A Lesson in Forgiveness - Entry for Hello Sunshine

I have never been a real emotional person, in a sense that people who cry in movie theaters make me squirm. I have always let my mother feel everything and express it for me and in that way, we have a bond that is deeper than my comprehension. My "never too late" experience came when I was a 22-year-old college senior and felt that everything was too late. I attended a big SEC school where I thought I'd figured out who I was. I had plenty of friends, a major I was excited about and I was happy.

Then, as graduation approached, my dad called.

My dad had not been a part of my life since I was thirteen, but if honesty champions, our relationship was gone long before that. My mother and he split under circumstances that I will not delve into, but as a girl in her formative years, it was more traumatic to my character than I realized. I shut him out and the saddest thing was that I didn't care. I didn't notice his absence.

My life went on and my mother remarried an amazing man, who is now my stepfather. I watched as my brothers were forced to visit my dad on holidays, by a court of law, and I saw how miserable he was making this entire process for my mother. She’d cry in the car running errands, in the middle of making dinner, and in the morning on the phone with her sisters. She guilt-stricken that it was her who ripped our family apart. She felt so much, where I felt nothing.

After four years of college, with some attempts of contact every eight months or so, I rarely thought about my dad. Freshman year, my new sorority sisters would inquire about him and I would always say the same thing, “it's a sad situation, but it is what it is.” I felt that it was too late to rekindle a relationship—too much life had happened and he wasn’t there to support me through any of it.

I was still angry, numb and the emotions that related to my dad were too overwhelming, but one day after receiving a text from him, I felt clarity. I stared at the phone, unafraid, with a strange wave of calm settling over my body. It was a revelation that stemmed from many late-night talks with my best friend, walks, glasses of wine, crying and finally, growing up. I found it wasn’t too late to learn how to forgive.

Although, I know this isn’t the end of my dance with forgiveness, nor does it mean my father will be in my life, it is a step toward maturity. Forgiveness is truly a selfish process, although it isn’t always construed in that way. I finally found that I needed to be selfish so that I could move on and that is something that is never too late to accept, even as a college senior who thinks she knows everything.