Reflections of a Housekeeper, by Angela Burnes, week 41

We're all products of history. You've got to look at the past with approval, no matter what happened, because you survived it and took your shape from it…all the crimes, all the death. Surviving and passing through, into the now, that justifies it all. The vessel that holds you defines you. And that means every gunshot, every lie, and all the evil, done in the name of cruelty or apathy, they're a part of your story. You can't reject it without nullifying your own existence. The poor souls who got snuffed out lost their voices. Only they've earned the right to reject history.

Some day all this will be history too. And if I'm alive then, I'll accept today as part of my story; part of my becoming of whoever I'll be. Acceptance and abhorrence are strange bedfellows.