The struggle between good and evil

Her life flashed before her eyes. Plus, she remembered one photo, where Vitalik hugs her mother, and also remembered the inscription under this photograph “we love each other.” After that Natalia felt depressed and she cried bitterly. A few minutes later she called Vitalik and said in a tearful voice: “Forgive me, please, for my behavior; I will never do this again. I will not be what I was before. Tell me that your mother will recover. I love you. Forgive me that I was so stupid and did not respect you and your family.” Of course, she did not ask forgiveness from him for the fact that she did not like him, because it would disappoint Vitalik very much. So it was easier to say that she was stupid and did not respect him. Because if she asked forgiveness for not loving, then it would make it clear that she did not love him! And then she would look like a cunning liar, because she always answered to his “I love you” “I love you too, dear!”

Another friend, whose name was Victor, was set out to war in one of the flash points. He wrote that if he was killed, then let his letter be kept for his son, whom he did not pay attention to. When his son called him to play, Victor repelled him and found all sorts of different reasons to avoid spending time with his son and his wife. He gave his child a miss and irritated that he did not allow him to watch movies and interfered with other things, asking him to play with his son. He wrote that he could never forget the moment when he was digging the earth with a spade, and his son, coming from behind, began to pull father’s spade toward himself to help him to dig the earth. But Victor, turning around, pushed his son away, who then fell to the ground. Victor looked at his son lying on the ground and said: “What are you trying to do, do not bother!” Victor could not imagine that this would be seen from the window by his wife. When Victor and his son came home, he embraced his son and looked into his wife’s eyes and said: “We had a very great time together.” But at that moment his son became very sad.

Victor wrote a lot about the fact that love is much appreciated at war. Once a soldier said, wiping away his tears: “Everything turns out strangely, at home I was constantly offended and was angry with my family and other people, and now I’m crying and regretting it, I’m ready to hug them all day long and ask them for forgiveness for all resentment! I am ready to tell them every day that I love them!”

The soldiers ran for letters faster than to the chow hall. Many of them said that they are ready to sacrifice much to touch their loved ones and relatives, to their mothers, wives and children. In his letter Victor said that at first it was not customary and it was embarrassing to cry at war. But then, almost everyone cried there.

When the bullets whistled over Victor’s head and he saw his comrades-in-arms fall dead, and others writhing with unbearable pain, he remembered how he ignored his family and thought only about his son and wife at that moment, imagining how they were walking together and enjoy every precious second. Victor had never returned from the war, only memory remained from him, and the only things that remained after him were the letters that he sent to his relatives.

My other friends Vadik and Alyona were happy that they found each other. Every year they went to vacation by the seaside. They took a car, packed their bags and put off on a journey. They loved traveling; especially they liked to drive on night roads. Once, when they were traveling to the sea and had already driven half of their way, another car appeared on a contra-flow lane. There was a serious car accident. They both survived. Alyona got less serious injuries. She had broken both legs, her right hand, four ribs and she got a serious head injury. As for Vadik, he got a spinal fracture. He was forever chained to a wheelchair. When Alyona recovered, she left Vadik for another person. Her love was not true. But at the time of marriage, standing near her sweetheart, she promised to love her husband both in health and in illness. It is evident that for her it was just words. If she really loved her husband, she would never leave him. Because love has no timeframes and tolerates absolutely everything.

Another friend of mine, whose name is Angelina, married a very handsome and a very rich guy. This guy was glad that he got such a companion of life. But his mother could not say the same about her. She did not like the choice of her son. And she did not want to see this girl near her son. His mother had two girls in mind who would be perfect for her son as she thought, and who would not mind marrying him. And she would be happy to marry her son with one of them! His mother was a friend of those girls’ parents. His mother said: “Rich, handsome, intelligent, and married a simple girl from the village, I cannot believe it!”

