My dad wants us to take his route to the lunch room today. We skip the elevator and he takes us down one flight of stairs. We are walking down a hallway I haven’t been in before.

As we are walking, my mom points to an apartment door and says “That guy is an *#%#!@#.”

I see the last name and I know why my parents don’t like this man. However, I also know that he died two years ago.

What happened to forgive and forget? My husband has chided me a time or two because he thinks sometimes I forgive and forget way to easily. I believe those feelings just weigh you down. Life’s already hard without spending time to carry a grudge around.

I realize that because of the dementia in my parents, some memories just get stuck. From what I learned about the reason my parents didn’t like this man, he was actually doing what my grandfather had given him permission to do.

By the time the letter from my grandfather was found, my parents had disliked this man for so long, they could never let it go. That happened a few years ago.

It makes me realize how long ago the first signs of their dementia were emerging. Even though I recognized it at the time, there was still nothing we could do about it. Reflected.