“I just came home for lunch and about a half hour before
I came home I was helping your friend from school, One. He was coming to pick up a package, and he
said, ‘How’s Jamie doing? Is she going
to be coming home any time soon for a visit?’ And I said, ‘As a matter of fact, she’s coming
at the end of February,’ and then he said something about it would make him
feel better if he could talk to you and apologize to you for the way he was
back in school. And that’s all he said,
so I said I’ll pass the word along in case you don’t get to talk to her. So that’s what I’m doing, I’m just passing it along. Take it for what it’s worth. I’ll talk to you later, honey. Have a good day.”
My mother, who works at USPS, left me a voicemail. I never, in a million years, would have guessed
that these were the words I would've heard.
And, actually, my ears couldn’t make out any words after
I heard ‘apologize.’
Tears flooded my vision.
Before I could even process why, I was sobbing.
An apology from my first boyfriend—my first love, my
first heartbreak. He was the Romeo of my
lifetime. My parents hated him, his
parents hated me. And at some point, he
grew to hate me, too, and was very public about it. We were both young, and the hurt was great. After he graduated, I never saw him again,
but the trauma remained.
An apology.
An apology?
After ten years, an apology.
At any point over the last 4,380 days he could’ve
apologized, when I felt like I needed it, deserved it. But on today, the 4,381st day, walking around
like a free woman, free of my chains and shackles, that’s when it comes.
Do you see the beauty in that?
I spent a decade hating someone. And I spent a decade angry, because I felt
like I deserved an apology. The day after I
come to forgive, the day after I let go, the day after I was freed, I get this
beautiful voicemail offering the one
thing I desperately wanted for the last 10 years.
And God said, “You only thought you needed it. Now I
give it to you when you have no expectations, no standards, no demands. I give it to you when you have been freed,
and because you let it go, because you’re free, you appreciate its beauty so
much more. It’s not a scale-balancer. It’s not an apology that was purchased with
the pain to which you clung for so long.
It’s not a transactional exchange, where you gave to get something. You gave it to Me. You trusted Me. And now you receive this, a free gift.”
Faithful? Even
after this, I still can’t fathom just how truly faithful God is. Every day He proves His love for me. And this was one of the sweetest, most
amazing moments of my life. Thank you, One. Thank You, God, for this gift. God is amazing.
After ten years of deep-pitted resentment.
After 1 day of having let it all go.
This moment is far beyond anything I could have dreamed.
