abide

A beautiful friend sent me this link months ago, but I couldn't absorb all the beauty encompassed in its words. This morning as I was cleaning up my inbox, (there's been a lot of cleaning up around here lately), I sat and read the essay again, recognizing the truth that there's a period when the grief begins to lift, (a blessing, truly), and also, trying to understand what was said about the Buddhist concept of joy and suffering.

This paragraph,  

Blessings to all those who couldn't - or wouldn't - abide with us. Who turned away from the spectacle of our sadness because it made them uncomfortable. What happened to us served to illustrate how we all walk along the edge of a precipice. Some people don't want to be reminded. This turning-away was not because they didn't care, but because their own histories and fears were, for the moment, overwhelming...

was the core of what I needed to walk away with this morning, this ability to acknowledge that forgiveness goes way beyond my black and white box of paradigms. 

Later, I looked up the word abide and it struck me, simply, that it goes both ways. The paragraph above plays both sides; not as an excuse, but as an explanation, a way to let go.