Loving Dangerously

'Prison Wives'

I'm not a TV critic, but I recently attended some panel presentations for the Television Critics' Association. Several networks previewed their new shows, and one offering of the I.D. Network (‘the only channel devoted to investigations,' I learned) captured my attention.

‘Prison Wives' follows ordinary people who fall in love with violent offenders and then say ‘I do' in prison. Now, I have always wondered about these relationships, so I was very excited to see three of the real Prison Wives on the panel. Even more interesting, one of these Prison Wives was actually a husband.

While both of the women insisted that their spouses had been falsely convicted, the prison husband accepted his wife's involvement in what the show's producers described as a ‘grisly murder.' He did quibble, however, that she was only an accessory, which he seemed to find comforting. Despite their differences, all three expressed the same perspective: they had just happened to fall in love with someone who just happened to be in prison. The prison husband even compared himself to a Lufthansa pilot, loving a Jewish woman circa 1938. Personally, I see a distinction between the brutal, unjust persecution of Nazi-era Jews and the totally appropriate punishment of a woman who participated in (or accessorized) a ‘grisly murder,' but I'll accept that he genuinely regards his marriage as heroic. Which just might be part of the whole attraction.

When one of the prison wives described her experience as ‘exactly like a normal relationship,' I couldn't help thinking that it sounded a helluva lot more dramatic than mine. My husband and I make quesadillas and watch Jeopardy. We love each other dearly, but our day-to-day life is manageable, even predictable. The prison spouses, on the other hand, steal precious moments together. Divided by a plexiglass panel, they whisper of ways to prove his innocence.

And what about that? It can't be accidental that both women claim their husbands are innocent. Of course, they might be correct, but I hate to think what that says about our criminal justice system. So it's enlightening to consider time-honored archetypes of sexual attraction. Just think of James Dean, the ultimate bad boy. He was never evil, merely misunderstood, and he needed the love of a very special woman. Then fast forward to the recent string of books and movies about humans with vampire lovers. In Twilight, Edward wrestles with an overwhelming desire to drink Bella's blood, but he loves her so powerfully that he denies his true nature. Getting involved with someone who's been labeled a monster is reckless, but it's also romantic. Ask the parents of any teenage girl what keeps them up at night. It's the same thing that drives Catherine to her death in Wuthering Heights. An old, old, old story.

As for why the prison husband doesn't dispute his wife's guilt? Well, film noir tells us all we need to know about the lure of a bad woman. But then again, maybe the prison spouses aren't dealing with anything so unusual. Is loving someone ever really safe? Embarking on a new relationship is a bit like setting sail down the Amazon. You can be cruising along, wondering how you got so lucky, when Mr. Wonderful's fatal flaw snaps at you with piranha-like ferocity. Maybe it's the ugly tone he uses with the pizza guy, or maybe he casually references ‘that summer I knocked someone up in Taipei.' Maybe you're having one of those fabulous, confessional, late night talks and he pops out with some gem like ‘The sexiest woman I know is my mother.'

Under any circumstances, falling in love is damn scary. While most relationships face blindsiding pitfalls, prison spouses know their biggest challenge right from the very beginning. And once you've accepted your beloved's murder conviction, then his penchant for weird message-tees or vulgar jokes can't seem like a big deal. Next to the black-and-white starkness of that kind of love, the average marriage with its quesadillas and Jeopardy looks awfully murky.