11th of February 2008
Reflections of Actions Past
In the last several days I was alerted to the facts that my Grandmother, with whom I am very close, has chosen to no longer eat or drink. I am filled with emotions over this significant revelation that both saddens me greatly and also gives me joy. Yes, I know what I just said, and I know the emails are probably already flying into my inbox based on the words I choose; but for my Grandmother to make that decision on her own tells me she has finally given up on this life and is doing while she is still capable of making that decision for herself. Her choice garners my respect and admiration while I only hope she finds peace and love in what ever time she shares with us on this earth.
My Grandma has always been full of life, caring and much like Switzerland during WWI and WWII, she has always tried to find the positive in each situation and each person while refusing to speak ill of them (at least to me). Those words just sent shivers down my mother’s spinal column because that is not the relationship she has with her mother; however I know factually that the relationship one person has with a specific individual does not necessitate the same correlation will occur with another person and that same individual.
For that reason alone, I have always tried to form my own opinions on a person as we meet and get to know each other. I base my relationships on our interactions and not the thoughts from another. How many times do you start a job or a new person begins working in similar surroundings and a co-worker comes over with a pre-conceived notion about them? They go around telling everyone what they think and why their expectations are that you feel the same way. You may call it gossip, innuendo, deceit or fair warning; it all amounts to me still wanting to understand that person for myself. I feel strongly that I am the best person to judge for myself who is a good human being. I should be the only one making decisions on how I perceive someone to be and for what reasons I base my opinions.
This is all background to the point of my blog, which is that two people are never the same. We are as different as our finger prints, our eye balls and the brains within our thick skulls. Even identical twins don’t have the same finger prints or eyes; they are uniquely special, just like you and me. You and I may have the same friend and we may even be present for the same event; yet we perceive the outcome of said event differently. It is funny because I’ve written about this multiple times in various blogs, and it is also in the preface of my manuscript; but perception will always be in the eye of the beholder. That means that you and I may see, hear, taste and smell the same thing; however we recall those events, we store them in our individual minds completely differently. Because of that, our telling of those same events will differ. There may be a slight difference in our recounting of the events, or we may not even be close in description or structure or even the order of those same proceedings. Police officers are always amazed at how two or three different people witness the same events and yet they can’t even agree on things like colors. I saw red, while you saw blue, while witness three saw black. It is laughable if it didn’t make the police person’s job so difficult to ascertain exactly what in fact occurred and how the person or object actually appeared.
Life has a tendency to do the same things with our minds and our experiences. In my blogs I write about very personal things that have happened to me. Some are from childhood and others are from more recent events. My family is neither happy nor accepting that I publish any of these facts (using that word loosely) because they only read the words that portrait events in past as harmful motivating them to get angry. It amazes me with all that I’ve written, every word that speaks about forgiveness, the numerous posts that actually say these events are from my recollections and there is always another side to every story; none of those words are recognized by my family. I have pretty much removed myself from their lives before this, mostly due to their choices, however I could make strides to close those gaps. It is deeply sad, but I have found a way to have peace with my family and the events of my past while I choose to actually remember the times we laughed. I chose to hold on to the fond memories of our fun, our family dinners and travels that were made in groups and these are the memories I cherish keeping close to recollections. I have not written about these events yet, but much to the chagrin of my family, these blogs are just getting started and believe me – there is much time to write about the good our lives have shared. Right now I am healing myself and setting a proper foundation for my blogs to encourage a positive forum that has the potential to help many start the healing process.
