The Complications of Generic Forgiveness

Some people who do mean things do them out of plain old meanness. Other folks do mean things thinking they have been issued a higher purpose in their action. This old woman who used to live here--she died a few years back--was one of those who figured she had been called to square up the lives of those who, unlike hers, were full of inequities. One of the things she would do was what I call generic forgiveness. She would walk up to a person and tell them she had been praying on it and had decided to forgive them. When they asked, "Forgive what?" She would say, "Oh, you know well enough." And then she left them to figure it out on their own. I overheard her going through her forgiveness routine with this poor old man that I knew to be as innocent as new born calf. I caught up with her as she made her escape and told her I was on to her little act and told her she should be ashamed. She said the Lord had called on her to minister to sinners and this was just one of her tactics. She figured it would do any person good to sit down for a week or so and think over their shortcomings. She said if she had played some small part in turning a life toward the Shining Light then she had done her royal service. I said, "I see. Well, you're a better person than I am 'cause there ain't no way in hell I am going to forgive you, sister."

Tales of Harper, short stories and poems about the fictional town of Harper, Mississippi is available on Amazon Kindle