Wednesday July 30th 2003
 

Dearest Jacob

How are you doing? Fine I hope. Well as for me I'm in a bit of a bind and I really need some help from you again. I have nowhere else to turn, I am really struggling. I don't want to go to prison again, my nerves for one can't take it. And my family needs me.

I really do need some assistance from you. I need an attorney to represent me in court. And also the bills have to be paid at home. Skip - my significant other - is doing all he can to try and make sure our bills are being paid.

My probation officer violated me, it's a technical violation, but by me having a criminal history it doesn't look good for me. So the only way I can see my way through this is with an attorney. They use points here in Florida to convict you, which means anything in the past that you have done, and even done time on it, still counts against you.

I don't have anyone else to ask for help. So please consider trying to help me please. I need you to please contact my family at 813-xxx-xxxx. You can ask for Tommy (Skip) or Deontay (my son). Please let me hear from you real soon. I am currently sitting in jail and I am looking forward to hearing from you real soon.

Jacob, I have no place else to turn. I really do need to hear from you very soon. And if at all possible and if you are in this country in the near future, please come visit me in Tampa still.

Jacob, please write to me soon or call my family please. You can also reach Skips sister at 813-xxx-xxxx, and my cousin Jimmy's house at 813-xxx-xxxx. I want to hear from you real soon and I will appreciate anything you can do to help me. Jacob, it seems to me, when it rains it pours, it seems that I will never get my life together where I am not worrying.  As you know I just lost my mom recently, and that still has a tremendous affect on me. I'm really going through a lot of pain now and I really need some help.

My family is doing all they can to help me. Please contact us soon. Please call us soon as possible.

Love Linda

ps. I am currently in XXXX jail and my booking number is #xxxxxxx. Jacob, I have $1.000 attorney fees to pay, would you please help me out. And if you do send me money, please send a travelers check, it's easier to cash than a money order. You can send it to xxxx  xxxxxx St in Tampa, Florida in my name. Ok, thank you so much. Any amount you can contribute will be appreciated. Thank you so much, God bless you. 

Pga. sommerferie nåede jeg ikke at skrive og fik nyt brev fra Linda ca. en uge senere:

Thursday August 7th 2003

Hello Jacob

Well, I don't know if you have received my previous letter or not. But I wrote to you and I have not gotten a response yet. I really am in need of help right now, and I don't have anywhere else or anyone else to turn to.

So please, I need to hear from you soon, and do you have copies of the pictures you took of me and my family when you came to visit? If so could you please send us some. And thanks for the movie (DR1's program om mine besøg hos mine gamle venner i USA).

Jacob, I really do need help from you okay. I owe the lawyer in order for him to help me out. If you can contribute to this cause, please do, I can use it. My son just had a baby in July, you have got to see the baby. The baby is so beautiful, she's a girl. I can use $300 to $400 dollars or whatever you can contribute. You can come to Florida and visit me in jail, just let me know when you can come and I will put you down for visitation. I will have to do it in advance. So please don't let me down. I'm depending on you. Please call my family at 813-xxx-xxxx or 813-xxx-xxxx or 813-xxx-xxxx.

Jacob, I am waiting to hear from you very, very soon. Please write or call or call and write.

Thank you, Linda

Dear Linda

I am rushing this off just to let you know I got your two letters. I couldn’t answer you before since I was on vacation.

First I apologize for not having sent some pictures before, but it has been an overwhelming job to process and scan pictures from the many families I saw on the last trip. It was such a huge trip I went on this time and it cost me too much since my car broke down again and again. It is more than 6 years since I last could afford such a long trip. But at then I could better afford it since I had many lectures at that time. Since then I have fired my black agent because he owed me too much money and I have not yet found a new one. Thus I have very little income now, but enjoy it since it gives me more time to visit old friends.

It was sad to hear that you ended up in prison again, but I was not all that surprised. Somehow I don’t think you are far enough away from the drug environment. I always felt like coming to kidnap you to get away from it all. But the time was never right and it would also have meant too much responsibility on my part. Back in the 1980’es I had the money to be able to do it perhaps, but then you were usually so wasted each time I found you (or rather didn’t find you), that I gave up. Now I think you are more motivated, but now I no longer have the money or the position to be able to help you more than perhaps a bit emotionally.

