angels in the snow

“Your office has been trying to reach you all morning,” the court clerk said as she waved a note from behind her desk in front of the judge’s bench. I had just finished cross-examining a criminal defendant on trial for assault, and the judge had excused the jury for a one-hour lunch recess before closing arguments would begin. I unfolded the piece of paper and considered its message for a moment. I had become friendly with the staff over the several months that I had been assigned to that courtroom, and asked the clerk if I could use the phone in the judge’s chambers to make a personal call as a favor.

Normally that area was strictly off-limits to attorneys, but the look on my face must have let her know that this wasn’t a casual request. She escorted me back and then left me by myself in the empty room. I dialed the number and glanced down again at the words that appeared in the note:

'Call your father ASAP'

I was grateful for the privacy as the phone began to ring on the other end of the line. I was pretty certain Dad was calling to tell me that my mother had finally succeeded in ending her life.

* * * * * * * *

Mom had been suffering for several years from a condition called gastroparesis, a nervous disorder that paralyzes a person’s stomach and causes them to feel nauseous and hungry at the same time. When she was diagnosed, there was no known cause or cure for the disease. My mother had been in perfect health before being struck with a sudden onset of its symptoms at the age of 48.

At first, her mood had been positive and optimistic as she and Dad went around to a number of specialists to try one experimental treatment after another. Some of the medications had given her temporary relief, but she soon began to lose weight at a rapid pace. Her diet consisted of bland baby food and Ensure nutritional shakes. She had been tall and thin to begin with, and it was not long before all of her clothes began to hang from her gaunt frame.

The constant feeling of nausea and hunger during every waking moment gradually took a mental toll on her as well. My mother had always been an upbeat person, but she grew more and more despondent as she continued to struggle with her condition for months and years on end. I could hear the increasing despair in her voice with each passing week when I would phone to check in on her and share a funny story about one of Brendan’s latest five-year old antics to try to brighten her mood.

Her spirit was finally broken in 1998 on New Year’s Eve, when she attempted an overdose by taking every one of her prescriptions at once. After my father had fallen asleep watching television in the living room, she went up to their bedroom and swallowed all of her pills in desperation. Dad woke up a short time later to find her lying in bed surrounded by empty medicine bottles and a feebly scribbled note. She was rushed to the hospital, and was admitted to the psychiatric crisis unit for several days until her mental condition had stabilized.

* * * * * * * *

It was three months after that first attempt when I received the message in the courtroom to call my father. Dad didn’t have many details, but apparently Mom had told him that she was heading out to the store for a quick errand at around eight o’clock on the previous evening. When she didn’t return home after several hours, he contacted the police. They called him early that morning to report that her body had been found in a snow-covered field at the edge of town. Her car had been parked nearby with the front door ajar, her winter coat left behind on the driver's seat. A single set of footprints led to a spot a short distance away, where it appeared that she had just stretched out and lay back in the snow, finally succumbing at some point during the night to hypothermia.

Dad had already called my brother Michael in Mexico City and was on his way to pick up my sister Mary Ellen from college. He sounded completely drained and asked if I could be the one to tell my youngest brother Christopher, who lived near me outside Philadelphia. I reached my brother at work and broke the news to him, and after he got over the initial shock we made plans to meet at my house to follow each other for the trip to our hometown.

I took a few moments to pull my thoughts together during the remainder of the lunch hour and then returned to the courtroom to give my closing argument. There was no doubt that the judge would have adjourned the case under the circumstances, but that would have meant declaring a mistrial and retrying everything all over again in several months. I didn’t want to put the victim through the ordeal of another four-day trial when this one was so close to being finished. After the jury was sent out to deliberate, I contacted my office to have them send someone over to the courtroom to be present in my place when the verdict was eventually announced.

My head was full of questions during the three-hour drive to Williamsport, as Brendan slept peacefully in the backseat. I would have to wait until the following morning to speak with the State Trooper in charge of the investigation to begin to get some answers. I kept imagining my mother laying down in that field all by herself and wondered what more I could have done to prevent her from reaching that point.

