The financial insecurity is frightening now. I would be lying if I said that it wasn't. When I refused to trade my values for a paycheck, I knew I would have to live off my savings as I started this company. Things are getting tighter. The money is running out. But I refuse to make "safe" decisions out of fear. Fear based decisions are always the wrong decisions.
I can't live in fear. Its anathema to me. It was fear that prevented me from speaking out for myself, or stepping in to help Sjors earlier when something might have been done to release him. I resonated with the mantra of fear that dominated Sjors' life. I was afraid for Sjors. I was afraid for me. I was afraid of all that I had lost in my relationship with Hans. I was afraid of losing Sjors. I was afraid of some faceless enemy that threatened Sjors. I was afraid of breaking apart a family. I was afraid that Sjors wouldn't make the hard decisions. Because I was afraid, I compromised everything that mattered. And I lost it all anyway. Worse, I lost myself.
It was only in May 2012 when I first wrote to Mac that I began to face that fear, to turn it back on the people who had made me afraid. To fight.
Anger was a powerful curative for me. I'd been drowning in such terrible darkness for so long and I couldn't find a way out. The anger helped me kick to the surface. Slowly, gradually, with every angry rejection of their lies, I regained myself. Even as I feared for my safety and my life, this was a much less powerful sensation than the knowledge that I would lose my soul and myself if I did not act. A year later, in the train station in Amsterdam, when Sjors asked me to compromise, when he tried to frighten me into silence again; when he implied that my actions had been bad for him and he begged me to stop; when he told me that he did not love me because the person he loved would not have acted as I had; I could not be motivated by fear again. It wasn't an option for me. I had fought to stay alive, and such a compromise would have brought me beneath the waves again.
One month later (this time last year), I was in Cameroon. I was working to build a team. I was vomiting, my body and soul trying to reject poison. After our meeting at Amsterdam Centraal and seeing Sjors again, hearing the practiced rhetoric fed to him by MIVD and catching only the faintest echoes of the man I loved in the dark visage and hard voice, I began to realize how complicit he had been in the hell that MIVD put me through. He had chosen to compromise his core values, his fundamental truths. He had sacrificed himself and me and our future together.
I think he pretended that he did this for noble reasons. He had two small sons who were beginning to sense the network of lies on which he'd built their house; the loveless marriage and the cover-life for his covert actions. His plan (he told me in Rheim) was to become a better liar: to create a better illusion for his sons, rather than free them all from the lies. I was the inconvenient reminder that he could be an honest man and a fully realized person. Just as being with Sjors had been sunlight for me, being with me had shone into his life. But the truth was that he was afraid. And he sacrificed everything that mattered on the altar of that fear. Job said, "That which I have greatly feared is come upon me." How many of your fears came true anyways, Sjors? Was it worth it?
When I met Sjors, when I fell in love with him, I saw a man who was trying to be good and courageous. I feel so sad that Sjors is not that person.
There's a television show I've been watching lately. Like every other popular culture item, I'm far behind the times. "House of Cards" with Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright. The actor who plays Adam, Robin Wright's lover, bears an uncanny resemblance to Sjors...albeit an older, less fit Sjors. But the shape of his nose, the hollows of his eyes, and the way his face crinkles when he smiles are startling reminders. I find myself watching the show so that I can see him. Those echoes of the man I knew. When he kisses Robin, I remember the way that Sjors kissed me. Not with the poignant immediacy that the memories used to hold, but the gentle opening of a door in my mind.
I hold Sjors accountable for his actions. But I also hold MIVD accountable for the fear that they brought to us both. To MIVD: If you thought that slandering me would quiet my voice and limit your exposure, you were mistaken. That which you have greatly feared will come upon you. I have not forgotten. Do not mistake patience for forgetfulness.
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