The Negative Voice
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2001-02-21 - 2:55:32 PM

The Sin of Forgiveness

This is really a sort of a continuation of my thoughts on "Spring Street", but I wanted to use a quote from _Atlas Shrugged_ as the title instead.

Quick summary, for those who don't like Ayn Rand (that being, almost everyone): There are two childhood friends who find themselves on different sides of what turns out to be a war of ideology. They have almost the same values, they care deeply for one another, but they've come to different conclusions about the right response to the current situation. One has recently betrayed the other. When they meet, the victim says that the betrayer should not expect to be forgiven, no matter how long they've been friends. And the betrayer responds, "It is against the sin of forgiveness that I have come to warn you."

Long before I read that, I found forgiveness to be almost impossible. For that matter, I'm no good at letting go of anything. I look at a toy I was sick of when I was six and it's still mine. I don't want to throw it away. Ged save us all if something I still like gets lost; I'll be in a foul mood for days. And that's just for replacable property.

When a person does something to me, it's in their permanent record. My view of that person is forever altered. If someone pushes the wrong button, I can cut them off like a blade dropping. For example, I once had a girlfriend who said the wrong thing at the wrong time and aborted our whole relationship before it really started. We were in bed together- we were just talking and necking, we hadn't gotten farther than that yet- when my mother called. I often get aggravated when I talk to her on the phone, and the timing was especially bad here, so I was pretty short with her. This girl I was with thought that was her cue to give me a lecture on how I should treat my mom- never mind that she hadn't known me nearly long or well enough to have any perspective on twenty-one years of history with me and my parents. Her remarks were so ferocious, so ill-timed, and so out of line (in my opinion, anyway, and it's me we're talking about) that we effectively broke up right there. I don't think we actually broke up for a while after, but odds of us ever having a true romantic relationship were nil once she crossed that line. I'm that short-tempered about things that matter to me. This sometimes confuses people. I can sit there, calm as you like, and think, "when you shut up, I'll never talk to you again." I think a lot of people expect visible rage before they hit that point. Oops.

I can find some compensations, though. First, I can't forgive me either. I force myself to try as hard as I can to adhere to my principles. I haven't let myself down in almost three years, and I still feel bad about that last time. Second, not forgiving means I don't have to deal with a lot of ambigious feeling. When people do things that I don't like, I can look them in the eye, tell them how they rate, and move on. There's no do-I, don't-I dance going on. It keeps things simple.

Overall, I really don't know if I'd want Liralyn to inherit this trait from me or not. On one hand, I think that a ruthless willingness to throw people out of my life has kept me from getting hurt a few times, and I certainly want Liralyn to be able to protect herself. On the other hand, I'm a far from perfect parent, and I may need some forgiveness someday.

That nasty thought would be pretty hypocritical if not for one lucky factor: It's not up to me to decide what Liralyn's personality will be like anyway.

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