At last Monday's counseling session, Jill decided to do something different, which I thought was really interesting. She made each one of us pretend that we were counselors for the group, asked us to go in front, and pose a question to everyone else. Mine was innocent enough: "If your favorite alcohol beverage wasn't alcoholic, would you still drink it?" It led to a lot of discussion about how beer goes really well with pizza, how pasta goes well with wine, that sort of thing.

But it wasn't until Allison decided to ask, "Do you have any regrets?" that I really felt I learned something. I mean, regret is a common theme here in Liquid Etchings. Life is finite, eventually it'll all be past tense, so why get hung up on just another incident? And when it was my turn, I vocalized a sentiment that I've always echoed here: that I feel more sorry about my loss than the victim's.

It felt really strange and rude and selfish to hear myself say it, but then I rationalized (in a very stream of consciousness style) that it was because I felt that the courts and the cops and the insurance adjusters and everyone was on the side of the victim, and rightfully so. And that I was being punished for my actions, again, rightfully. I have no problems with any of this. Now, given that all of these forces are on the victim's side, I told the group that I felt like no one was watching out for me. Not that I needed anyone to watch over me for any reason, nor did I feel like I deserved special care in any way. But I felt like the victim was being taken care of, socially and financially. That's the court's job, isn't it?

So now that we've established that the court is going to take care of the victim in some way (including punishing me, which only serves to feed justice; does justice count as part of compensation?), I wanted to point out that I have no problem with any of it. I don't gladly suffer these consequences, but I suffer them nonetheless. And so because I feel that justice is (at least in the process of) being served, then the incident is a push. One day it'll be behind me. That's the point right?

Now I've got a new responsibility to bear, based on a choice I've made. I've chosen to be bitter. I've chosen to care more about the fate of the car. What consequences do I suffer as a result of those choices? I've been to jail and I've been levied fines for my earlier transgression: we're even. My new choice comes only with the consequence that I am viewed as a cruel person. Uncaring. Materialistic. And you know what? I'm fine with that. Because I know that my cruelty and uncaringness and materialism extends only to the settlement of that earlier transgression. It's like you eat something spicy, and you want something to drink only because you want to mitigate the capsical effect. So I consider myself to be generous and caring and compassionate person in 99% of my being. The rest of me has a bad lingering taste.