I will nevertheless send you money for the lawyer. I would also like to come and see you in jail if you have to stay there for long. But remember that I am just a photographer and writer, not a good psychological counselor. In November I hope to have organized 2 or 3 lectures in America on my own without an agent – enough to pay for my trip – and then it would be wonderful if I could come to see you. Also for another reason: one of the times I came to see you (but didn’t find you) was in the late 80’es. When I asked around Alabama and 5^th St I ran into Inez, Robert’s old girlfriend. We immediately hooked up and I stayed with her in her shack for a short period. But then she too disappeared out of my life on drugs for a long time. However, this time when I came to find you, I found her children and left a message for her. Thus I hooked up with Inez again – but after my departure. Suddenly one day she sent me an e-mail here in Denmark and now we communicate daily again. That is wonderful. But what is more wonderful is that she pulled herself away from the drug scene and got an education. I think you can use her as a good and positive example. In some ways she was worse off than you since she totally neglected her children all those years while I had the feeling that you always were able to maintain a close relationship with your sons - in spite of your prison terms – and had a lot of love for them. Rikke – my Danish companion on this last trip – liked them very much. But still we sensed that they had been somewhat influenced negatively by your long experience with drugs.

I was again impressed with your sharp intelligence and memory. This gives us a lot of hope for your future. But at the same time it is depressing that you haven’t been able to make more out of it during all those years. It reminds me of my friend Tony Harris. When I met him in 1973 he was in prison for drugs, but over the years he grew and became my best assistant – first here in Europe and since in America – going around doing racism workshops with me. We were a very powerful couple – a white and a black man together. But in 1990 the money started drying up and I had to lay him off. And then he sunk right back into the ghetto, crime and drugs I had once found him in. For the next 10 years he was a wild crack addict – stealing right and left – so that even his own family wouldn’t invite him inside. Then he found help from the Potter Center in Atlanta and found God. And now he is totally free of drugs and doing fine. Here a month ago he came back to Denmark to visit me for the first time in 12 years again. And it was a fantastic experience to have him stay with us again. When I saw him as a crack addict in those years – loosing all his teeth etc – I would never have thought that there was any hope for him. What it shows is that we must never give up hope.

Anyway, I don’t know how I can really help you now. The money I send can only be a onetime thing since I earn less than a school teacher now. Also it is hard for me to get time to write very often. This will probably not reach you before your court date, but please tell me what happens. And where I should send the pictures to.
All the best of luck in court.

With love

Jacob Holdt
Gernersgade 63
1319 Copenhagen
Denmark
www.american-pictures.com

Brev fra Linda efter at jeg sendte hende pengene.

Friday August 22nd, 2003

Dearest Jacob

I appreciate your help. I waited to respond to you because I wanted to make sure you knew where to write back to me at. Well, I am in a prison drug treatment facility now. and I'm going to try and get myself on the right track once again.

I want something out of life and I am determined to get it, and I know with the help of my God I will accomplish it. So don't give up hope in me.

I have set a goal for myself and that goal is to have a restaurant one day. I love to cook and I am good at it also. So I am going to use this God given talent to the best of my ability. So one day whenever you are here visiting the USA, you will be able to walk in my restaurant and have a really good meal. So remember that okay.

Jacob, my birthday is coming up real soon September 4th and I will be 40 years old (unbelievable isn't it). I still can remember meeting you all those years ago at the age of 8 years old and you taking my pictures. It's been a long time ago.

My boys and family are doing fine, they are very proud of me for trying to get help for myself. Well, that's what's going on with me right now. I will be looking forward to hearing from you very soon.

Whenever you get more pictures of me and my family and you and Rikke, please send. Tell Rikke I said hi, and my son R. wants to hear from her. He is in jail now on an old charge and he wants her to write to him. So this is how she can write to him
R.R. #xxxxxxxx, xxxxx prison. He is looking forward to hearing from her. And also he wants a picture of them together. He also wants her to know he had a birthday on August 5th. He turned 20 years old.

I really appreciate the positive influence you guys had on my children. Thank you again Jacob. And also you had a positive influence on my significant other. So please stay in contact.

I want to know when you will be back this way so I can have you visit me okay.

With lots of love

Linda