Perfidy and Forgiveness

My favorite book of all time is about a tiny mouse named Despereaux. At one point in the story, covered in oil and a coating of flour, his tail having been brutally chopped off, with a red thread tied around his neck, he faces his father. I’ve been thinking a lot about him, about this image, over the past little while. You see, I have experienced many emotions in my life-sadness, fear, joy, anger, regret, love, hopefulness, despair. But somehow I largely escaped one emotion that I suspect we all face at one time or another-perfidy.

Perfidy, my friends, is treachery. Untrustworthiness. Deceitfulness. Betrayal. Have you had the unfortunate pleasure of meeting it yet? Did it just brush past you and send a chill down your spine? Or did it shake your hand and sit down awhile and have a cup of tea in your kitchen? Did it jump out and surprise you? Or did you see it coming and hide, hoping it wouldn’t notice you cowering in the corner behind a plastic plant?

Perfidy decided its visit was long overdue, and so it came. And just to be sure I remembered its name, it came again.  

It did what perfidy does to all whom it visits. It rubbed its inky black fingers on treasured things, beautiful things. It stood between me and my memories and cast its long shadow over them. It outlined a question mark with its ashen, gnarled finger on my ability to choose wisely. And it did all of that with a mere brush in passing. It simply grazed my cheek as it drifted by.

Ultimately, perfidy did what all gauzy, black emotions do. It presented me with a choice.

You see, for all its terrible beauty, it is lacking a home. It twists around your heart and asks to stay awhile. It commiserates. It comforts, even, in its brutal way. It lays gently at first. It purrs softly about how it can protect you. It offers to carve out large swaths of space all around you. And you get to choose.

Despereaux got to choose. His father committed a terrible act of perfidy. It was no mere brushing of the cheek. Perfidy assaulted the poor little mouse with the gigantic ears. It nearly cost him his life. And yet, when he faced his father, covered in oil and flour and the weight of what was done to him, he did not choose to let the inky emotions find a home. He chose forgiveness.

Forgiveness, like all light emotions, is much less subtle than its counterpart. It is the bold choice, to be sure. Forgiveness and hope and fearlessness and all the other gold emotions are lacking silver tongues. And they are so bright, they are blinding at first. If you glance at them and then away, their afterimage will haunt the blackness around you for days. They remind you that they already have a home in your heart. They don’t need you. You need them.

“’I forgive you, Pa.’ And he said those words because he sensed that it was the only way to save his own heart, to stop it from breaking in two. Despereaux, reader, spoke those words to save himself.”

I imagine myself, covered in embarrassment and pity, with a freshly inflicted wound and a red thread tied around my wrist, facing perfidy. I look it in the eye and say, “I forgive you.” I speak these words, dear reader, to save myself.

 

 

<Please read The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo. Your heart will thank you.>