Nell should be angry, but it’s not his fault. His scattered thoughts float like bubbles into the air, some bursting on contact with solid objects and others dissipating into the atmosphere without direction or purpose. Like his words, sometimes spoken randomly have no connection to the present now, only recollections of an eventful childhood and repeated questions. The perplexed look on his face speaks louder than the words he speaks.  His reflection looking back at him in the mirror betrays him, but he still remembers to ask for forgiveness. 

The elders warned, never pick up a man in the club or in church. But there he was standing there with that rich, Hershey’s chocolate, vaseline slick skin darkly trimmed in Just For Men black. His mustache barely covered his thick upper lip highlighting the sparkle of that perfect Colgate Chuck E-Cheese grin placed strategically beneath his nose, the almond-shaped eyes, and that Isaac Hayes bald head.  So, when he pursued Nell, she ran, but she didn’t run far, and she didn’t run for long.

He was in awe of her.  At times she would catch him just staring at her from around the door frames, saying nothing – just watching.  Once, at an Alvin Ailey performance, he sat on the edge of his seat beside her just so he could look to his right and watch her reactions, instead of forward at the amazing dancers.  He wowed her with “first time ever” events – first cruise, first music festival, first romantic blanketed picnics in the park, concert trips became annual traditions.  She’d say, “take me to the water,” and a trip to the beach would ensue. She perched comfortably on the throne he built for her, a protected and proud wife she supposed… til death do us part.

Marriage ceremonies are closed with an often-overlooked profound proclamation.  The declaration is powerful and promising --“what therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” (Mark 10:9).  The power implied in this singular verse placed intentionally at the end of the marriage ceremony ostensibly seals the knot formed by this union.  The three-cord union, of course, represents a couple’s presumed alliance with God. We believe that because of the power inherent in that alliance we are always protected, and intruders are forewarned. The promise declares it to be so -- “And if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).  Therein lies the power and the promise.

Infidelity is “unfaithfulness” (Webster), the “final straw” (Scott, Rhoades, and Markham, 2013). But what of the believers of old – our mothers, our grandmothers, our great grandmothers who stayed.  Her stories, like dirty laundry, stayed in the house or were incinerated in the wood-burning stove that kept the house warm.  Her secrets were washed away with lye soap and lard. Her pain was shouted out of her shoes on Sunday mornings or fell like rain past her praying lips as she washed dishes or mopped floors.  Her anger was inflicted on the washboard leaving scarred knuckles and clean collars.  Her fight was in the fingers that weaved together tight, eye squinting braids in her daughter’s head.  Her resolve goes with her to the grave.  He walks away guilt-free, because she forgave.

Forgiveness nowadays looks different.  For Nell, forgiveness was like forgetting the enduring pain of a stubbed toe that even after the pain subsides, the permanent black and blue stain remains as a reminder of the assault forever. Forgiving does not erase the lies that were told or the joy that was stolen when he decided to cross the line and return home wet and soiled to clean sheets. And now he says,  “I can’t remember, forgive me.”  For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. (Matthew 6:14).  The words burn upon hearing, until the numbing begins-- like a lidocaine injection.

Nell is numb. Options are few when the enemy is dementia.  When the offender has no recall, the argument is mute. What remains are the vows, the power and the promises of the word, and the memories of who he used to be.