[julieisafemme]

Originally Posted by dreadgeek

You bring up a salient point here, Corkey--you'll notice that nothing I have said in the last three days of talking about this can be read as me forgiving Vick or proclaiming him my new best friend and boon companion through thick-and-thin. I don't know Mr. Vick and the odds-on chances are that I will never meet him since he lives in an orbit that, quite honestly, I don't aspire to. Blessedly, it is not up to me to forgive him.

I'm a sucker for redemption stories. Maybe because of my own manifest flaws and the ways in which I have lived below my potential or made just mind-numblingly stupid choices. I want to believe that Michael Vick truly feels remorse. Because even though some people--perhaps with good reason--believe that he doesn't feel remorse or doubt it, I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. I want to because it would be a better world by a small increment if he felt remorse and was truly determined to go down a different road. I want to because I want to believe my own self-redemption--from something I will not bore you with the details with--was genuine. I hope it was. Everyday I wake up and strive to be a little better than I was yesterday--a little more the woman I dreamt of being, the woman my son saw when he was only six months old, the woman my wife fell in love with, the person I sold myself to my employer as being, etc. I don't believe in any kind of divine beings or afterlife, as far as I can tell, this is It. You have one take at life, there are no rehearsals, and the director said "Action!" the moment you took your first breath we have a limited amount of time in which to figure out how we are going to live. The consequences we wreak on other's lives are very, very real. None of the things I've done that were stupid in galactic proportions were done out of malice or a desire to do evil. Most were done out of selfishness and within a reasonable amount of time, I realized how horribly I'd fucked up. Then I only wanted to make things better. Absent other evidence, I feel bound to give Mr. Vick the benefit of the doubt because I've been a complete fuck-up at times in my life.

That might be pure sentiment on my part. It probably is. I still want to believe that he understands that what he did was wrong, that he only wants to make things right and I hope that his example inspires others to turn away from cruelty. Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. I know I would mean it and for all the right reasons. I want to believe that he would to.

Cheers
Aj

Yasher Koach or continuing strength to you! Thank you for sharing this. What I find resonates the most with me is that you have found a way to forgive yourself. I have found this very difficult to do and it is the key to being able to forgive others or if not in the position to forgive, to at least believe in the potential for redemption.