All of this to tell you that I was informed during the conversations pertaining to my Grandmother; that my family is not pleased with the blogs. My mother had no prior knowledge that I was having any difficulties with my previous employer due to a boss who both maintained RSS feeds to all of my blogs and used them as fodder in order to discredit me. He obviously didn’t like what he read and disagreed using the only method possible to show his distaste for them by spreading rumors and innuendo to discredit me. My mother could not know that my boss would espouse to others with disgust over my ideologies with what I write and made sure to slant his version of my words so that anyone listening to him would think ill of me for writing as I do. I found out about his treachery when a couple of the people who originally felt as he indicated they should about me started reading my personal blogs eventually understanding that their rush to judgments about me were not based in facts. As my mother indicated that we might have to fly out to Walla Walla Washington in the next week or so if Grandma did not change her mind I had to let her know that I would be starting a new job next Tuesday and that might cause a major complication with start of a new job. My mother added to the family distaste for my blogs that the rest of the world didn’t know that what I wrote was fiction. I had to pause when she made this strike at my work.
I very quickly gathered my senses because she also paused expecting me to blow up at her for this personal attack, and after the conversation ended I had to think about what she said. While I was thinking about our conversation, it occurred to me that I’ve written multiple times on this very subject. If you break down what she and my family believe I am lying about the events of my past and their involvement as I indicate. They are not happy that I am airing Dobson family secrets for the entire world to read. Especially my older sister who thinks nothing that happens inside the family fold should ever be discussed outside the family – ever.
I can see their point, if I, like them refused to acknowledge my past and the impact the past has on our present and future. The past should never directly negatively affect our futures and should only mildly adjust our present. But as I just wrote about this in the blog previously posted, we must find that fine line where we are able to dissect the past, understand its impact on our lives today, so that it can only drive us into our future positively. Please understand that each person having an impact on our past will not see their interactions the same way we do. I shocked myself and also patted myself on the back for the speed at which I recognized that conjunction within what my mother expressed as fiction. I then understood that while they view their interactions in my life differently from how I remember it to be, I am OK with their need to say my work is fictitious. It is merely a defensive mechanism allowing them to keep the memories they choose to recall alive and maintain the delicate balance they have with their own past and how they acknowledge that past.
I would prefer that they acknowledge the honest events of our childhood, embracing those occurrences to the point that they finally allow themselves to heal. I absolutely wish the healing that I have been able to use twice in my life to accept the good and the bad that I, myself have done to others during those horrific times during my childhood. I would give anything for them to stop escaping their past and once in for all accept it for what it was, understand it to the best of their abilities and finally free themselves of its hold on them in the form of forgiveness. That means forgiveness for the people who harmed them, but also forgiveness for themselves.
I also understand that people who live through such horrendous events, like my mother who lived with a father that molested her for so many years and even my younger sister who was molested by our older brother and then pawned off by him to neighbors and others who abused her like a piece of meat as apposed to the child she was. Those events were so traumatizing to them, that forgetting and repressing them is how they survived them. Facing those events in their lives they can’t see will ever have a benefit worthy of reliving the pain they know will accompany the arduous process towards healing. I understand their stance, because I held it for years. I had such anger inside of me that it ate away my insides. I let anger drive my every focus and couldn’t understand why every bad thing happened to me one right after another. I couldn’t determine that I was the cause of the angry outburst. I was the one causing the bad things constantly happening to me. I refused to acknowledge my past and I ran from it. Every time I saw a councilor, I enjoyed our interactions until they asked me to start discussing my parents and then I would inexplicably stop seeing them. They never understood and neither did I because I would make excuses of not enough insurance, not enough time and even too far away. Only when I started speaking openly about my brother’s molestation of me was I able to understand what drove his actions and finally enabling me to forgive him.
It is funny, but I draw on both my experiences with counseling and religion that taught me a pattern to forgiveness. It is that final act of releasing the pain, anger, frustration and all other harmful emotions that finally delivers peace to you over the situation. That is our focus and should be our driving force to reach a point in our lives where there is nothing more causing pain and suffering and we only derive peace and serenity from everything in our past and in our present. If we are truly at peace with ourselves (inclusive of all that is in our past) then we truly have found serenity and we absolutely have an amazing future ahead of us.
I must reiterate something from my last blog that is so very appropriate again; we must not dwell on our past, but we must face it, allowing the past to be freed granting our present to be a place where serenity lives and also opening our futures to be even better.
Your Humble Servant – Todd M. Dobson
