The art of carrying a grudge

I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard someone say, “I can’t understand why people carry a grudge.  It’s so much effort—I just let it go.” L says that to me every so often.  She’s someone who doesn’t carry grudges, and she can’t for the life of her understand how either her sister or I, who are the two people she knows best that can do it, manage.

She just doesn’t have a clue how to do it right.

I’ve carried a lot of grudges in my time.  I carry several right now, truth to tell.  I learned how a long time ago from watching my grandmother, who was a master at it.  I don’t have the sheer venom she brought to it, which means I’m not nearly as accomplished as she was, but I took lessons from someone who really knew how.

The thing about carrying grudges is that you don’t have to expend a lot of effort on them.  You shouldn’t expend a lot.  Brooding on a grudge is wasteful, and will indeed wear you down.  The secret is to shape your anger and resentment carefully, and then put it away.  Sitting on the shelf in the back of your head, it doesn’t take up much room or energy, so you just keep it until it’s wanted again.

Maybe you take a grudge out once in a while to make sure it’s the same shape you remembered, and to be sure it’s there when you want it, but that’s about all the maintenance it needs.  A quick reminder of how the anger feels is enough to recharge it, and you can store it again.

I think the oldest grudge I still carry is getting on for thirty years old now, and when I checked on it not long ago, it was still there and still as hot and lively as when I first formed it.  After a couple of minutes of remembering it, feeling the emotions again in the way you run a car’s engine in storage periodically to keep the battery up and the oil flowing, I saw it was good for a long time yet to come, and I put it back in its pigeonhole.  It’ll be there for the day when I need it.

Lex Luthor infiltrates the ugly insect from the railroad.  Fnord.