One day it happened that his mother was very ill. She was diagnosed with cancer. As a result, she withstanded several surgeries, and she needed care. Her rich friends rarely called her and practically did not visit their seriously ill friend. They simply wrote her off in their minds, what could not have been said about Angelina. The sick woman did not like it when she came home and began to help her with household chores. She could not huff her out of the house, because she loved and respected her son and understood that she was his wife.

She simply did not have the strength to say something against it and show her dissatisfaction. But time passed. Angelina and her sick mother-in-law were getting closer and closer to each other. The lady found out that one of the girls she recommended to her son became a drug addict, and the other, having taken all her money from her husband, left him. When she found out about this, she walked on her weak legs to the kitchen where Angelina was cooking, and asked: “Angelina, do you really love my son?” Angelina answered: “I really love your son very much, as well as you!” The sick woman answered:" You know Angelina, we are very rich and respected people, but at the same time we are poor! We do not have what you have. We do not have love. We have everything except love. I am glad that you are the wife of my only son, and I ask God to give you a lot of children and let them please you and remember your grandmother who understood much thanks to their mother. Forgive me, please, Angelina, I cannot express in words my guilt towards you. Forgive me! If you cannot erase all my insults from memory, then at least tell me, please, that from this moment we will be best friends. And just say that you forgive me! Hearing this, I will feel much better.” Angelina, hearing this, happily replied: “I forgive you with pleasure, and now we are best friends.”

Tears began to drop down from the eyes of a sick rich woman’s, and she went, snapping along the corridor, to her room. A few months later she died. The last few months of her life this woman talked only with Angelina, who did not leave her even for a minute. The sick woman did not want to see anyone at home. When she said something to Angelina, she had never been in a pique with her weak spots. On the contrary, she received only healing for her inner world from Angelina. Before the lady died, she said to her son and Angelina: “Be happy and never offend each other. Forget the word ‘I’, now there’s only ‘YOU’! Love each other very much. Whatever happens, keep on loving!”

That’s how the lives of people with whom I communicated and made friends have come about. Last time I also thought about one person, namely about my classmate, who moved to another city, when we all studied in primary classes.

Once at school time I saw that the guys from our class goofed on one of our classmates. They shut him in a closet and did not release him for several minutes. The only boy who did not take part in that heartless madness was the same boy, whom I remembered a few days ago. He approached the boys from our class and said: “Why are you doing this? After all, he really feels unpleasant and he is very offended, so, you’d better be pitiful to him, because he has a mother who loves him and doesn’t want you to shut him in the closet and mock him.”

I then thought, is this wonderful, pure, merciful and true love really lives only in one boy from our class? This boy was different from the rest guys. He studied well, never offended anyone, had a good memory, always greeted everyone and righted the oppressed. He was the only of the kind. His gaze differed from the ones of the rest guys. His gaze combined: love, mercy, pity, compassion, romance, meditation, boldness, subtle psychology, sacrifice for the sake of society and a will to justice. I know nothing more about his fate, since after the third class he moved with his family to another city. At school, I’ve never made a pal of with him. But I do not know why. Perhaps, this is not possible to explain. I just remembered about this boy. Why did I remember him? I do not know! Maybe it’s love! Or maybe it’s naive and funny! I’ll try to find him in social networks. If he is not there, then I’ll try to find him some other way. I really want to find him. I can hardly stand his gaze if he is not married or has become a drug addicted or an evil psychopath, a drunkard, a homosexual or a criminal. Who knows, maybe I made was mistake with him. Maybe he transformed from a loving, sweet boy to an evil, irritable, proud, grinning and unhappy man. Because I know that people can change. Good people can transform into evil, and evil can become good. But what kind of person is he that does not have a constant good core in himself and can transform from good into evil? After all, every evil thought, deed and every word must be repelled and chased away, and you must not be allowed to multiply this evil in our life.

