The terrible feeling of being sundered, less than a whole person that she’d felt all her life had vanished when she met Tom — but now that terrible loneliness was consuming her life.

Dorothy increased her office hours, poured herself into more cases until one day she simply collapsed in the middle of an impassioned closing, arguing in defense of a young homeless mother who had killed the social worker who had tried to take her baby. Dorothy, the woman of steel was no more.

After a long convalescence, she finally took stock of her life. She was now just 60, too young to retire but also not strong enough to practice law like she used to.

What could she do? Teach? She contacted the prestigious law school she and Tom had attended and cadged an offer to lecture a few hours a week. That was something! She’d be active, useful, and surrounded by bright young minds!

Teaching helped, but at the end of the day, she was alone, sitting up in bed watching late-night TV — bad late-night TV! Later she would attribute what happened next to that late-night talk show and its ditzy guests.

It was 2 am and a big black woman in a massive wig was interviewing a thin white one with almost no hair. Their mouths were opening and closing soundlessly, and at last, Dorothy relented and turned up the volume.

“…my mother,” said the thin white woman wiping at her rabbit-pink eyes. “I asked her, but the truth is she didn’t know…”

The black hostess turned incredulous eyes towards the camera before looking back at her guest. “Honey, your mama didn’t know who her baby-daddy was?”

The thin woman blushed, or rather, she broke out in ugly red blotches. “My mother had some godless years, Mavis, but she’s walking with the Lord now!”

“Amen!” cried Mavis enthusiastically, then she asked, “But how did she not know?”

“It was those Woodstock days, Mavis,” said the woman. “People were sinning and following the ways of the devil and indulging their flesh…”

“But you found your father,” Mavis interrupted before the thin woman started preaching. “How did that come about?”