Ferrol Sams

Got to thinking about Ferrol Sams today.
He's just up the road, as we say, in Fayetteville, Ga., just south of Atlanta. Sams is a rather famous regional doctor and writer. He just turned 86.
I thought of him because I've been thinking of my mother-in-law Sara, now deceased. She was a contemporary of Sams' and attended Mercer University in Macon with him. Sara dated him briefly, and was (sort of) included in "The Whisper of the River" — Sams' novel based loosely on his years in Macon.
A couple of years ago, after Sara had died, Michael and his father Hugh and I were driving around Atlanta. True to form, Hugh started to say some things about Sams that to me smacked of an old rivalry. (Michael had previously told me this was a long-festering wound of his dad's. "I never liked that guy," he'd say.) Not sure the two men ever encountered each other, as Sara and Hugh met after her Mercer days.
Bear in mind that at the time of Sara's death in 2005, she and Hugh had been married more than 50 years. They had a strong and happy marriage and raised two sons.
From the back seat, I said, "Hugh, don't you think it's time to forgive him?"
I guess there's sting in old wounds, real or imagined.