I reject evil and all the thoughts that push me to something evil, because I do not like evil, I love only good. Otherwise, if I take a cue from evil people, if I get angry and act like them, then I will turn into a bad person like a hypochondriated, angry, cynical brat, and hardly someone will ever want to communicate with me. If it was so, I couldn’t enjoy life every second, I couldn’t have joy, love, mercy, and I would be angry with everything around and as a result I would go crazy. It’s up to me to choose. I make this choice every morning and choose only good. But it is still difficult for other people to choose something for themselves, because of inexperience and inability to think.

I know a few of my friends who are older than me, but who are not able to think. These people cannot choose anything for themselves and their loved ones. Every day they drift like clouds chased by the wind. But the wind does not ask where the cloud wants to drift. Often the wind drift clouds into insanity, evil, lawlessness, laziness, impatience, alcoholism, drug addiction, violence, resentment and so on.

Every day of life is a valuable gift. As I live the day, so I will live my life. If a person spent the whole day offending his loved ones, and at night he died, then he died as an offended and proud man. This last day became his whole life.

I have another friend. This guy’s name is Oleg. He was very touchy. Sometimes he could take offense at his mother all day. He often gestured with his hands and said: “My mother is pretty hot and tempting! She can tell me anything. And the most important thing is she doesn’t ask for forgiveness. So I can’t talk to her all day long to teach her a lesson.”

I almost imagined what his mother told Oleg about, because looking at the behavior of this guy, it was clear that if he did not change and did not get wiser, there would be a big trouble. He drove quickly, he was constantly rude and became addicted to alcohol, cigarettes and girls of easy virtue, and never helped his parents in any way. When his friend said that he had to come over to his mother to help her doing something, he laughed in surprise and said: “You’re mother’s baby!” It was impossible to solve any serious, vital question with this guy. He could not be trusted either. One day he came over to his mother. Probably, he did not understand himself why he came to see her. In less than half an hour they began to quarrel. His mother was telling him the right things. But the brain of this adult wasn’t mature enough and did not perceive what was said, but perceived all the words of his parents with hostility and reproaches. This young man did not even know what he wanted in his life. He did not know either what profession to chose or what kind of future wife he needed. He did not know what to talk to a girl about. When he finished his conversation with new acquaintances, he used to come and say with a sneer: “They are some stupid people, they do not know what to talk with me about, and they do not understand me at all.” Of course, Oleg could not realize why no one could understand him and talk to him. Only my friends and me knew the reason of this misunderstanding. We were receptive to him, because he was our friend, and we did not want to offend him. We all knew that he was not mature yet though our age was quite the same. He took turns discussing all his friends with us. He did not understand what he was saying. He took offense, was angry with all his friends, neighbors and parents. One day his mother said something that Oleg did not like at all and it seemed very offensive to him. He got angry and dropping the phone he had a grouch on his mother. He said that he would never put up with her first, because she told him rather offensive words. He did not call up to her for two days, being sure of his rightness. Two days later Oleg was called to the phone from the hospital, picking up the phone, he heard: “Hello Oleg, your mother was knocked by the car. She could not survive. We express our condolences”. Oleg could not believe it. After all, deep down he hoped he would reconcile with his mother. He just wanted to take offense at his mother a little and as he said, “to teach her a lesson,” showing her. Now Oleg knows that love cannot offend!

I’ve told you a bit about my friends, now I want to tell you about myself. I’m very pretty and I have a beautiful figure. I constantly go in for sports to look good and to be fond of my future lover and not to get sick easily. It is very important for me to have an attractive figure, because I want my sweetheart like to look at me.

