Boxes of Manure

If you can't forgive, then you can't dance, you can't sing and you can't smile
Anonymous

There's a tradition in Indonesian kind of Islam, that is not found in other places, which is asking forgiveness at the end of Ramadan. Nowadays, people even starts asking forgiveness before the start of Ramadan. It is believe that during the fasting month people purify their heart so by asking forgiveness in essence they becoming as pure as baby. A new clean leaf of life.

Just as with any tradition, sometimes it is just a thing people do at certain time because they dont know any different so it dilutes the meaning of it. Sure, there are people who really mean it when they utter those words, both most of the time, it is a mere lip service.

It is not easy for me to forgive, and even more difficult for me to forget, despite my insistence to remember the good things people did to me, and (to try) to forget the bad things like my grandma taught me to. Most of the time I am a happy-go-lucky kind of person. However, there were moment when people cut me, I mean really did something beyond certain level and when it happened, the cut was deep. That's when the grudge sprung.

Like the time when I was trying to compare this girl magazine I bought a day earlier in Dutch and the same magazine from other country (most of the time their contents are similar) in English as I was going to buy another magazine for my 3 hours train ride at Rotterdam Central Station's Bruna. The owner told me (even though there were other people who did the same in there) loudly that if I didnt have any money to buy anything I should've wait for my train outside. From then on I've never bought anything from that bookshop again. I heard the other day my friend had similar experience with Bruna Amstel Station, the guy yelled at my friend's 2 years old son when he touched some of the books. At that time I felt discriminated.

I know logically, I should react as if someone gave me a box of manure, I could accept it or I could give it back. By holding a grudge, I accepted that box. I, and not the person who gave the box, make my life uncomfortable with the smell of the box that I keep. I know it's stupid. Had I said thanks but no thanks for that 'present', my life would be more comfortable. So now I am trying to learn to forgive, cleaning up boxes of manure in my life. I do it for my sake.

There are boxes that is difficult to get rid off. For it also contains part of my history, perhaps even my identity. It contains my raw emotions, that normally wont surface unless something extreme happens in my life.

Perhaps I should learn it from the oyster. An oyster uses the grain of sand that irritates him, and turns it into a pearl. I should learn how to turn those boxes of manure to kindness and care, so it releases the pain and set me free.