We don't seem to be as free to make bad choices as those who harm us with theirs.
We are free to Havisham the clocks at grief’s apogee, flit through cobweb clotted rooms, past desiccated feasts, by moldy vermin-tunneled cakes, and empty our lives into dusty bitterness, but only by ignoring sotto voiced approbations from friends, family, and loved ones. They note—with sad regret—we are “failing to move on.”
No one seems to note—with regret—the jilting fiancé, the leaving partner, the unfaithful spouse. The betrayers receive one-line mention hidden in mounds of detail about the bitterly time-frozen Havishams of life.