I know that men like beautiful female figures, and I constantly upload my buttocks, legs and other parts of my body with physical exercises, and I also find some time for jogging every day. In fact, going in for sports is very cool. I’m sure that when I meet my beloved, he will like it very much. But what a person my beloved should be? Probably he should be as smart and loving as I am. But, of course, it may happen that my future husband will not be perfectly intelligent and loving person. But even if it is so, the main thing is that he wants to acquire this mind and love. It is not even possible to go shopping for food without the desire, and a person can live with a principle “if I don’t have something, I don’t need it.” But if a person wishes, but does not have, I will help him to acquire this. I will fight. I will give him love if he does not have it. If something goes wrong, I’ll come from the other side, showing endurance and patience. After all, not everybody acquires the mind, patience and love in one second. Sometimes, it’s possible to reach out a person only after many years. Age plays a not very significant role in human life. I know many women and men who are already 40 or 50 years old, but their intelligence and wisdom are several times lower than some of my acquaintances who are not even 30. I’m thirty now. You cannot judge a man by his age. This approach is partially true. Never compare your inner world and your knowledge in thirty years with other people of the same age.

I have one 55-year-old acquaintance who once said to me: “At the age of 20 I was, in general, a child, at 30 I started to understand something, at 40 I look at things quite differently, now I’m 50 and I see everything.” There are also some people, like this adult man, who see life absolutely differently. But they cannot explain this. Each of them has its own point of view. When this man began to tell me about his life and began to teach me something, he could not imagine that he would have to learn from me. When we finished talking with him, he was even a little ashamed that he does not understand much yet. I absolutely did not want to offend him, just as a result of our conversation he realized that he needed to study, but not me. It was proud, irritable, spiteful, self-centered, drinking, full of ambition and blind prejudices man, who did not like being interrupted and in some way disobeyed. He told me almost an hour only about the Cold War and a secret government. This man has never been at a real war, where young soldiers dreamed of living and loving. Otherwise, he would not sit with me on the bench and drive me into his crazy reflections, “who – whom and when,” and would neither make me nervous, nor his wife and himself. He would have learned better to love and adequately perceived reality, leaving his tedious reflections, because his words do not fill anyone with love, but, on the contrary, they clog up the mind. If he really wants to help his country, then let him do something useful and effective, which can really help. And let him say a few pleasant words to his wife, who “turns like a squirrel in a cage” all days long, and her husband just sits on a bench with a fictional war and bored with his harmful conversations. When his wife told him how he tortured everyone with his talks about war and politics and that people around him were just laughing at him, he was getting angry and, waving his arms, he said: “Yes! There are puppets like you, and somebody plays with you. And I see and I know everything. “All that he sees and understands, I was not interested in at all, because I understood it better than he did. People on the planet always used to fight with themselves, arranging both hot and cold wars, raised vassals, created intelligence, attached, detached the land and so on. This man did not understand just one thing. He did not understand that you cannot focus on this, because otherwise he will just go mad. Now, if he really had a flexible mind and if he talked about love, and not threw it away, then it would be nice to talk with him. I know that children did not really like to come to visit their grandfather, because children go where there is love. Grandchildren were rare guests, because he was grumpy, boring, stupid, sinful and not able to love anybody. I know that there are things from which a person can go crazy. One of them is the very “Trojan horses” that do not let you sleep well. Such a person begins to feel that this “horse” is already very close. It seems to such a person that he will soon be brought here and armed evil warriors will come out of him. But not only a man can go crazy about the war. Sometimes it seems to him that his neighbors are also plotting something against him and are constantly watching him. A person can even be sure of this, although the neighbors themselves may not even know about it. It would be great if our 55-year-old “smart” grandfather understood this. Why did I remember this man? Because I’ve never wanted to have a husband like him in my life.

