What's The Word?

                                                                

Sorry is not enough.

For all that hurt, pain, loss, disappointment, betrayal and basically all those bitter and inevitable truths of life, of course, apart from death and taxes, we have someone or the other to pass on the blame to. Nobody is an exception. They’re like an ace shooter’s aim, bloody impossible to miss. So every time we are hurt, backstabbed or let down by someone, we start playing the blame games. And why not? After all, screaming “It’s all because of you” at someone’s face is so much more satisfying than considering the fact that may be I was wrong. We all love to believe that it really wasn’t our fault because in our heads, we’re always the “good guys”,  or maybe we’re just too scared to face the consequences of being wrong. So we wipe our dirty hands on someone else’s shirt and pass on the bad feelings of having stained something onto them.

But at times when it really is the other’s fault, especially if it’s your near and dear one’s, somehow surprisingly, instead of seeking solace from the whole “Thank God it’s not me!” thing, we really face difficulty in accepting the fact that somebody that we counted upon with all that faith and trust humanly possible for one to bestow upon someone, was the one to screw things up for us! It’s like finding out that the lifeguards who were supposed to supervise our safety and rescue us in case of an emergency wee the ones who actually pushed us into the ocean. Ridiculous feeling, that one.  And for that little moment, we refuse to believe that  our so called “friends” had left us alone in all the mess. It’s like the striking of a lightning then. At first, we only see the bright splash of light and we are so confused and scared that we refuse to believe that a storm is coming. And then the loud thunder follows, confirming all our fears that we were trying so hard to shield ourselves from. It is in that tiny little moment in between the lightning and the thunder that we hope that it wasn’t our friend, no it couldn’t be. After all, I’d never do that to them. I’d even take bullets in my head if they needed me to. But sadly, the thunder only ascertains our doubt and blows away that tiny breeze of hope into nothingness. We realize that our pain is a result of somebody whom we trusted like hell.

And then comes the apology.

“I’m really (wait for the big word) sorry! I didn’t mean to… I know I should’ve been there for you but…”

Oh of course you should’ve been there dammit! But the asshole that you are, you weren’t!

Ideally, when someone apologizes to us, we are expected to be all saintly and nice and accept their apology. “Forgive and forget, beta”, that’s exactly what our elders have drilled into our heads ever since we were kids. But can a mere five-letter word do all the healing and make you forgive and forget? May be those (fake) apologetic eyes will cast a spell on us and make us feel guilty instead, and maybe, just maybe, we’ll finally manage to forgive them, but will it help us forget everything just like that?

No.

What? Not happy with that answer? Well, we’re not God. We’re only fragile little humans with high levels of hyperactive Dopamine. So what? When we are hurt, we want to hurt them back, when they are wrong, we want to show them what’s right, when they kick our ass, we want to strangle their necks. But we definitely don’t want to forget about it, and moreover, we want to make sure that they sure as hell remember all of it as well. I guess this is all normal (just scratch the strangling part, OK?). It’s very…umm…human. So sometimes it’s definitely OK to shed all that pretention away and say “Screw you!” instead of pulling a fake smile and saying “It’s OK”. Sometimes we really do need to give our “stronger” self a rest and be all weak and vulnerable and breakdown when nobody is watching. May be that is the effect that revenge, in safe limits, can have on us. It’s satisfying, isn’t it? And it is bloody well necessary for us to move on as well.

Because, once the anger is all out, we can then devote the compassion within us to that scum of a friend who ruined it for us. Because, sorry is an overrated and a highly abused word and one shouldn’t easily fall for it, because some smarties really do know how to use it to get away from things. Because, saying “It’s OK” even when it’s not, only makes us feel worse.

Because sometimes, sorry is not enough.

Because sometimes, revenge is the word that we’re looking for.