I became lost in my thoughts during the rest of my journey home. The headlights shown on the falling snow that was covering the world outside beneath a veil of white. Within me, my emotions were becoming shrouded as well. Over the course of that day my focus had been placed outwards towards other tasks, such as closing arguments and consoling my sibling, so that I would not have to face my own grief. I had yet to shed a single tear, although that time would soon come. For now, my mind wandered aimlessly seeking numbness from the pain, as I traveled further into a landscape frozen in utter stillness.

Taking the lead

"Gentlemen, it doesn't matter whether the music is cha-cha, rumba, meringue or salsa. There are two things you must learn for any Latin dance: how to get you and your partner IN IT, and how to get the two of you back OUT." Our instructor Jeanne spent the next section of class teaching us the proper way to 'introduce' our female partner to a new change in direction and how to begin an entirely different dance altogether.

I had been on the run all day, and had arrived at class still in my suit that I had put on twelve hours earlier. Even after the jacket and tie had come off, work was still very much on my mind for the first part of the lesson, along with a list of a half-dozen other things that would need my attention once I eventually got home. I had to force myself to concentrate on each of the particular steps that we were being taught and tried to push the other thoughts off to the side.

Before long I settled down and just focused on the music. Soon my legs, hips, and shoulders began to follow right along with the driving tempo. Without really being aware of it, I was no longer thinking about each individual step and had stopped counting out the beats in my head. Sandi, the assistant instructor who was my partner, flashed an encouraging smile as we started to move naturally through each of the dances that we had learned up to that point.

Her smile was soon replaced by a frown as she caught a glimpse of a husband and wife struggling to keep up with the rest of the class. Sandi assured me that I already had all of the steps down, and cocked her head over in the direction of the floundering couple. "I'm needed over there," she said with a wink. She cut in and started dancing with the husband to try to fix the problem at the source. His wife was sent over to become my new partner.

Her name was Marie and she was a very friendly woman in her mid-fifties. Things started off fine, but it turned out that there was one slight problem: Marie was a little too friendly. She meant well, but she was more concerned about making small talk than paying attention to the actual music. She chatted about everything from her children’s hobbies to their recent family vacation to a quick recap of the latest episode of ‘Dancing with the Stars.’ Her body kept trying to move in the opposite direction from where we needed to go for each step. That, in turn, was throwing me off of the rhythm, and I had to quickly shuffle my feet to get back in step with the music. It wasn’t long before I was counting off the beats to myself again.

I didn’t want to be rude to this woman who was a complete stranger, so at first I just smiled back at her and tried to listen with one ear. As she continued to talk I could feel my frustration growing, the easy movements from my dancing with Sandi all but forgotten. Marie and I became locked in a subtle tug of war, each of us trying to pull the other in opposing directions. She and I were definitely IN it. I recalled our instructor’s comments at the top of class, and realized that it was my job to get us both back out.

I took over with a sudden surge and changed my entire posture, locking my arms into place and tightening my grip on her hand and rear shoulder. The next time that the two of us needed to move forward for a particular step, I pushed off with my legs and drove Marie back on her heels while holding her firmly around the upper body. When it was time for us to go backwards, I pulled her in towards me with steady direction. When we needed to turn, I dropped one arm and placed my hand on her hip, spinning her off to the left with a firm push. Then I quickly twirled her back into position to start the next step.

Marie was naturally startled by the abrupt change in tone, and she quickly stopped talking as her eyes searched my face to gauge my mood. I smiled and gave her a look letting her know that everything was in control. I could see her shoulders relax slightly, and she stopped resisting whenever I began to lead her in a particular direction. Soon she was smiling as well as we moved easily along with the music from one dance into another.

Our teacher walked into the center of the floor as class came to an end. "Latin dancing is not for the feint of heart," she told us. American ballroom was about grace and poise, with the dancers gliding across the dance floor up on the balls of their feet. Latin dance was rhythmic and down low, with the body’s weight centered back over the heels. ”Stick with me and come to every class ready to work, and I promise you that by the end of ten weeks, you WILL know how to dance to any kind of Latin music."

I headed out of the high school gym towards my car, feeling completely refreshed and already looking foward to next week's class. I was going to enjoy moving to another rhythm for a change.