STUCK IN TIME: FORGIVENESS & FORGETTING

 Is it really possible to forgive and forget?

The Tree of Forgiveness Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1885

Greek legends tell how Phyllis, queen of Thrace, fell in love with Demophoön, king of Melos, who visits her court en route for Athens after the Trojan War, where he had hidden inside the legendary Trojan Horse. He left the court, but when he failed to keep his promise to return within a month, she committed suicide, whereupon Athena, taking pity on her, turned her into an almond tree. Eventually, Demophoön returned to Thrace and, discovering what had happened, embraced the tree, which immediately burst into blossom.

Between you, me, and the almond tree, in the painting above, Demophoön looks as if he doesn't expect to be forgiven.

Memory is very important to me, but I've learned not to hold grudges. Grudges are all about keeping your pain, fear and anger alive. By doing this, you allow the grudge to control you. Your memory is not just a recollection, it's a reenactment. It initializes all your emotions just as if it were happening again, a recording in constant rotation shooting you back in time. In reality there is no time jump, but you are stuck in time.

Forgiving means that the memory no longer has the power to control you, to make you suffer in quite the same way. The blade of memory may make you wince, but you no longer bleed so profusely. You've taken the pain and anger and sorrow into you, but you've released the vilest portion of it, the part that made you feel less than, lowly, vulnerable.

©s. obriant

A lot of bad people did bad things around me and to me and to people I loved when I was a kid, so how did I manage to survive, much less forgive? Forgiveness wasn't this huge benediction bestowed on the evildoers in my life. It was the sure knowledge that I wasn't like those people and didn't want to be like them. This gave me hope.

Lack of forgiveness, grudges, and revenge arise from a lack of hope, a core belief that nothing changes. Change is my mantra.

I never forget, but I have discovered the capacity to forgive by letting go of my fear. Fear makes me sad and my childhood was overlain with fear and sadness which in my teens I camouflaged with anger. Fiery anger can be tinged with righteous purity, masking any true knowledge.

My camouflage worked so well that it took me years to realize that I was still letting fear rule me. Drat! I still had to deal with those memories and how stuck I was in the past. Writing helped me ferret out many of those emotions, examine them in detail, endow my characters with all the depth and nuance of being simultaneously good and bad.

This happened when I had a solid sense of who I am, and knew that the essential Sandra would persevere. The joy I feel in the world starts inside of me and radiates out.

I'm not a Pollyanna, a foolishly optimistic nutcase. I have felt both despair and hope. The memories of both states are not just in my brain. The feelings they generated are buried deep within the muscle tissue, sinews, veins and capillaries of my body. I can activate them. I know where they live.

Memories of Armando

Not Armando, but you get the idea

                                        

     My dog and I occasionally walk past The Coffee Bean. There’s usually a group of five or six older men laughing and talking together at a table outside.  One afternoon, when Joey was around two-years-old I tied him to a meter where I could see him when I went inside for a double Cappuccino.
     The line was long and he started barking when I didn’t immediately return. I saw one of the older men holding a paper cup of water for Joey to drink, then petting him. That’s how I met Armando, 85, who asked if he could hold him by the leash at the table with the other guys.
      

     “Sure, just hold him tight. He’ll pull if another dog shows up.”

     “I know dogs,” he said.

      Joey loved all the attention lavished on him and wagged his tail every time he saw his pal, Armando.

        

         Armando had moved to the U.S. from Brazil when he was fifteen. His family lived in Brooklyn and one-by-one they traveled west to Los Angeles. He continued to work as a plumber in Brooklyn and finally made the leap to L.A. sixty years ago. He met his wife here. They had three children, all of whom had children and who now live in the valley.

         “My wife died twenty years ago,” he said.

         “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. “Do you see your kids and grandkids?”

         “Yeah, they were fun when they were little but now they’re always looking down at their phones.”

         I smirked and shrugged my shoulders.

         “Can you take off your sunglasses?” he asked.

         “Sure, but then I won’t be able to see you. They’re prescription.”

         It was his turn to shrug his shoulders; only he did it with joy. “My vision is still 20/20.”

         His eyes were blue and his skin was mostly unwrinkled. He was tall and not bowed around the shoulders like many older people. He walked every day and always wore sandals and shorts. Deeply 

tanned, Armando had ingratiating good looks and appeared much younger than eighty-five. He also seemed very self-sufficient.

         Joey and I ran into him often over the years, and when we walked by The Coffee Bean I waved at the group. My path varied each day so catching sight of them was not a guarantee.  

