Grace For Jerks

I’ve been cut off in traffic more times than I can count.
Blinkers ignored, horns blaring, middle fingers raised like greasy little flags.
And sure, I could meet them at their level,
roll down the window, let loose a fireworks display of profanity,
compose a mental Yelp review of humanity titled Disappointing, Would Not Recommend.

But more often, I wonder.

Did they just get that call,
the one that splits a life clean down the middle?
Did they spend the night in a sagging recliner,
rocking a baby whose fever only broke when the dawn did?
Did they crawl out of a morning heavy with loss,
or toward a night they’re not sure they can survive?

At the counter, waiting on takeout
that was promised at 6:10 but ticks toward 6:25,
I could sigh loud enough to stir the air,
shift my weight, rehearse my complaint,
or
I could remember:
the kitchen’s short-staffed because someone collapsed.
The cashier is covering two shifts,
hasn’t eaten since breakfast,
and is holding it together with caffeine, advil,
and the thin hope that nobody yells tonight.

At work, when someone lashes out,
and they do,
I’ll admit, it cuts.
It’s easy to take it as a verdict:
I’m failing,
I’m small,
I’m the weak link in a chain I never asked to carry.

But then I remind myself:
I don’t know their battle.
It could be bipolar.
It could be heartbreak.
It could be a thousand tiny fractures,
hairline cracks no one else sees,
until one day, they split wide open.

And here’s the quieter truth:
We aren’t taught to ask for grace
when we need it most.
We don’t know how to look a stranger in the eye
and say, I’m not okay, can you meet me gently?
Instead, we’re taught to armor up,
to brace,
to snap before we shatter,
to defend instead of let ourselves be defended.

I’ll admit, I give the benefit of the doubt more than most.
But here’s the secret no one tells you:
Assuming the worst feels like armor,
but it’s really just heavy,
and it rusts.

And sure, armor keeps the blows from landing,
but it also keeps the good things out:
the soft words,
the unexpected kindness,
the ordinary mercies that might’ve saved you
if you’d let them through.

In the end, it doesn’t just block the hurt
it starves you of everything
that might’ve healed it.

Believing there’s more to the story
doesn’t excuse cruelty;
it’s just a quiet rebellion against becoming someone
who recoils from every outstretched hand,
until even love taps against you
and finds no way in.

I don’t get to know the why
behind someone’s anger,
don’t get to peek inside their day,
or rewrite their reactions.

But I can choose mine.

And I choose to be the kind of person
who remembers that everyone is carrying something,
that we are all, in one way or another,
hauling around our own unspoken shit.

I try to be the kind of person who lets people be human.