Free Spirit: Growing Up On The Road and Off The Grid

In Free Spirit: Growing Up On The Road and Off The Grid, Joshua Safran recalls his childhood spent living literally outside of society -- sometimes with little sustenance or supervision, frequently with no electricity or plumbing for months at a stretch. Shaped and sharpened by the oft misguided tutelage of Claudia, his anti-establishment, hippie-Wiccan-artist mother, Joshua understood from an early age that he and Claudia were different from other families. While most parents enthusiastically sent their kids off to school, Claudia believed schools to be almost as “evil” as corporations, brainwashing kids with lies intended to preserve the status quo and perpetuate poverty, inequality, and injustice. As a result of Claudia’s unremitting determination to defy the system and realize her utopian vision of an honest, communal life, Joshua spent most of his formative years home-schooled or on the move – either studying subjects like philosophy, history, and feminist theory with Claudia or learning basic survival skills from the school of hard knocks. If being forced to endure a slew of ramshackle, makeshift homes and a string of Claudia’s short-lived relationships with unavailable men wasn’t enough for any growing boy, Joshua’s situation took a drastic turn for the worst when his mother fell for and eventually married Leopoldo, a self-professed rebel soldier/poet from El Salvador who claimed to have escaped the death squad in the name of the revolution. Of course, revolution or no, Joshua knew Claudia was smitten with his stories and overcome by his tales of bravery in the face of fascism. If only Leopoldo was half the man Claudia believed him to be and not the hothead loser who blew his family’s last earnings on liquor, drank to excess, and verbally abused and beat on his mother, then maybe Joshua would stop fantasizing of ways to end Leopoldo's one-man regime once and for all.

I had come to know of Free Spirit by way of meeting its author, Joshua Safran, a few years ago in a different, yet related atmosphere. While directing the Philadelphia Jewish Film Festival, I opened our annual Docs and Dialogue Series with the award-winning documentary Crime After Crime, a film very close to Joshua’s heart. Crime After Crime, which won “Audience Favorite” that festival season, is the story of the battle to free Deborah Peagler, a woman sentenced 25 years-to-life for connection to the murder of Oliver Wilson, her brutally abusive pimp boyfriend.

Film still from Crime After Crime

Joshua Safran and his partner Nadia Costa, two rookie land-use attorneys at the time, took Deborah’s case Pro Bono after Deborah had already served twenty years of her sentence. They believed that with the indisputable evidence existing in her favor, they could easily win Deborah’s freedom in a matter of months. What they were not prepared for was the almost decade-long battle that ensued to give Deborah her life back. What this incredibly powerful documentary revealed was not only the tremendous abuses Deborah and her family suffered at the hands of her former boyfriend, but also the grave injustice the Peagler family endured due to the warped and corrupt practices of America’s criminal justice system.

I invited Joshua to attend the festival and represent Crime After Crime at our screening. His personal recollections of Deborah’s case and his demonstrated commitment to bringing awareness and justice to victims of domestic violence not only moved the audience to tears, but left everyone, including me, with a sense of urgency to help innocent women like Deborah.

Joshua felt empathy towards Deborah Peagler for many reasons. He understood what it was like to feel like a powerless victim. He knew of all the tricks Deborah spoke of when she described how Oliver would treat the wounds he inflicted all over her raw and swollen body. Joshua knew first hand what it was like to watch someone you love be hurt again and again. Maybe, as a child, he wasn’t ready to take on that fight with Leopoldo, but now, with everything he had learned and overcome in his life, he was truly empowered. His fight took the form of helping Deborah Peagler win the battle over injustice, corruption, and demoralization. Through Deborah he would also fight for his mother and for the man he believed himself to be.

Score: I love this book! 4.5/5 stars
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