Postcard from the edge

Today I received a postcard from someone whom I care about, but who has demonstrated an intermittent kind of interest in our dealings with each other over the years, oftentimes being absent and unavailable, when I really would have appreciated consistency and concern (no, no, ms. sometimes-smart-ass-herself, it’s not your card and most certainly it’s not you!).

And I thought: how cool is that! I’m reading it again and again and I am really touched by it. It's so expressive! It 's so sweet! It's so easy to forget all those months of quiet! I see the postcard and at least for now, I am floored, in the best of ways.

It seems to me that even a longtime pattern of bad conduct should readily be obliterated if good conduct suddenly appeared, out of nowhere. Really, that is as it should be.

And conversely, a recent act of perceived bad conduct should not obliterate a history of care and concern. It should not even make a dent.

That is as it should be. That is as it should be. But most often, that is not the way it is.