As I watched an episode from 'Touched by an Angel' I discovered Jean Sibelius created some wonderful pieces called the Sad Waltz.

 

“Dancing, at its best, is independence and intimacy in balance.” “Sometimes in life confusion tends to arise and only dialogue of dance seems to make sense.” “Dance as the narration of a magical story; that recites on lips, illuminates imaginations and embraces the most sacred depths of souls.”

Touch by an Angel is one of my favorite series. Each episode is about the stories of people and the God who loves them. In one episode we meet a couple who found themselves drifting apart after the wife chose to have an abortion because it would interfere with their life's career path. The only problem was, the pain stemming from this abortion remained with the couple for 15 years.  As the wife attempted to work through the emotions of this loss, her husband was burying it down deep with the help of alcohol.  

Bitterness consumed their souls and this led to emotionally and sexually withdrawing from each other. In one of the final scenes, Monica retrieves a poem from the fireplace the wife had written for her husband in an attempt to seek forgiveness for making the decision to terminate her life without consulting him. 

 As the poem was read, her husband felt a dike breaking that was holding back his tears.  It was at that point, he apologize to her for the way he has been toward her.  This was a couple despite losing a child they never knew still madly in love with each other.  

It was at this point I learned of a composer named Sibelius who wrote what would be called the sad Waltz. Shortly after our daughter died, my wife and I got involved in a ballroom dance class where the instructors taught the men how to lead and the woman how to follow. As he explained, it is not uncommon for couples to fall out of balance with each other after the loss of a child. It is when we learn to dance as a couple that our balance is restored. I did some research on the sad waltz and this was the back story I found.
It is night. The son, who has been watching beside the bedside of his sick mother, has fallen asleep from sheer weariness, Gradually a ruddy light is diffused through the room: there is a sound of distant music: the glow and the music steal nearer until the strains of a valse melody float distantly to our ears.


The sleeping mother awakens, rises from her bed and, in her long white garment, which takes the semblance of a ball dress, begins to move silently and slowly to and fro. She waves her hands and beckons in time to the music, as though she were summoning a crowd of invisible guests.


And now they appear, these strange visionary couples, turning and gliding to an unearthly valse rhythm. The dying woman mingles with the dancers; she strives to make them look into her eyes, but the shadowy guests one and all avoid her glance. Then she seems to sink exhausted on her bed and the music breaks off. Presently she gathers all her strength and invokes the dance once more, with more energetic gestures than before.


Back come the shadowy dancers, gyrating in a wild, mad rhythm. The weird gaiety reaches a climax; there is a knock at the door, which flies wide open; the mother utters a despairing cry; the spectral guests vanish; the music dies away. Death stands on the threshold.[1]