Stephanie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sjcarpediem) wrote2008-05-20 11:52 pm
sjcarpediem) wrote2008-05-20 11:52 pm
Entry tags:
Please notice this...
Clear, 17C
I am usually the first to preach not to keep secrets. Well, I've realized that I have one. A really big one. A guilty, horrible one.
I once lied about my identity; and benefited in ways that money cannot equal ever, under any god or heathen, while someone, somewhere, must have suffered. It doesn't matter how naive or knifing or plausibly deniable it initially was; or how or when I realized the fact and the weight of the lie I told.
The fact is that I told it and I benefited from it. I discovered and experienced and when I understood that I had been given access to that only through a lie I tried and tried to make the lie a truth. In part of doing that, I see now that I actually perpetuated it.
Until I also understood that it was once a lie and would always be a lie; no matter what happened as a result.
We all tell lies. We all make mistakes; and though I usually feel like I've made more than my fair share of big ones, the fact is that I have--almost as a rule--accepted, even sought, bearing full responsibility for them (even if I have regretted it, later, or known that I would).
The lie is not my secret, nor is the mistake of it.
My secret is that I have never atoned for my dishonesty. The worse of it is that I have meanwhile been praised and honored for being honest.
That part on how I gained from it is only to emphasize to what degree atonement is necessary.
The fact of the matter is that I have kept this secret because I did not know how to deal with the repercussions of letting it out.
Well.
I'm done with that.
I'm sorry to everyone who was tricked and misled into believing things about me that aren't true (though to be fair and honest to those who've joined me only in the last five years, you had already missed my error by then). I know that now you know I can't be trusted because there's no way to sort the fact from fiction. You must always wonder, now, if I am who and what I say I am or seem to be.
If I was a decent person I'd never tell another soul--and that's what I thought I was trying to do for the past five-plus years. Maybe I'm just being weak and taking "the easy way out" by outing myself after the recent chain of disappointments and challenges and cries in the night for support of some kind....
But I realize I was wrong then and am, now, and always will be until I've earned and been granted forgiveness from the ones I've wronged. I don't enjoy being wrong and the longer it goes on the more people I'll need to apologize to and beg forgiveness from. I'm damming this polluted stream.
So I'm starting, here.
Actually, that's another lie... I've already started somewhere else. The plan is to start at the outside, with the least affected and work my way in to the ones I'm aware of harming most directly.
If you want details or to harangue me or de-flist me or try to exact penitance or other explanation; I'll be leaving this entry public, and screening replies in case of any foolishness. The point is that your comment is between you and I unless you request otherwise.
I am usually the first to preach not to keep secrets. Well, I've realized that I have one. A really big one. A guilty, horrible one.
I once lied about my identity; and benefited in ways that money cannot equal ever, under any god or heathen, while someone, somewhere, must have suffered. It doesn't matter how naive or knifing or plausibly deniable it initially was; or how or when I realized the fact and the weight of the lie I told.
The fact is that I told it and I benefited from it. I discovered and experienced and when I understood that I had been given access to that only through a lie I tried and tried to make the lie a truth. In part of doing that, I see now that I actually perpetuated it.
Until I also understood that it was once a lie and would always be a lie; no matter what happened as a result.
We all tell lies. We all make mistakes; and though I usually feel like I've made more than my fair share of big ones, the fact is that I have--almost as a rule--accepted, even sought, bearing full responsibility for them (even if I have regretted it, later, or known that I would).
The lie is not my secret, nor is the mistake of it.
My secret is that I have never atoned for my dishonesty. The worse of it is that I have meanwhile been praised and honored for being honest.
That part on how I gained from it is only to emphasize to what degree atonement is necessary.
The fact of the matter is that I have kept this secret because I did not know how to deal with the repercussions of letting it out.
Well.
I'm done with that.
I'm sorry to everyone who was tricked and misled into believing things about me that aren't true (though to be fair and honest to those who've joined me only in the last five years, you had already missed my error by then). I know that now you know I can't be trusted because there's no way to sort the fact from fiction. You must always wonder, now, if I am who and what I say I am or seem to be.
If I was a decent person I'd never tell another soul--and that's what I thought I was trying to do for the past five-plus years. Maybe I'm just being weak and taking "the easy way out" by outing myself after the recent chain of disappointments and challenges and cries in the night for support of some kind....
But I realize I was wrong then and am, now, and always will be until I've earned and been granted forgiveness from the ones I've wronged. I don't enjoy being wrong and the longer it goes on the more people I'll need to apologize to and beg forgiveness from. I'm damming this polluted stream.
So I'm starting, here.
Actually, that's another lie... I've already started somewhere else. The plan is to start at the outside, with the least affected and work my way in to the ones I'm aware of harming most directly.
If you want details or to harangue me or de-flist me or try to exact penitance or other explanation; I'll be leaving this entry public, and screening replies in case of any foolishness. The point is that your comment is between you and I unless you request otherwise.
no subject
I'll tell you a story. My aunt for some reason thinks Hungarians and Gypsies are the same thing somehow, which is terrible, because her mom (my grandma) was Hungarian. I don't think anybody knew about this misunderstanding she had been harboring, and when my grandma passed away, it was this aunt who made arrangements with a church for the funeral.
So I think almost everyone else was bewildered when the pastor kept calling my grandma a "gypsy woman".
Maybe there's more to this story than I know about, because I've heard stories of mixing of this and that, or stealing of babies, but from what I understand, she was a woman from Budapest and a good Magyar family.
Still, it was a really good reflection on her life, if a bit culturally inaccurate.
no subject
As for my own source, it's something I've always been interested in, and for quite a time was out to either prove or disprove. I've gotten very far back on a number of branches, but not the relevant one--my mother's mother's mother is where that one ends, with nary a detail or clue, and my mother's mother isn't talking although I've asked both generally and specifically many times. She told my mother and her siblings growing up that they were Roman Catholic, so unless I can uncover something absolutely kosher (forgive the pun)--which is undoubtedly impossible in this situation--it is not proper to suspect anything other than what she has maintained.
I've had a few forays with conversion. I stopped when I realized how hypocritical it was, especially since I was (and am) still at least somewhat unwilling to go "all the way" in full and utter observance. I respect and admire the system and the faith and have very much reveled in the community it creates and nurtures and still very often wish I could count myself a member of it; but, if it was meant to be it would be and maybe one of my challenges is to accept that disconnection. I console myself that this way my 'soul' at least is not besmerched by violating the sabbath.