Forgive and Don't Forget.

Juxtaposition: to place 2 seemingly opposing words side by side. I never really understood how juxtaposition worked until today. I mean I knew what it was, but I didn't really know why it had to by called by some 5 syllable title. Until today. When, for some reason, it made sense. And it's all thanks to this three word phrase: "Forgive and forget." I couldn't possibly think of 2 words that are more in opposition.

There's forgiving. And then there's forgetting. Forgiving is the process of concluding resentment, indignation or anger as a result of a perceived offense, difference or mistake. But Forgetting is dismissing from the mind. The only 2 things these 2 words have in common are their first three letters. I can and will always forgive someone, but i NEVER forget what they've done. Maybe it's my semi-photographic memory, but I never forget what people have done to me, and I never will.

Forgiving has this connotation of being this very long, grueling process that causes emotional damage, but that's where people get confused. That is actually forgetting. Forgiving is just giving someone another chance. Forgetting is ignoring why you have to give them a second chance in the first place.

I still remember the grudges I've held since 5th grade. I will never forget. There was this girl in my class who had a crush on my "boyfriend" at the time. Yes I say boyfriend in quotations because all we ever did was call each other names and make each other cry. I use that term VERY loosely. But anyway, I liked him and he liked me and she was never in the picture. But then one day she decides to tell him that he can do better than me and that he deserves a girl like her. HA. Don't you just LOVE 5th grade soap operas? SO great. So she tried to kiss him and he pushed her away and then we all walked back into the classroom from recess. Except her. She sat on her ass and cried like a baby because she got denied by a fifth grade boy. But to this day, I hate her for ever assuming she is greater than another human being. Oh and for trying to kiss my boyfriend. Moral of the story? I forgave her and her fifth grade foolishness, but I still haven't forgotten what she did.

Or, my sophomore year when this girl decided to spread a rumor that I hooked up with her boyfriend.... Yeah. Trust me when I say, you will never understand my hatred for this girl. And this was 1 of the many rumors she spread. Rumor after rumor I forgave her for what she said (I don't know why, she is a waste of a human being anyway), but I will never forget every single lying word that came out of her big, disproportionately shaped lips. I'm not bitter at all. Can you tell?

But the point is, be careful what you do, what you say, and how you do and say it, because no matter how many times someone forgives you, they will never forget what you did. Choose every single word and step you take wisely, because making a mistake is like stepping into wet cement. The cement wills till harden and people will still be able to walk on it, but your footprint will always be there.