Several years ago, I loaned an acquaintance some money. It was supposed to have been a secured loan, with the collateral of some art photographs, but he never got around to getting the pictures to me, and he never got around the paying back the money. I stopped seeing him in our regular haunts and figured he’d moved away. But last fall, after several years, he turned up again — at this lecture and that class, at a cafe or a bookstore and once even on the subway. The first time we met, he acknowledged the debt, I gave him my address, and figured he’d mail a check. He didn’t. After that, every time I saw him, I got mad. This past Saturday, I told him.

I mean, I really told him. “Read the riot act” is, I believe, a fair description. I told him that he’d deceived me and, in effect, stolen from me. I told him that he had no right to be running all over New York City doing things that cost money when he hadn’t even established some kind of payment plan—$5 a month, something—to let me know that he at least intended to pay this debt. When I was finished, he was the stunned owner of a piece of my mind.

 He was telling me how times have been rough and that he’s on unemployment (“You haven’t been on unemployment for eight years,” I was thinking but didn’t say), and he said that he was not a person of integrity when he took that money from me, but that he’s working hard to become one, that he knows he owes me, and that he’ll pay when he can. (And I’m thinking, “What about $5 a month, or $2, or 50 cents?”)

Now, there are those who would say that I should have felt a great deal
better after this venting. Giving somebody what-for is, I think,
something like sex or a long-distance run: when it’s over, you know
that something happened. But I didn’t feel all that much better. Ten
percent better maybe. I wished it were ten percent of the money.

As I walked away, however, I got a Jesus jolt. That’s what I call it when, every now and again in response to some confusion or emotional state, I hear the words of Jesus coming to me in a strong, calm male voice. Lest you think that I’m approaching either sainthood or schizophrenia, allow me to be very clear that I do not believe that Jesus is talking to me. What I’m hearing is the voice of Ernest Holmes, author of The Science of Mind, reciting from a long-play record album called “The Sayings of Jesus.” I got it mail-order when I was nineteen and consuming spiritual information the way a starving man would approach a buffet. I listened to that record scores of times, and those words live inside me like “M-i-c-k-e-y M-o-u-s-e” and “You’ll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent.”

Jolting me, then, from my ten percent serenity came: “Forgive us our debts, as we have forgiven our debtors.” Shoot. I didn’t want to hear that. This guy owed me. He betrayed me. He was wrong and I was wronged. “Forgive us our debts,” the voice said, “as we have forgiven our debtors.” And I knew what I had to do.

As soon as I got to a quiet place, I took out my Blackberry and called his cell. “This is Victoria,” I said. “I want to forgive the debt. It’s not for you. It’s for me. I want my peace back. So as of now, it’s over, it’s done, and it’s paid it full.” Then I got the other ninety percent.

Anyone could argue about whether or not I did the “right” thing. It could be said that I was enabling his irresponsible behavior and not helping him a bit. But I’m free today, and I can’t help but think that freedom is contagious.