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The Hard Word - a game about ethics and morals

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Rodia
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Posted: Sun 06 Feb , 2005 12:50 am
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I never carry any keys.

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Impenitent
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Posted: Sun 06 Feb , 2005 12:56 am
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:smile:


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vison
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Posted: Sun 06 Feb , 2005 1:45 am
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Impenitent wrote:
:smile:
Impenitent, thank you for your welcome!

I think I tend to be more forgiving as I get older. There is so much for others to forgive in ME and I guess I'm hoping for mercy. :D

I know myself so well, my capacity for doing wrong in a million petty, stupid ways. I am sometimes impatient and cross with my little boys when I shouldn't be, which is the worst. I can be sarcastic and cutting, with a mouth that could slice through steel.

And since, in my life, I have done hurtful things to friends, I am not too hard on other people. Heaven knows I used to be! Mrs. Judge, that was me. Most of the time, the little rubs and annoyances of everyday life can be ignored or smoothed over. Even the small betrayals between friends.

Still, having said that, I'm currently hugely PO'd with a woman I've known since we were children together. po'ed She keeps breaking dates with me, or only calling me when she wants something. We've been friends forever, but she's getting on my nerves. I hate to give up on a friendship, but the truth is, I think I'm getting the signals from her that she doesn't want to be bothered any more.

So there you are. I am such a ninny at times. :(

This is a good thread. Everyone here seems to be pretty reasonable. Mind you, we could all be lying through our teeth. :Wooper:


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satch
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Posted: Sun 06 Feb , 2005 2:05 am
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Would you forgive a friend if they had - lied to you? Stolen from you? Cheated you? Once? Repeatedly? How far does your forgiveness go?
Mmmm, a friend of mine stole from me a couple of times (not anything huge, not at all. Just things like pens or whatever, but it's all principals :P) and used to lie about everything... I guess in order to get attention or something?? I did confront her one time (after she told me she was pregnant... God I'm so glad she was lying or I would have felt like such a bitch.) and she went off on one at me saying that I was her friend and should believe her blahblah.... But we're still friends, and I've forgiven her for lying 'cause... I dunno... She didn't do it to hurt other people, I guess.

But the person I talked about in my *last* answer (lol) I haven't really been able to forgive. Not that she did anything majorly bad that would make me hate her forever, because I don't. And there's not much reason why I can't forgive her, I just can't. (Other people I just don't want to forgive because I'd rather bitch away about them being such bastards and hate from afar, than let them off the hook - so to speak.... *Raises eyebrow*)

I'm a bit of a sucker when it comes to things like that and I tend to let people walk all over me. I don't speak out about things I don't agree with (or at least I didn't use to. Seems like that's changing :P) and so I don't want to just forgive her or anyone else who fucks around like that, and say "yes of course that's ok it was all a mistake" and give them the opportunity to do it all again.

So instead I just cut off all ties with them and don't go back to it. If I can't see it, it can't bother me ;).

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Ethel
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Posted: Sun 06 Feb , 2005 6:01 am
The Pirate's Daughter
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Impenitent wrote:
So, can you forgive and reforge a friendship when forgiveness is asked for? Or do you close the door and lock it?
I'm not sure I can forgive significant dishonesty, but I have had the experience of forgiving years of estrangement and reforging a friendship. I told this story on TORC not so long ago; I apologize to anyone for whom it is redundant. (Skip, skip!)

I made a friend in my last year of high school who was my roommate in college. She was smart and funny; wonderful company. We could make each other laugh like no one else could. We were the best of friends and constant companions. A lot of people were convinced we were lesbians. We just laughed about that and said, "If only it were true!"

She graduated a semester before I did and went off to take a job and begin her life. For a while we kept up our friendship at a distance - we lived in cities 3 hours drive apart. Then... she changed. In retrospect, I think she just had too much on her plate. She took up with a man who had an alcohol problem, and who was (at least) emotionally abusive. She was working full time and going to law school at night. She didn't have a lot of free time, but more than that, she didn't seem to have the emotional energy for friendship any more.

