Forgiving My Grandfather

My natural paternal grandfather died long before I was born. In fact, he passed away when my own Dad was only five. Thus I only knew what I had heard, which wasn’t much. It also wasn’t nice.

Apparently he was not known to have held a job, but sat at home smoking and brooding while my grandmother earned whatever she could, taking in laundry, sewing, and working as a domestic for the more fortunate. Not owning an automobile, my grandmother would carry groceries for over a mile, only to be beaten because she had forgotten (or didn’t have enough money for) her husband’s cigarettes.

From time to time he simply walked away from the family, then returned, expecting to be welcomed and waited on. When he died I’m not sure anyone mourned him.

Some years later my grandmother met and married the gentle carpenter who became the father figure to my own Dad and his two brothers. My “real” Grandad was everything that my natural grandfather was not.

We’re not entirely sure what illness carried Tommy off in his early thirties, but we do know that his doctors urged the family to donate the body for research. Apparently he was a medical curiosity.

We also know that he was a highly talented pianist, and owned a decent collection of treasured books. Otherwise, we don’t know much else positive.

With that history, I’ve always played that part of my ancestry close to the vest, the locked dark room I wished weren’t there, and, frankly, resented carrying the man’s genes. Most people have some heroic ancestral story. Mine was one I would rather not share.

But ultimately we have to consider the larger picture, to contemplate a highly intelligent man of considerable talent who, by reason of an incurable illness for which he did not ask, is relegated to being half a man, a shut-in in a time when every family needed every hand on deck, a burden rather than a support. None of this is any excuse for beating your spouse or being a jerk, but it gives room for some compassion and understanding. Would I have risen any higher in the circumstances? I can’t answer that with confidence, and if I can’t, I shouldn’t judge.

Here’s the funny thing: forgiving my grandfather didn’t do anything for him (as far as I know). But it did a lot for me. He represents a quarter of my makeup, my being, my mind, and my soul. I’m stuck with him, like it or not. So, in forgiving him, I freed 25% of myself from the shame and disappointment which had hung over me like a cloud. That’s a very large piece of freedom.

We usually consider forgiveness a gift to another. In fact, it’s a gift to ourselves.

(I may not be the only one who needs to forgive somebody. Feel free to pass this on to another prisoner.)