And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,
The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
Win us with honest trifles, to betray's
In deepest consequence.~William Shakespeare
*****
Forgiveness is the healing of wounds caused by another. You choose to let go of a past wrong and no longer be hurt by it. Forgiveness is a strong move to make, like turning your shoulders sideways to walk quickly on a crowded sidewalk.
It's your move.
It really doesn't matter if the person who hurt you deserves to be forgiven. Forgiveness is a gift you give yourself. You have things to do and you want to move on.
The betrayal of trust that is quite often inherent between a child and his elders, especially those able to stake some claim of family, can really fuck a guy up.
I've been trying to write this post for a VERY long time now. The catharsis is overdue.
*****
I was 14 and out to Ontario for two weeks with the family on vacation. We, my brother and I, spent a weekend away from our mother to be with our paternal grandmother.
We've always had different monikers for all of our grandparents to differentiate between them without actually referring to them by their given names. Maternally they were Gram and Gramp. Paternally they were Nana and Bus. And my stepdad's mom has always been Grandma T. I'm fortunate enough, at 31, still to have all three of my grandmothers with me. I even grew to know two great-grandmothers and have fleeting memories of one great-grandfather. I can only aspire to such longevity.
Bus died when I was young, only about seven or so. The only time I've ever seen my own father cry was when he came by our mom's house to break the news. It was shortly after they divorced. Bus was a lifelong nickname, bequeathed at the instant of birth when the attending nurse proclaimed, "My, what a big buster!" It was printed proudly on his business cards throughout his career. William (Bus) Fraser. My brother's middle name is 'Buster' in honour of that, and for which he is inordinately pleased. He will always be Uncle Buster to my own children.
Nana, being the way she is, remarried rather quickly. I only met Bob once on another family trip east to Ontario. He passed away of a heart attack not much more than a year into the marriage.
Then, again shortly after, came Ray. He's been with Nana now for over 20 years.
Plans for the weekend we were to spend with them were simple enough. Overnight at the lake-side cottage. Back in to Toronto the next day to catch a Jays game at the Skydome. Meet up with our mother the day after that for the rest of our trip.
Things started to get weird at the cottage.
My brother and I spent a short part of one afternoon smacking golf balls from the beach out into the water. This was interspersed with swimming out and trying to find some of them. Which we did with some success. Neither one of us was aspiring to Tiger Woodshood at that time, though my brother currently shoots under 90 consistently. I've never acquired any inclination for the game.
Our shenanigans quickly came to an end when I took a swing at one ball, missed, and gracelessly lobbed the club through a high, spinning arc into the lake. For all our skill in finding so many of the golf balls, that club eluded us in almost an hour of searching. Ray made very little noise at the loss of a long-retired driver.
After a day spent largely in the lake, I drew myself a bubble bath before heading to bed. Imagine my chagrin and consternation when Ray barged in through the bathroom door unannounced to 'check up on me' while I was in the midst of doing what adolescent boys are prone to do alone in the bath. My back thankfully to the door, and with a penumbra of bubbles still to my credit, I sputtered something incoherent and he slowly withdrew.
Moments after pulling the drain on the tub, and as I was towelling off, he again intruded through the door, prompting me to fling the towel around my waist. I silently cursed myself for not having gotten up to lock the door after the first time. Of course, why would I think that he would be inclined to do so again? Yet he did.
Going to bed that night was a little disconcerting since I initially shared the bedroom with about a dozen moths flitting about the ceiling lamp. (My thoughts turned instantly to my mother, to whom moths represent what snakes are to Indiana Jones.) I figured that turning off the light would induce enough somnolence in them so as to allow me my own. I figured wrong. Their incessant wing-beats against the ceiling, while surprisingly audible, were also a little unnerving. Thus, I flicked the light back on and spent the next half hour standing tip-toed on the bed, tissue box in hand, trapping, crushing and disposing of a dozen ex-moths. (I assure you, they weren't just restin' nor pining for the fjords.) Quite satisfying after all was said and done and I could retire back to the dark and the new silence I had initiated.
Back to Kitchener the next day. Prior to the afternoon Jays game in Toronto for which we had tickets, we went out for brunch. I don't recall the reason, but at one point afterwards I was sharing a car ride alone with Ray. Both the beginning and the end of the journey elude me today. All I recall is the interval.
The radio was playing, I was in the front passenger seat and Ray casually (causally?) placed his gnarled old-man hand on my left knee. I didn't respond. Just sat there, utterly still. He slid his hand down to my thigh and then, again encouraged by my lack of response, further. He exerted pressure rhythmically. Contrary to all the willpower I could muster, I responded. I was mortified and just stared, red faced, out the window until he stopped. I seem to recall at one point him muttering, "Mmm, that's nice."
Later that afternoon, the four of us found ourselves in Toronto, staring almost straight up towards the tip of the CN Tower from our seats along the third base line in the Skydome to watch the Toronto Blue Jays play baseball. I have no idea who their opponents were. Seated to my left was Ray, then Nana, and then my brother.
