $20 in quarters. We get sniffed by drug detection dogs and then we board a bus driven by one of the prisoners. We go to my dad’s unit and check in. We go through a metal detector, through two steel doors to get to the visiting room filled with tables and chairs, and we wait for them to call him from his cell. 

Depending on our timing, we’ll wait about 15 to 45 minutes for him to show up. It depends if we get there before the changing of the guards. The visitation room is about 100’ by 40’ with a bathroom for guests and one for inmates. You can go outside on the patio (concrete slab with some metal picnic tables) that’s about the same size as the room but it’s surrounded by a 15’ high chain link fence and razor wire on top.

There is usually about 50-75 visitors in the visitation room and concrete slab. Visitation is over at 4pm and so we are usually sitting around a table talking, playing games with pieces missing, reading children’s books, and eating food out of vending machines. We’re not allowed to bring in food or anything else. We’re allowed to bring in $10 per person in quarters to use in the overpriced vending machines but I think the most we’ve every brought in was $30 and it goes fairly quickly.

The kids actually enjoy it, which surprises me. At first, they didn’t realize where they were going or why they had to go through all the security. It was just the place where grandpa lived. We’ve tried to go every six months but it’s been a year now and I’m sure my dad’s anxious to see us. I know the kids want to see him. I wrote a while back that the kids know where he lives and why he’s there. I’m guessing that he’ll get more questions this time.

My dad usually has an agenda about what he wants to talk about. He’s been working on a book for the past 15 years and is in the process of trying to get it published. We started visiting him as a family seven years ago when we moved to Phoenix. We had to encourage him to play and read to the kids. They like playing games with him from the wooden box full of misused games and missing pieces.

So, basically, Tina and I sit there while my kids play with grandpa. On several trips, one of the kids gets sick on the way there or on the way home. A year ago, Aria threw up on my shirt in the lobby while waiting to get in the visiting room. Fortunately, it smelled like the chocolate donut she had just eaten. I didn’t have a clean shirt and I was not going home after that long trip and so I held Aria for six hours in the visiting room until our visit was over.

After our visit, we climb in our car, go through security to be sure we’re not hiding a prisoner, and we head home. It’s just a really long day. We’ve tried different things to make it better, such as driving over on Friday night and spending the night in a hotel and going in the morning. The last few times we’ve done without the hotel because it just bumps up the cost of the trip and it just costs too much money.

Here’s how it boils down. We try to go every six months and I’m glad that we get to see him but every six months when we start planning on when to go, I dread it. It’s just not an enjoyable trip and it costs money that we really don’t have but it’s something that I feel I need to do, that I should do, and so I go out of duty instead of desire. I’m glad when it’s over because I won’t think about going for another six months. In the end, I’m glad I go and the kids are glad they see grandpa, and I’m thankful to Tina for putting up with it all. 

Is it bad to do something you should do out of duty instead of desire?

Should I feel bad about not wanting to make that trip to Yuma more than twice a year?

Should I feel guilty that I don’t see him more than twice a year?