The annual report on rejoicing (3)

BFM*s, and the tenderness of this world

Every once in a while (more like several decades) there is a lucky generation that got to know the Forsytes through television. I was part of that lucky cohort and over time they became family to me.

Now that is something for which I always consider myself very lucky.

The story is somewhat soap-operaish, and rather straightforward in lots of ways. There is uncle Soames, Beloved Family Member #1, and auntie Irene, Beloved Family Member #2. BFM #1 hurted BFM #2 badly, and never managed to repair the damage by the end of the story no matter how much he wanted to(and tried), despite the fact too that BFM #2 wronged him first.

"I gave her all she wanted. I would have given her even-forgiveness-but she chose to leave me."

For quite some time I have wanted to write something with the title "the parable of the very forgiving uncle Soames" but then genuinely felt quite sorry for poor uncle Soames if I titled it that way. Sarcastic wording aside what I wanted to say was more or less the same. The Forsyte Saga probably has taught me more about forgiveness than all the decent Christian sermons/books/chicken soups for the soul I got exposed to put together.

We all love stories of forgiveness gestures on a grand scale (eg. concentration camp survivors forgiving Nazis in court, mothers forgiving the murderers of their sons in court etc) and wished that these would inspire us to go on living as more forgiving people day to day dealing with the smaller offences of others. Most of us however don't quite seem to understand why these stories are so appealing and yet the day to day forgiveness remains so hard:
-the inspirational forgiveness stories are so very clear cut and black and white
-the day to day forgiveness that is required of the rest of us is hardly ever black and white and clear cut. More often than not, the offences are mutual and the debt owing are mutual, regardless who may have subjectively been dealt a more decisive blow
-none of us would be very comfortable with the notion of mutual debt owing, and by gravitating towards the inspirational larger than life forgiveness stories, we wished we could also see our own situations as clear cut as"you owe me heaps of money and I owe nothing", feeling conveniently victimised and sweeping our own debts under the carpet

the parable of the unmerciful servant has called us not to grab people by the throat and demand instant payment and throw people into prison. It still puzzles me why we would be deluded that as long as we evade such behaviour in a very literal way every other crime under the sun becomes permissible or even commendable...
no, this is not a call to ride on a moral high horse called "forgiveness" and parade in the street with signs of "I have cancelled the debts of blah and blah" just to publicly announce they have owed you money in the first place to the general public.
nor is this a call to shove "forgiveness" down people's throats and if they put up any resistance, instead of the prison, we drag them into our own dungeons  and lock them up and abuse them till they accept "forgiveness" shoved down their throats.
nor does it give us a right to roam the street day and night to seek and stalk our debtors just so we get our chance to stage our heroic debt cancelling gestures.
and it is probably still not quite right to graciously cancel our debtor's few thousands and not bring anything else up while knowing fully we ourselves owe him/her more than a few thousands as well... or even worse... assume our own debts towards others are automatically cancelled because we are already so graciously cancelling theirs...or worse yet...get offended when our good Christian debtors don't cancel our debts first and remind them that the Master's wrath is close at hand...

This is probably just my personal opinion but i think what wasn't spoken in the parable but may still be a calling... is that when we still haven't fully processed the master's grace, or when we are a bit muddled in the head and couldn't figure out whether we owe others any money or not, or when we know we are prone to impulsive behaviours of throat grabbing +/- public signposting +/- dungeoning +/-force feeding +/- stalking and harrassing (aren't they all variations of throat grabbing anyway?)...
kindly step away from the street for now, and face your debtors only when you know you have the capacity to sort something out properly.

Now, back to The Forsyte Saga.
I love auntie Irene. I want to watch her looking beautiful and playing the piano and smiling kindly at me. She is still a bit of a little girl's idol to me. yes I need my jump comic or taiga drama hot-bloodedness, but what I managed to take from her passive aggression actually was what gave me the very breath that has kept me alive during some very difficult years...
though I haven't really told her that I am not an uncle Soames hater. He, like the rest of us, wants beauty and love and absolution more than anything else and only turned to property entitlement in desperation when he was utterly disappointed and deprived in this regard.
and, just like the rest of us, he has not a single clue, what does it really mean, to cancel another's debt without throat-grabbing in one form or another when matters get a bit personal.
but I suspect she already knew, and is not mad at me for that.

there is a time for Ryomaden and the call to fight till your last breath, but positive energy comes in other forms too--
uncle Soames and auntie Irene, and their joys and woes, to me, are the tenderness of this world.

No matter how many times I read the book (in English or its chinese translation), bits of it never fail to bring me close to tears: Indian summer, Balthasar's death as he joyously greets his master one last time, but what is probably more heartbreaking is when uncle Soames proves himself not really a ruthless man of property but a doting father capable of love and nurture (which would probably land him within the 0.5% percentile of better human beings than the rest 95.5% lol am just catastrophizing again)... and yet we all know no matter how much he reforms with the passage of time there is still no reward for him in sight...

I die a little every time I read this bit:
"For many years he had ceased regretting, even vaguely, the son who had not been born; Fleur filled the bill in his heart."

But this sadness does not translate into a 2-3/10. In fact it is probably an 8-9/10.

*borrowed the term BFM from the Mockingbird magazine with thanks~