In my school days my reports often went along the lines of 'if only Sara would talk less and listen more....' or 'if Sara paid as much attention to her own work instead of helping others do theirs....' But I love to talk, I love to converse. A dialogue, not a monolog. A sharing of information, its like being in a living library, you find out peoples lives, their thoughts, experiences. You glimpse other worlds, you can travel where they have travelled, imagine where they have trodden. You can share and resolve and be irritated and be alarmed and be self satisfied that your own world, on some days, is better than theirs. Or be jealous that its not. But who wants a job acting in an advert anyway.........
And today I sat and listened to a lady and I found that her son had been molested by a now-famous author. Such a short conversation, but one that rested briefly on what must have been years of pain and anguish. And anger. I recognised within her my own wish to find justice with those who have hurt my loved ones. But what is justice anyway? I cannot undo what was done by harming the harmer. I cannot give back any years, nor create new memories. They will never be sorry. And thats what I seek - a heart felt, deep and awful realisation for them of what they did. And for them to be sorry. I fear that day will not come. But I wish for it. The lady in the chair next to me wishes it too, for her loved one, she wishes harm or even death to the lady who hurt him so badly when he was so young.
As they say, such is life. And we are better than those people. Kinder, more compassionate. Nicer. And we have more happy memories, we have more laughter, we have more love. We have more days in the sunshine. So if there is any sorry to be had its that we should feel sorry for them, they that do harm, what mean lives they have to behave in this way. So I for one will leave them in the shadows, and I'll walk out in the fresh air, and I will be free of them and their ways. I shall not talk of them again.
