Be careful what you think you want.....

Over 20 years ago, in high school I had my personal tormentor. I have written about him in the past but I will not post his name anymore. He was a bully and it took me 20 years and a painful loss (at the time it was a loss) to get me to look at many things about my life. Why I was who I was and how I came to be that person. He was a large part of it. I had wished for a long time for him to suffer. I learned this past week that he did. Was it retribution for what he did to me? I sincerely doubt it and if it was I surely would not have wished this kind of suffering on anyone. For some unknown reason I did a google search on him and I found out some news that has disturbed me. This person was a grade ahead of me and his brother was a grade behind me. His brother had the same first name as myself and he never bothered me, not once. I didn't even register on his radar. So why was his brother such a bad person as to cause me to wish bad things on him and his brother was not? I know the answer. These young men's family were genitic marvels, muscular, athletic, powerful young country boys. But my tormentor was the runt of the group, much shorter than even his younger brother. I believe he was tormented by his older siblings and he took it out on me because I was no where near his strength and he knew I was afraid of him. I finally left all that behind. But this past week I found out his younger brother died 3 years ago. It has disturbed me to find out that my tormentor did ultimately suffer. Suffer more than I would ever have wished him to. As my wife lies in a hospital, possibly having less than six months to live I am confronted with the knowledge that sooner or later we all have to face that which we do not want to. Be careful what you wish for because it can come true in the worst of ways. I forgave him long ago but that does not absolve him of what he did to me, yet I would never have wished that kind of suffering on him.