In my growing up and college years, I had a bad temper.  However, over the years I have learned to control it, as well as come to the knowledge that if I was offended, I was the only one to blame.  No one could make me angry nor offend me without my permission.  As I read the prompt regarding this week's story, I thought of a egregious (conspicuously bad) act regarding my mode of transportation, a bicycle, in college after another bicycle incident that had occurred as I was leaving my missionary field of labor in The Netherlands.

During the time that I served in The Netherlands, the missionary mode of travel in larger cities and from city to city was tram or train.  However, to travel within the assigned area the main mode of transportation was generally a bicycle.  I had lost one bicycle to theft during the time I served, and so I had replaced it with a used "girl's" bicycle.  At the latter part of my mission, I had the opportunity to visit relatives that still lived in The Netherlands--cousins who descended from brothers and sisters of my grandparents.

As I visited Groningen, the city from which my grandparents and great-grandparents emigrated, I met and visited a niece of my grandfather, Hermannus Thiessens by the name of Elly Sloots.  Elly and Harm had just had their first child, Rene', born to them on 25 May 1965.  Since I was scheduled to return to the United States just before Christmas 1965, I had been granted permisison to return to Groningen to visit relatives.  As usual, I had transported my bicycle by train in order to get around the city with my companion.

Elly and Harm Sloots' wedding day-Martinikerk, Groningen and Rene' Sloots

Since I was soon to leave,and did not plan to take the bicycle home, Harm said that he would like to buy it from me.  I agreed, and he was to send me the money as soon as he obtained his next payday. I returned back home, and never received any correspondence, payment for the bicycle, or any indication that I would ever receive it.  When I didn't hear anything regarding the bicycle, I could have been angry and made a big deal of it, but it didn't take long to forgive and forget!

Going back to school at Utah State University on my return, I bought a different bicycle as my transportation on campus.  It was the bicycle I used for some of the dates I went on.  Since I lived near campus, the bicycle was kept at my residence on Darwin Avenue, a street near the LDS Institute of Religion.  I used the bicycle mostly for transportation below campus for getting food from the grocery store.  But before I had used it for year, it was stolen.  I reported it to the campus police as well as the Logan Police Department.  It had been registered with them, so they had record of the frame serial number.

A couple of weeks after the bicycle was stolen, I received a report from the police that it had been recovered--at least part of it.  It had been found below campus on what was referred to as "The Island".  Furthermore, it was at the home of one of Utah State University's star football Players, Merlin Olsen.

I was livid that one of our football "heroes" could be involved in stealing!  But because the bicycle was only in parts, it wasn't much good to me and I decided that I would not press charges.  Whether or not Merlin was the thief, I don't know.  And at this point, I don't care.  But for a long time, I held feelings that finally gave way to forgiveness.

Since Merlin had become an actor and portrayed the farmer Johathan Garvey on Little House on the Prairie as a sidekick of Michael Landon, the feelings of distrust came up each time I viewed an episode where he acted.

Even after leaving that series, he starred in his own NBC drame, Father Murphy, playing the title role of a foster dad posing as a traveling priest.  Even in the espisodes there, I had some of the same feelings.  However, with time I overcame those feelings and found that the seven letter word, Forgive, is a very powerful word indeed.  And to apply it as a virtue akin to not judging people does indeed set us free.  In order to be forgiven, we must develop the ability to forgive.  And by not judging others, we remain free of having to apply this virtue.  Do I really know that Merlin Olsen stole my bicycle?  I do not know the circumstances, so I cannot tell.  But to forgive relieved my anger and allowed me to forget the incident until the memory came back with the story prompt today.