His wife was an unhappy woman. They did not have mutual understanding and communication with each other. They communicated briefly and laconically. He spent the whole day doing his own business, as well as his wife. Very often they scrimmaged for hours. They tried to find out something, but I still could not understand what exactly they tried to say to each other each time. Cries, anger, abusive words, resentment, pride and humiliation became an integral part of their lives and soon completely filled their lives. This is the same example where there is no love, patience, understanding, reason, mercy and help between people, but there is stupidity, pride, irritation, quarrels, resentment, humiliation and all the rest of evil. When I remember this family, I feel uncomfortable. For all the time of communication with them I have not been able to hear, at least, a couple of clever, warm and affectionate words. What business you can talk about, if these adult people cannot hear good and smart words. They could only plant potatoes together, but it was already problematic to pick it, because once they told their relatives: “We will plant a lot of potatoes together, and then we dig it out and sell it.” Of course, they planted potatoes together, but when it was time for crop harvesting, they grudged sharing big profits in half. They told to their relatives: “Potato crop this year!”

I also noticed that this man had some kind of suspiciousness. Throughout the conversation he tried to prove that he was a real man, but not a coward and more than that he was very independent. I do not know why he was obsessed with this! Maybe someone told him once that he is not a real man, and he still thinks about it and goes crazy about it. That person had not learned to think, had not learned to love, had not learned to appreciate and thank, and also had not learned to cope with his suspiciousness and annoying thoughts.

I do not want anybody to scream at me, I do not want to be offended or irritated, I do not want to feel rejected, humiliated and forgotten, and I do not want anybody to scowl at me waiving his head from side to side and tutting.

Well, today I found that classmate on a social network, about whom I remembered a little earlier. I found the guy who stood near the closet and said: “Why did you lock him there? The guy has a mother who loves him and does not want you to keep him in the closet.” The guy I found on the social network was married already. He had two beautiful children. I was not upset about this at all. On the contrary, I was happy for him. I was happy for their life and for the fact that their family is in good health. Why am I glad and not upset? Because I can love, but do not envy. He is happy and therefore I am glad that he is happy.

I want to meet a man with whom I could be really happy, and with whom I could live my whole life. I want to obey my husband implicitly. But I would certainly like to obey an intelligent and loving person. But where can I find such a man? In a park or a cafe? Or maybe in church? Or maybe just outside? What should be inside my chosen one? Probably, I need an ideal person with whom I would feel loved, protected and pacified. I do not want it to be like in some families, where people live by the principle – I do not interfere in your affairs, and you do not interfere into mine. I want only WE in the relationship with the spouse. And I want every day to be like a separate happy life.

I do not want my future husband to be like my father or that very grumpy, angry old man who grabbed somebody else’s potatoes, because there are people in the world who do not enjoy mutual love, but completely the opposite.

I remember that our father always told me and my younger brother that pity and love are the worst feelings and demanded from us that we should remember this forever. He liked to repeat the proverb “man is a wolf to man.” He also believed and taught us that in this life everyone defends his/her own interests, and the manifestation of kindness and sentimentality only soften the personality and make it weak. Strangely enough, but that’s what my father said. He often watched feature films about prison subculture and drew conclusions about the fact that strength, self-assertion, malicious gaze, revenge, resentment for offense and many other atrocities constitute the basis of a safe and peaceful life. It took me quite a long time to personally re-educate myself and learn to think and understand everything in a completely different way. Many of my father’s wrong, stupid words hid very deep inside me. He educated us in rudeness and cruelty, never gave us anything voluntarily, neither played any game with us, nor spoke to us, or rejoiced at our presence, he never looked with love into our eyes, and rarely, due to a sense of duty, grudgingly pretended to smile. He was always ready to a conflict. Even if some person parked his car in front of our entrance just for few minutes, he always shouted to him with anger: “I put my car here!”

Once, we made a gift to our father. We invited him to our grandmother, because there a surprise was waiting for him. We bought a big cake, and the following words were written on it: “Daddy, you are the only one, and we love you very much.” When our father came into the house and we gave him that cake with smiles on our faces, our father turned his face slightly aside and was ashamed to look into our eyes. Our father was ashamed of tenderness, kindness, love and mercy. Therefore, when we gave him this cake, the following was written on his face: “I cannot tolerate tender love, I feel like somebody has taken off my underpants in the presence of my children.”