Ray had brought along a pair of binoculars to get more intimate with the action. My brother and I traded them back and forth rather vigourously. Hunched over, elbows on knees, I remember staring through them, not at the play, but at the stands directly across from us, in the vicinity of the first base line. There were a woman and boy that I focused on. I assumed them to be mother and son. There, in our seats, Ray placed his right hand again on my left thigh. The boy was wearing a baseball cap. As I froze, he again slid his hand further up my leg. For some reason, I think the ball cap bore the emblem of the visiting team that day, but I still can't recall who they were. He again exerted rhythmic pressure until I responded as before, though my entire being shouted out at the terrible wrongness of it. The mother was a brunette, I think? My grandmother sat two seats to my left, an arm's length away, oblivious. I don't think I saw a dad with them; perhaps he had to work that day and treated his wife and son to a ball game; that was a pleasant thought. I very badly wanted to be over there on the first base line for that short eternity.
Back at their house in Kitchener, Ray showed me a small collection of skin mags he had in the en suite off their master bedroom. Feeling rather uncomfortable, I tried to be as noncommittal and uninterested as possible. Still, against my better judgement, when I had a spare moment after dinner, I stole away and borrowed one to quickly hide in the top drawer of the dresser in the guest room that was mine for the weekend.
I went to bed later that night. On opening the top drawer of the dresser, I saw that the one magazine had been joined by three or four others of similar ilk. Never, in my entire life before or since, has my skin crawled like it did then at all the implications I became aware of.
I didn't sleep at all that night. Nor, thankfully, was I disturbed as I half expected to be. Though I was VERY disturbed.
*****
Denial set in immediately the next morning. It was so much easier just to play pretend that it never, ever happened. I think I even gave Ray a big hug when our mother picked us up to continue with the rest of our trip. So long as you act normal, everything else really, honestly, gosh darn it (oh, for the love of God PLEASE!) is normal.
To this day I have a sometimes debilitating fear of initiating any action that might have the remotest possibility of being undesirable to the affected person. Sort of a perversion of the Golden Rule: Do not do unto others as you would not have done unto your self; but since other selfs are different from your self, they might have different ideas about what stuff is acceptable to have done unto their selfs, so maybe it's best to keep to your self, you know, just to be on the safe side. (The actual thought process is really more convoluted than that.) For that, it took me a long time to muster up the courage to lose my virginity.
Like so many other individuals who have experienced much worse than what I did, it was many, many years before I allowed myself to realise just how deeply that weekend affected me. And how horrible it is to completely internalise it for most of one's life.
The bubbling miasma of inchoate emotions derived from those events, redolent of hatred, self-loathing and bitterness, can fester, seemingly dormant for years, while they slowly poison the character of the one who suffered the abuse in the first place, inadvertently transferring the stigma second-hand to those who least deserve it and know not its source.
That's the worst part. For which reason I'm ensuring it doesn't happen to me and mine. I steadfastly refuse to pass down this sort of bullshit to my wife, son and unborn child. Far better to air it out than pile it in a dank corner of the house until it stinks up the whole goddamn place. How can Ray possibly deserve to get away with it?
This all came to a head for me, in my own mind, this past spring when my wife and I took our year-old son out east to visit the rest of our family who had not yet met the first of the next generation. Together with my mother and brother, the five of us visited for an afternoon with Nana and Ray. On pulling into the driveway of that same house, Amy asked me if perhaps it would be nice to have my mother carry her grandson in to greet his great-grandmother. Hearing this, my instantaneous response was, "No, she doesn't know not to let Ray touch him." The defensive feelings I had for my son that afternoon are indescribable. My wife's innate compassion similarly so.
Though it took me the entire latter half of my life, I have forgiven Ray. Not at all because he deserves it, though yes, he does...
...but because I do.
I haven't words to express the pain and pride I feel right now, not that I have a right to either.
You've described my own feelings about forgiveness perfectly. It's not about the other person, it's about you. And it doesn't mean you EVER forget.
Posted by: elizabeth | Wednesday, 14 December 2005 at 01:18 PM
That's awful that it happened, but glad you seem to be coming to terms with it, as much as one can. Very difficult to forgive, I'm sure. I recently wrote a series of short stories on experiences with my now-dead uncle, but nothing like what you went through.
Posted by: Mark | Wednesday, 14 December 2005 at 02:29 PM
Wow. I don't know what to say. I read this kind of hoping it was an update about your meeting with GGK! Quite a bit heavier.
I guess I can see how and why you supressed this for so long... although I can't remotely fathom what it must be like to have to still maintain cordial contact with him knowing what you do.
Maybe he got help ... or maybe he came to terms with his own demons. I guess if he hasn't slipped up after so many years, and is still with your grandmother, that's a possibility.
Posted by: Jim | Sunday, 18 December 2005 at 04:41 PM
Just wanted you to know I read this. It is good to forgive, I agree. It feels good to get it out in the open I bet.
Posted by: Linda | Wednesday, 28 December 2005 at 10:58 PM