Awake: A Memoir

by Jen Hatmaker

Forgiveness is not foolishness. Foolishness would include no boundaries, no responsibility, no honesty. Foolishness would bypass accountability for pretending. A fool would diminish the consequences to protect the offender’s conscience. Foolishness would open a door that should remain firmly shut. But forgiveness sets me free. I hope it hands him some freedom too, but that is his to alchemize. Rupture and repair may be the highest expression of humanity, and it is its own reward. Getting there means there is some combination of honesty, humility, vulnerability, compassion; these are high-water marks. This could be one-sided work if the only option was to forgive without any meaningful contrition, but it would be harder. It can be done because I have agency over my own emotional condition, but it would certainly, certainly be harder. But he closes the gap, and I am grateful he helps shrink the long road of healing. For both of us. His actions detonated the bomb, but he was not spared the carnage. Our joint disintegration only prolongs the recovery process for the entire family. It is a wondrous good for us each to heal. Our congeniality is a welcome contagion in what will forever be our shared ecosystem.