In the flourescent glow of the bathroom the women take the curlers out of their hair, brush their teeth, change their pajamas and slippers for blouses and skirts, wipe the sleep from their children’s eyes. It’s almost time.

A short while later, two big white buses bounce through the decaying outskirts of Youngstown, past factory ruins and boarded-up motels to a small red-and-white sign: Northeast Ohio Correctional Center.

The buses turn left, and the bright sky is filled with the glint of sun on razorwire. They’re here.

Happy Father’s Day.

More than 170 D.C. area residents visited their incarcerated fathers, grandfathers, sons and brothers over the Father’s Day weekend, courtesy of Corrections Corp. of America. CCA pays for four buses twice a year to transport families of inmates to the company’s Youngstown prison. It is a 600-mile roundtrip. It takes nearly 24 hours. The visitors spend more time on the road than in the actual visit. But the families are grateful, nonetheless. A chartered van travels from the District to Youngstown every weekend, but that costs $60, plus hotel. Without this free bus, some said, they would never have made the trip.

The bus door opened onto the CCA parking lot. William Alexander Sr. slowly descended the stairs and, with baby steps, tottered over to the first gate. At 79, he recently survived a stroke and was released from the hospital just days ago, he said. He hadn’t seen his son in nearly two years.

Leaning on his wife’s arm, the slight, stooped man shuffled through two metal gates, signed a consent form, surrendered his ID, emptied his pockets, walked through the metal detector, was frisked by a guard, sniffed by a barking German shepherd and was buzzed into the visitation room.

There, in an orange jumpsuit, was William Jr.

He stood up and gave his father one of two hugs that would be allowed that day.

"It’s really a blessing that he came," said William Alexander Jr. of his father. "It lifted my spirits. It gives you hope.

"At Lorton, my parents could catch the bus out there. But they are living on a pension and it is expensive to get here. Besides, I think it is hard for them to travel like this at their age."

Alexander said he is on a waiting list for a job inside the prison and also on a waiting list for educational classes, which he said are full. He doesn’t know how long he’ll have to wait for a spot to open up, he said anxiously, and in the meantime, he does "basically nothing" all day.

Alexander has nearly three years left to serve. He prefers to think of it as 34 months.

"I have got to hold on to every moment of this visit," he said. "It’s got to last me a long time."

The Alexanders and dozens of other families visited on Father’s Day under a tent in the prison yard, playing cards and checkers, eating candy from the vending machines and – the day’s special treat -- barbecued chicken on sale for $3.

The razor wire and fences and locked doors and rules didn’t stop the day from being festive. Families lined up on the patio to pose for Polaroid pictures for $1.50.

Prohibited from sitting side by side, husbands and wives held hands across the tables and fed each other bites of chicken on plastic forks. Little boys arm-wrestled their daddies and poked at their big biceps. For a few moments, it almost didn’t seem like a prison.

"I can catch an M&M in my mouth!" a 6-year-old boy announced to his father.

"I love you, you know that?" his father answered and kissed him on the ear.

"When are you coming home?" the boy asked.

Though the visitation room and yard were filled both days of Father’s Day weekend, only a fraction of the 1,200 inmates received visitors. Many spent Father’s Day alone, peeking through the narrow slits of their cell windows to catch a glimpse of the good times in the yard.

Many inmates said life inside the prison is strict but stable, and that the widely publicized violence of last year seems to be over. The most difficult inmates and some troublesome guards were moved out by the new warden, James Turner, inmates said. Those who had been part of the class-action lawsuit against CCA recently received their settlement checks and said the institution as a whole seems to be moving past that difficult period.

"It doesn’t take away the memories, though," added one inmate.

But the visits did help make things better.

John Taylor, an inmate working clean-up duty, said he felt happy all day just watching other inmates being visited.

For their part, family members, some of whom were distrustful of CCA before seeing the Youngstown facility, nearly all agreed it was cleaner and better built than Lorton. One woman said she would rather drive to Ohio to see her son in that facility than to have him nearby under the poor conditions at Lorton.

But many family members were unprepared for the strict rules, even though trip leaders tried to announce them in advance.

No paper money allowed in the prison — quarters only for the vending machines. No outside materials can be brought in — no cigarettes, no lipstick, not even a Father’s Day card. Visitors with babies may bring in only two diapers and two bottles. And the dress code for visitors prohibits sleeveless shirts, open-toe shoes, hats and shorts for adults. Revealing or provocative clothing is out of the question.

A woman in five-inch heels and a tight sleeveless red dress with a deep slit up the back was stopped before she even boarded the bus.

"Oh no, honey, they ain’t gonna let you in wearing that!" one passenger called out.

Disappointed, she retreated to her car to change into jeans and a T-shirt before boarding the bus.

On the bus, the families, many of whom did not know each other before the trip, shared stories and discussed the difficulties of maintaining contact with their relatives behind bars. A quiet, older woman braided her granddaughter’s hair while she colored Bible story pictures with a purple crayon. A high school student fed her 7-month-old baby.

Some had taken the cramped private van that runs from the District to the Youngstown prison every weekend. Some of the older folks said they just couldn’t take the ride physically. Others said between the $60 fare and the cost of food and a hotel, they just couldn’t afford it.

Phone calls are an even bigger problem, families said. All calls from the prison are collect and it costs about $10 for 15 minutes. A collect call that gets picked up by an answering machine costs $2.75, inmates said, even if they hang up right away. Families said they face hundreds, even thousands, of dollars in phone bills.

Some said they know the public doesn’t have much sympathy for people who have committed crimes, and many agree that their relatives are in prison for a reason. That just doesn’t make it any easier, they said.

As departure hour approached, husbands and wives, boyfriends and girlfriends clung to each other for a final embrace. In what was perhaps the day’s only indulgence, the officers let them linger.

But eventually the whistles started blowing, as the officers herded people toward the door. At the last minute one little girl rushed back to her father and threw her arms around his waist, burying her face in his white jumpsuit. Tears streamed down her face. Her father looked like he might cry, too.

"Ok, let’s get rolling," the guard shouted.

The little girl walked back toward the door. Her father waved, and she was gone.

Moments later, the buses pulled out of the lot, leaving the inmates picking up trash in the razorwire yard.

Copyright 1999, The Common Denominator