The Next Chapter, Our Story
Here is the email I received from the Department of Corrections today.
Good afternoon Mr. Avery,
I hope all is well. I tried contacting you at the last know numbers I had for you and one of those numbers was disconnected. I tried calling an alternate number I found for you and the mailbox was full. Luckily, I was able to retrieve your e-mail address. I am contacting you regarding a message I received from Leon Shook, probation and parole officer, regarding Patricia Long. Mr. Shook advised me that offender Long had her final sentencing this week and she was given a unsatisfactory discharge from probation and was released from custody. Mr. Shook wanted to ensure you were aware of the status. You may have already received notice from the D.A.'s office regarding the probation sentencing status, however, we wanted to ensure you were aware of the most recent status.
If you have questions regarding this matter, please contact my office.
Sincerely,
Francine Garcia
Victim Services
New Mexico Corrections Department
505-827-8848
I Speak for the Dead
I speak for Michael Snyder shot eight times by his wife and then buried in the yard only to be found by his stepson’s conscience as the stepson confessed his limited involvement in the crime to friends and later the police.
And where was Michael’s six year old daughter as shot after shot impacted her father, as mom wrapped dad’s body in a tarp to be stored until later buried?
Conscience does not seem to be an issue for the wife after several shots, getting a friend to bring a backhoe in for body disposal; lying to the police about her husband’s whereabouts; and failing to disclosure to the new homebuyers that she had turned the yard into an impromptu cemetery where she acted as judge, executioner, corner, and mortician.
Why, because she was the victim of years of abuse of course. Abuse which lead her to defending herself against abusive husband who, by the way, was also apparently dealing with questions about his own sexuality.
And the only witness to the abuse, apparently not the seventeen year old son, or the six year old daughter who should be able to outline incident after incident of where stepfather/father heaped this abuse on mom to such an extent that seven or eight bullet holes proved the only remedy. But I am sure you give them enough time and they will come up with the stories necessary to defend their one surviving parent. After all we do not wish the fourteen year old daughter to lose both parents, especially a mother who involves a minor child in the attempt to hide her criminal actions.
And there are no police reports, no shaking heads among neighbors and friends, just one male ‘friend’ who saw the bruises on the wife and did not respond by calling the police, by setting up counseling or other services, no he responded by lending her the murder weapon.
And if you believe all of this is ridiculous beyond belief, Google “Mary Winkler”.
She recovers or she does not
It is now over two years since Patricia’s arrest for violating her probation by making numerous suicide gestures/attempts.
I missed the hearing last week as I was out of town on business and my information comes from our son Glen and the assistant district attorney.
I am not sure how many of these hearings spread out over the last two years, at least half a dozen. I was thinking half a dozen, but the court website says eleven. This number does not include the three we traveled down for and the court cancelled at the last moment.
This hearing differed from the others. First, it took and hour and a half before they could get Patricia into the court room. The
She agreed to the recent finding of competency. The
As I understand it, Patricia faces two choices. If she agrees to the DA plan, she would leave for
My calculation for her husband’s release date seems to have been short, I thought Mr. Lopez would be released by now but he is still in jail for his own probation violation (DWI arrest number eight).
I really did not wish to hear the word ‘combative’. It is an indication that little has changed, Patricia is unchanged.
People ask how the children are doing; honestly I am so proud of them. Glen feels genuine sorrow for the events; sorrow not to be confused with pity, trust, or missing contact.
I believe Jessica has dismissed her from consideration and her life. She did not have to assume some responsibility for her mother as Glen was forced to at seventeen, thus I believe her position is natural and rational.
Montie worries a little, and shares the sincere desire with his father that this would simply end.
Someone asked me yesterday how does this end, it has been ongoing since February 2002, my thirteen year-old son was five.
My response, “It ends one of two ways, she recovers or she does not”.
“If she recovers, it is a miracle to be shared with the world, a time of rejoicing and attempts to heal”.
“If she does not recover it could be years of this chaos as she fights the world until all energy is drained out of her soul and body”.
Same Old Song
Patricia’s hearing was moved back to October 7th yesterday after she would not agree to the stipulated order with a finding of competency. Both the
La Belle Dame sans Merci
I fell in love with Dicksee’s La Belle Dame sans Merci as a freshman in college. The painting is inspired by a Keat’s poem of the same name. My love is one of those moments in your life difficult to explain.
I own a copy that use to hang in my office and now hangs in my den. A print with Dicksee’s version and two other Romantic artist’s versions hangs in my bedroom. A third relief version hangs in the master bathroom.
My first love of the painting was without knowledge of the title or the poem Keat’s wrote. I fell in love with the idea Dicksee communicated of total surrender, of giving yourself up to Love completely.
The Knight is a Christ figure, vulnerable to the slightest movement of the beauty above him. And such beauty -- the long red hair, the beauty of her face, the perfect dress setting off the white flesh.
To me this was Chivalry at it best, in service to Beauty.
Before the internet, I searched for information about the painting, glimpsed only for a moment at seventeen years of age. Eventually I found information to include the title --
La Belle Dame sans Merci, or The Beautiful Woman without Mercy and the poem by Keats, the tenth and eleventh stanzas follow:
I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried—“La Belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!”
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill’s side
It is a poem about a knight killed or trapped by a fairy princess, doomed to eternally be wrapped up in her spell.
And who says God does not have a sense of humor?