Day 508 – Love And Forgiveness (That’s What You Get)

Emotions raw… Feel them. Things thought resolved bubbling up. Forgiveness on the brain. Living with others. Synchronicity. Pain. Contrast. Happiness…

How can I be in this place? How can I be in this world? Brokenness everywhere. And me, too. Was holding things. Am holding things still. My sister visiting. Just shut me up as I was singing my song. I just told her to cut that shit out. Messing with my vibe…

I don’t have much to write about. Sometimes I just need to write. Praying won’t do it. Reading won’t do it. Meditating, dancing, singing, hanging with folks won’t hit the spot. I need to put words on paper or computer or anything, and then I am ok.

I am not hurt. I am not broken, but my heart is breaking open… But there is a sadness for so much time lost. I have a good friend. My best friend – the last man standing – for over twenty years. Oddly enough, he doesn’t make it to the blog that much. Just like my father’s name is hardly ever mentioned here. I loved them the most. I Love them the most. My Best Friend hurt me really badly. He had hurt me very badly over the years.

This past fall, to make a long story short, I tried to hook my best friend up with a good friend of mine. She was a female friend living in LA. To make a long story short, the hook-up didn’t go too well for me. My best friend ended up forsaking helping me out with stuff I needed and being there for me in order to spend time with my female friend. My female friend relished in the opportunity to be picked first and forsook me as well. I stopped being friends with both of them for a while, but my best friend – well, he’s been my best friend for years.

He was the one who came and took care of me and cooked me oatmeal when I was sick and alone in my apartment in LA and couldn’t even get up off the floor to make my own food. He was the one who sat on the phone with me and counseled me through anxiety attacks as I started back writing again. He is the one who sends me his last little dollar to celebrate myself and take myself out to dinner after some small accomplishment. He is the one who checks up on me. He is the first man in my life who didn’t disappear. When we were much younger, after our first fight, I thought he would never talk to me again, because that’s what the men in my life did when they got mad at me. They disappeared. But after a few days of being mad at me, my Best Friend called me and he said, “Just because I’m mad at you doesn’t mean I’m not your friend anymore.”

It was a mind blowing concept for me.

Twenty years later, my Best Friend broke my heart by the way he treated me last fall. We stopped talking for a while, and then we became friends again, but things were different. I was hurt. We had many, many, conversations, but he never really saw what he did that hurt me so bad. He never acknowledged it. He never said sorry. He tried and has been trying hard to be nice to me since, but something had changed in my heart about him. I didn’t trust him anymore and it made me very sad.

As fate would have it, he got very sick. My other friend whom he had betrayed me with had gotten sick, too. They are both assholes of a sort, and so they don’t have a big support system around them. All they have is each asshole other. My best friend reached out to me in his time of need, but I thought, “Go be friends with my asshole friend who you betrayed me for. She’s an asshole so she ain’t gonna help you with shit, and that’s what you get…”

I’ve had that feeling towards him. I’ve been holding that feeling towards him. That “that’s what you get” feeling. I’m just being honest. Part of the time, I’m aware that I’m holding that feeling, but most of the time I’m not aware. It’s just like there’s a sadness between us. He frowns when he sees me, mostly. I am not particularly excited about him, but he is like an old coat that has been there for me and a comfort. I know it’s not cool to admit these things out loud, but it’s true. I had been holding those “that’s what you get” feelings about him and my female friend as well.

As fate would have it again, some years ago, my Best Friend had introduced me to the guy who is now courting me. Last night, me and Best Friend were talking and I told him about how I like cooking for the guy who is courting me. I never liked cooking for my best friend b/c he’s always critical and ungrateful and he never seemed to like anything I do for him unless it looked like I had to go through some pain to do it. Anyway, when I told my Best Friend that I enjoyed cooking for new guy, my best friend got jealous. He started talking about how he was the one who introduced me to the new guy, and for a moment I thought, “I’m gonna do my Best Friend just like he did me with my female friend.” I’m gonna cancel doing stuff with Best Friend or say no to him and tell him I’m hanging out with my new guy instead. I’m gonna stop helping him while he’s sick and tell him that I thought he’d be ok and it’s more fun hanging out with my new guy. I’m gonna save all my smiles for my new guy and frown at my best friend all the time, and then he’ll see how it felt to do what he did to me. That’s what he gets…”

It didn’t feel good to think those things, but I thought them. I realized that I wasn’t over it. I wasn’t over the pain that had come between us. I wasn’t over so many things. I had been holding so many people hostage energetically, waiting for them to learn their lessons, waiting for them to get what they get until I forgave them.

And I don’t know what to think about these things. This is grown up stuff. Where is the line drawn? When do you say, you have done too much, and you will not repent, so you can’t come around me no more? When do you say, you have done so much and you will not repent, and I will forgive you anyway? When do you punish? Do you punish? When do you love anyway? At what point does continuing to engage in certain relationships become self abuse?

I don’t know if there is a book of rules about these things. There is no book of rules about these things, besides the religious books. I wanted to Love him. My Best Friend. I was tired of holding him hostage to my unforgiveness. I didn’t want to be like him, holding back my smiles from him, only seeing the worst in him. I didn’t have the answers. I don’t have the answers.

What I know, though, is that there is something about forgiving and saying sorry. Not just forgiving others, but forgiving yourself. My heart longs to love. Some people have been assholes. Sometimes I have been the asshole and I am sure that someone has written in a blog or a journal about the ways I have hurt them somewhere. Sometimes on purpose. Sometimes not. What would it be like if I could just open up my hands and let it all go? Just say, “I know you hurt me, and I know you may never realize or acknowledge your offense, but I am not set on punishing you anymore.” Could I allow them to be happy and healed and live good lives, even if they never said sorry to me? Even if they never wished good things for me?

I want justice, but something in me says that this is justice. This is justice for my own heart. Forgiveness is justice for my own heart. I don’t really understand, but I know it’s true. I want to Love. I want Love to flow freely between me and the people in my life. My Best Friend is tenured. He has earned his place as friend till death do us part. I am sure we have journeyed through many lives together in many ways, but in this life, finally, I want Love between us…

So this is what I needed to write. These are the words I needed to release. My back feels lighter. Aches and pains are softening. My frozen heart is melting. I will be safe even if I forgive. I will have Love even if I forgive. Justice has a way of finding it’s way into all of our lives, even if I’m not serving it. For me, I choose Love now… I choose Love and Forgiveness now. And that’s what I get…

Ameen.

Day 508
Love And Forgiveness (That’s What You Get)