Seasons

December 9, 2020

I numbly looked at my calendar this morning, methodically crossing away the turmoil and frustrations from the day prior. I flipped the pages to March looking for the tiny letters in the right-hand corner of a box, identifying the official first day of spring. Although nationally March 19^th is the day that is said to promise sputtering pink azaleas peeking out or beady fireflies buzzing and circling around my window at night, it never really is. For me, it is not until April when spring gently awakens and bestows us with her beauty. 

I never set my morning alarm back then. The sun would lovingly peep out, slowly inching up the length of my arm until peacefully resting along my cheekbone. Wiping the morning from my eyes, I would poise my head upside-down to look through our bay window at the oak tree that generously shaded our house with her limbs. I always thought of her as my protector; my gentle guardian hugging and wrapping our tiny house in her arms, shielding us from the unknown, harsh realities that lingered around us. 

Selfishly, I never wanted to wake him. This was my sacred moment, standing alone at the screen door, breathing in the new life that spring had so carefully placed overnight. I was mesmerized by our slice of land; the Highlands lazily chewing, the sleeping hens quietly breathing atop their nooks of hay, the smell and feel of fresh, clean air intertwining her fingers in my hair. The symphony was nearing its end as the crickets and cicadas prepared for sleep. You could see fat, gooey drops of dew slide off the leaves of our oak tree, sprinkling the grass like diamonds. As the sun assembled her place in the sky and as I began to hear his rustling body, the ranch whispered to me, promising only the brevity of a moment and the constant of change. 

With learning the law, comes large, stale textbooks that reek of tired people. Day in and day out, I sit here, squeezing cases and words and rules into my over-stuffed brain. I am in a metamorphosis myself: the colors of life fading into pastels, every day getting paler until I am colorblind. But today, a burning color painfully shoots back into my eyes like sunlight radiating off a white surface as I read. I read and re-read this chapter as each word sends a repetitive cold shock down my spine. My toes go numb, my thighs feel heavy with hot blood, my gut twists into itself and I can taste the bitter, pungent stomach acid bubble in my throat as the echo of each heartbeat hammers and pounds on my ears. 

“Money Laundering, in simplest terms, is the transfer money obtained from criminal activity into ‘legitimate’ channels to disguise its illegal origins. Money laundering occurs whenever someone attempts to conceal or disguise the nature, the location, the source, the ownership, or the control of the proceeds of unlawful activity.” ¹

I remember him getting home from work, the dogs in all their glory pushing open the screen door, falling over each other, running to greet him. He approaches, beads of sweat intoxicatingly dripping off his beard, reeking of damp chicken feed and musty cattle, and pushes his cracked lips on mine. He pulls away and looks at me. The first time we ever met, I remember looking into his eyes, fiery, blue kaleidoscopes, and telling him how beautiful they were. They were still so radiant. “I’m going to give you some money, about two hundred bucks, every week. Put it in your account.” Mesmerized and stupid, I didn’t fight, I didn’t question. I just stared into those eyes. 

“Money laundering can take many forms from simple to complex: Structuring: Cash is broken into smaller deposits of money. Bulk cash smuggling: Physically smuggling cash into another jurisdiction, usually overseas, and depositing it in a financial institution with lax reporting requirements.” ¹

As the summer sun lingered longer in the sky, we began to visit our little river. We would climb and swerve between trees, slipping occasionally in the accumulated dust, giggling like children at our bloody knees. Secluded at the top of the mountain, I would watch him jump, over and over, into the icy mountain water howling with freedom and grit. I remember lying on my back, feeling the heat and energy of the smooth boulder seep into my skin, deep into my bones, gently reminding me of my own intrinsic light. On my forehead, I felt a drip of ice disrupt my meditation and I opened my eyes to wet, dark curls playing above my face. “I’m going to open a store in town. I don’t know what yet but it will be unique. Maybe I can sell porn magazines or snow cones or beer.” I smiled at his naive imagination and closed my eyes, “Sure, baby” and rekindled my meditation. 

“Cash-intensive businesses: A business typically involved in receiving cash uses its accounts to deposit both legitimate and criminally derived cash. Favorite operations for cash-intensive money laundering include parking buildings, strip clubs, tanning beds, or casinos.” ¹

I felt my heart pound in my throat, choking me with every beat, as I read. The room begins to sway like a boat and black spots temptingly encroach from the outer corners. I taste sweat trickle down my nose and into my mouth as I run to the screen door, whipping it open, gasping for the crisp and harsh winter air. My memories swarm in my brain like a tornado, destroying the enchanting and picturesque coloring they once had. He was just a small farmer...but the money, the store, the car, the ring...business had been bad for years but...the money, the store, the car, the ring...all in six months but...the money, the store…the car, the ring.

I looked at my oak tree, spiny and bare, retracting from my pleading eyes, no longer coddling our house with warmth and security. The joints in my knees wobbled and my back stiffened like a marionette, helplessly hanging on her strings until instructed to move. I looked down at my hands, eerily resembling the hands of a porcelain doll; hands that were contorted to perform without question. To prove to myself they were still my trembling hands under my thoughtful jurisdiction, I reached for a pen and my stale notebook.

“Dear diary, is this the life I blindly allowed myself to live? Is it still love if it’s built on a foundation of deceit?”

I returned to my screen door, quietly watching him trudge through the sticky mud that enveloped the brown grass. He looked up and met my gaze, his eyes twinkling in the reflection of the dying sun. Cold and bitter, the ranch whispered to me, promising only the brevity of a moment and the constant cruelty of change.

1. Money Laundering Law. (2020). Retrieved from: https://www.hg.org/money-laundering-law.html