         Months passed, it seemed, during which I didn’t see Armando or his group. They weren’t gathering anymore. Someone probably died, I thought. Maybe it was Armando. Maybe they all had died.

         Today I tied Joey to the meter and had just ordered my double Cappuccino when I noticed a man adding sugar to his coffee.

         “Armando! I've been thinking about you. Where’ve you been?” He was a bit thinner but still unbowed, tanned and his blue eyes sparkled.

         “I went to a casino with my wife,” he said. Although it was obvious he didn’t recognize me, he gave me a big smile. I pushed my sunglasses to the top of my head.

         “Your wife?” He’d been a widower for over two decades.

         “Yeah, she likes to gamble, but I don’t. The casino gave me a free cash credit of 10 bucks and I won $28, but I forgot my winnings at the table.” He laughed.

         “Did you get married again, Armando?”

         He looked momentarily puzzled but kept talking. “My wife had been playing for five hours straight when I decided I’d had enough of waiting around. So I went to the spa, got a massage, sat in the sauna. It was great!”

         “You did a role reversal,” I said. His expression indicated he didn’t understand what I meant. “The woman is usually the one who goes to the spa.”

         “Oh, okay. We had a great time,” he said, and then apropos of nothing added, “A lot of Asians were there. They’re really addicted to gambling.”

         “Uh-huh,” I said, and looked over my shoulder at my dog tied to his usual meter. He was nine now and sat patiently waiting for me. “Remember Joey?”

         “Oh, yeah,” he said and walked off, going outside and sitting at a table by himself.

         When Joey saw Armando exit, he stood and whipped his tail back and forth with enthusiasm. Armando didn’t acknowledge him. Joey’s wagging slowed, and he sat again, staring at his friend with a worry crease between his eyes.

         At his table, Armando smiled and nodded at no one in particular. I hoped he was thinking of his long ago visit to the casino and that in his memory he and his wife were winning big.

This Stuff is Mine

The image at left says:  Housewife: The best job in the world.

I keep waiting for my inner hausfrau to burst forth from within, someone with good knees who keeps an immaculate house. Why is the archetype German? Surely there are other ethnic archetypes of the person I am not. I'm 50/50 Irish and Mexican. Both these ethnic groups fall to the negative on the good housekeeping continuum. I think (vows to do internet search to disprove point).

I’d rather do the research than dustbust the dirt that dripped from the burro’s tail I transplanted. Not cleaning is as obsessive as cleaning too much or thinking about cleaning, or in my case — thinking and writing about not cleaning. It’s also a form of self-hate, because who likes dirt? I don’t. And this dirty floor and dusty stuff is mine, and even though I’m a lousy housekeeper (distracted is more descriptive) I don’t really respect other lousy housekeepers, and I hate that about myself because it goes against my promise to love all things Sandra.

It’s all here, people: inner turmoil, angst.

Some of you are feeling smug, and maybe even vaguely nauseated because cleaning and straightening, picking up and putting away require no thinking on your part. It’s your innate quality, what you were born to do. It’s like you’re programmed, preset and predetermined. On the other hand, you probably have no injuries. I’m an actuarial nightmare.

Yesterday I was dusting in my little area. Not dusting dusting because I usually wait until I need a damp cloth. I highly recommend this method; the dust comes off in a satisfying sludge on the white face cloths that I use. They get recycled into dust rags after one of my dusting sessions. Nothing gets them white again. These preordained dust rags are never nearby when I decide to dust, so I use another face cloth. The pile is growing. Soon, I will venture forth and purchase more white face cloths.

I’ll probably end up an old lady with a room full of dust rags. They’ll fall on me in my hospital bed and I’ll suffocate. Unless I manage to raise one arthritic paw and create a pocket of air. Or maybe the cat laying next to me will tunnel us out.

That was exciting. Even under spectacularly ridiculous circumstances I imagine the angles for survival. I love that about myself. Which reminds me of the flaw that brought me to this self-examination.

While I was dusting I knocked down this teeny perfume bottle and it cracked on the tile floor. My only thought was to pick up the top half quickly to save some of the essence. I picked up a few pieces of glass, but didn’t examine the floor very closely. Through sheer luck I didn’t step on the littlest shards. Just dustbusted those babies. Decided to let the perfume soak into the tiles. Strong, but not unpleasant scent the first night. Today — very nice, sensual, like your mom’s favorite cocktail dress hanging in the closet, evocative even years after she last wore it.