We kept making plans to get together. She would cancel them at the last minute. Or just stand me up. This went on for months, then years. I tried to be patient but it got harder and harder. She called me the night before my wedding to tell me she was "too busy" to come. Hurt isn't the word. How can you be too busy to come to your best friend's wedding?

I tried a few more times after that. I think we managed to have lunch together once. But it finally became clear that I wasn't important enough for her to find time to see me. That hurt, badly. The way I coped was by telling myself that she - the person who had been my friend - was dead.

Though we both lived in the Los Angeles area, years passed without us having any contact at all. Then one night, six or seven years after I married, my husband and I went to dinner with friends. And Mary walked into the restaurant with her brother and sister-in-law. She was delighted to see me; came over to my table eager to talk. But she had been dead to me so long that I was coldly polite; she quickly gave up. I sat in stony silence for a bit, but my husband and friends urged me to go talk to her. I decided they were right.

So I went to her table, sat down, and said, "Forgive me. I was rude just now. I was startled - but I am glad to see you." The conversation was awkward at first, but it improved. I remembered why I had liked her so much. By the end of the evening we had drunk a lot and laughed a lot; we parted with promises of meeting again soon.

And we did. She made sincere efforts to repair the damage to our friendship. She called me often; she set up meetings and showed up for them; she came to visit. Though her 'abandonment' had felt like betrayal, in time I fully and freely forgave it. The things that had made us friends in the past helped us rebuild: our many shared tastes and interests, our senses of humor, our natural compatibility. That meeting in the restaurant was - oh, maybe 18 years ago now. She once again became my closest friend; she still is.

After my marriage broke up, when I was left with little except a traumatized child and a lot of debts, she was the first one to visit. We were eating off a plastic picnic table and sleeping on mattresses on the floor. The morning she left, she handed me a check for a thousand dollars. She said, "Buy a table. Buy a bed. Pay me back when you can." It still brings tears to my eyes to think of it.

So... yes, I can forgive a lot. But in the case where I did so, my forgiveness was actively sought and richly rewarded. I think that makes all the difference.

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Andri
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Posted: Sun 06 Feb , 2005 11:09 am
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Ethel, that's a beautiful story.
But I am really glad that you two made it up and now you are there for each other. It required a great strenght and maturity from your part but it was worth it.

I often wonder why people offer so much support to someone whose marriage/relationship has broken down but fail to recognise that a friendship gone bad can be an equally heart-breaking experience.

Like you I lost my best friend. We were together since we were 11 and used to be closer than sisters. When we went abroad to study she started suffering from Anorexia. I tried to be there for her and do anything that I believed was best for her. Spend months watching her waste away, putting my life on hold to help her recover. At the end, the strenght of the illness was so bad she had to fly back to her family. We continued talking on the phone and meeting at holidays.
Two years passed and she started to recover. Just when I thought that things would be rosy again, she called me and told me that she wanted to end our friendship, to move on and create a new life for herself. That was a huge blow but I respected her decision because I was sure that this wasn't easy for her either.

We now see each other occasionaly because we belong to the same charity. I find it very hard to talk to her because I know that the person who stands there is not my old friend but a different person altogether. I sometimes wonder whether that sweet funny teenage girl I used to know is still hidden somewhere inside her. I also wonder what would happen if I just went up to her and gave her a bear-hug like we used to do.

Forgive? There is nothing to forgive. I believe that she acted for her best interest and if she felt she needed to break away from me she didn't do it in order to hurt me but because it was a matter of her coming back to life again.

Would I be ready to reforge the friendship? I don't know. The emotional baggage that I still carry from this story is too great and I fear that I will not be able to handle it properly.

I guess time will show. So Ethel, consider yourself a lucky one. You have your friend with you because you were strong enough to let her back in your life.
:hug:


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