PART I – The Early Years (1981 – 1999)
From Chapter Nine – Shady Confession

            One morning while Dan was in the shower, his beeper went off.  Normally I would ignore it figuring it was probably one of his workers. But some little voice told me to pick it up. In bold letters the message read  – “THINKING OF YOU!”

 Thinking of you? Thinking of you!

 At last the pieces of the puzzle fit.  Of course, that was it. He was fucking someone!

            I didn’t wait for Dan to get out of the shower; I barged in and threw the curtain back, ripping the hooks right off the shower rod.

            “What the hell is this?” I shoved his beeper in his face.

            “How should I know, did you ever think it could be the wrong phone number?”

            He was quick with an answer; never raised his voice or uttered a four lettered word. He grabbed his beeper from my trembling hand, stepped around me as if I had some dreadful oozing skin disease, got himself dressed, and out the door he went, muttering over his shoulder that I was nuts.

PART II - The Generosa Years (2000 – 2002)
From Chapter Fifteen – Enraged!

            “I’m leaving Tami, I gotta go.”

            My stomach rose up to my chest and then, like a roller coaster, plummeted suddenly. It wasn’t what he said as the way he said it. Words didn’t need to be articulated in fluent detail, a megaphone couldn’t have been any louder or clearer. He was leaving and he wasn’t coming back. I pleaded, literally down on all fours. I clung to his leg like a crying child. It’s shameful to admit that I begged for him to change his mind. My words fell on deaf ears.

            “I gotta go Tam.”

And he left. Deserted me on the floor as if I was nothing more to him than a broken useless toy. He took his new suitcase full of name brand clothes and abandoned me like his old socks that he left behind in his bureau drawer.

 

Part II - The Generosa Years (2000-2002)
From Chapter Seventeen – Murder, Media, Mayhem

            I was in the bathroom putting my makeup on getting ready for an event at my job when Little Dan came running into the house out of breath. He told me there were men with cameras on their shoulders that followed him from the bus stop. I peered out the window and was astounded to see an entourage of reporters mulling around the front of my house, vans from CBS, NBC, ABC and Channel 12 News were parked along the road. I was looking out at them, and they were ogling back at me. The large front room window was bare of curtains or coverings because there wasn’t any molding around the window to hang a curtain rod. I felt like a fish with no place to hide in my fish bowl. I was concerned that the newscasters would hound Tony when he got off the school bus. Little Dan and I planned to run to my car and speed off before the reporters could catch us so I could pick Tony up directly from school and hide out at my mother’s. But the reporters stormed at me the moment I opened my door, clicking their cameras in my face. 

      “Mrs. Pelosi, can we have a statement?” 

      “Was Danny with you the night Ted Ammon was murdered?” 

       “Do you know where Danny was?” 

       “Do you think Danny murdered Mr. Ammon?”

PART III – The Shameful Years (2003-2005)
From Chapter Twenty-three – Arrested!

            “Lady, you are under arrest. Put your hands behind your back.” (He did not read me my rights.) 

          “What for?” I was stymied.

          “Because I have to cuff you.” My ignorance wore thin on him.

          “I’m not getting cuffed.” Ignorance manifested to anger.

          “Lady, then you’ll be charged with resisting arrest.”

           He would not hear me out or allow me the chance to retrieve the papers. He pulled my arms behind my back and snapped the cuffs on. I pleaded with him to let me drive my car to the precinct. Instead he shoved me in the back of the police car, like a dog. I feared I was going to be raped, or worse. I knew there was no warrant for me. And there was no way out of that car. I was handcuffed in the back of a police car, powerless. Being taken somewhere I did not believe to be the police department. I had recently seen a TV talk show about women who were raped by police officers, or men who pretend to be officers, the show emphasized - never get to the second location. I cried, silent salty tears that trickled down my cheeks and dropped onto my blouse. 
                 
           This can’t be happening, oh my god, this can’t be happening.

             

PART III - The Shameful Years (2003 – 2005)
From Chapter Thirty-one - Guilty with Reasonable Doubt

            “Oh my god,” one of the girls screamed, “ I think they said the verdict is guilty.”

           “No,” Rachelle screamed back, “you must have heard it wrong.”

            Everyone was dashing back and forth from the computer to the radio trying to find out what was said. Someone turned the volume up and seven of us stared at the radio. Within seconds the verdict was broadcast, “the Danny Pelosi verdict is in.  Danny Pelosi has been found guilty.” 

           Rachelle fell on her side, still holding her knees to her chest reeling back and forth, “He’s not guilty, he’s not guilty.” She screeched a painful wailing cry of despair. Her frail body contorting as if in a seizure. Our young Program Director whom I had known since he was a child, scooped her up, rocking her in his strong bear like arms.

           “Daddy!” she sobbed.

 

PART IV – The Healing (2005 – Present)
From Chapter Thirty-three – The Courage To Change The Things I Can

            I am done beating myself up.  I’m done being overcome by shame and disgrace of being married to a man convicted of murder.  I adopted that shame as if it were my own.  I am not accountable for anyone else’s actions. I did nothing to be ashamed of.  I was a wife. I was a mother. I went to church. I went to work. I helped children. I accept that I have made choices and decisions throughout my life which were not the wisest. I accept that I cannot change or undue one fraction of a second of what occurred in my life. The past is the past. I can harbor resentments and regret that I spent my life living in a pitiful fantasy – or I can move one. 

I’ve chosen to move on.