Oops! I made another mistake: I spoke out of turn, stepped on your foot, forgot to show up for an appointment, hurt your feelings.  This time I didn’t do it on purpose, but sometimes I do, that’s how mad or jealous I can be. There are times I just project my own fears onto you and times I simply don’t notice that you’re hurting too. 

I’m sorry. Please forgive me.

We all do these things. Why is it so hard for us to apologize?

The logistics of apology so often becomes such a briar patch of blame and elaborate self-justifying that we just shut up and let it fester. On a large enough scale it leads to Holy wars that kill thousands of people and last for decades. And for what? 

For example, what was the original offense, generations long gone, that happened in Romeo and Juliet’s families? Was it so, so terrible that the adults couldn’t get together over dinner one night and agree to bury the hatchet—instead of the children? 

Yeah, I know, wounded pride and all that. 

Well, I like to be right, too. But so what?

It happened that a few months after Herb’s death a friend, tired of hearing me moan, told me I should get over it already. 

I was hurt to the quick, and embarrassedly wondered if maybe he was right, but there was the reality of my body still in shock and my heart still inflamed with rage and disbelief at a medical system that would not let Herb die when he was ready to. 

I’d been in so much pain; what I needed was comfort and care, not accusation. The well-meaning, but shaming advice left a welt still sore to the touch, and has made me think a lot about the power and rightness of compassion, and simple apologies when you’ve gotten it wrong. 

All I needed to hear was, “I am so sorry I hurt you. I did not mean to.”

These days I’m exploring the power of comfort and care. I am so longing to receive it, that I am committed to giving it wherever I can. Believe me, this is not an easy practice right now, but if I am to heal from my shock I have no choice. 

Comfort and care.

I was just at our local Mom and Pop grocery store, talking about chocolates with the Arabic “Pop” of the place and another woman buying up stacks of fancy chocolate bars. She explained that she was going on a trip to Alaska with her wife, who needed a stash of chocolate to keep her going. After she left the store he leaned over the counter to me and whispered, 

“Her wife? Was that a man?”

“No,” I smiled. “She is a lesbian woman married to another woman. It is legal here now, you know. It’s very brave of her to be able to say it out loud to an older Arabic man,” I added. He nodded, leaned a little closer and said,

“My sister, she has a son—so beautiful and kind, everyone loves him. And he is…you know…”

“Does the family accept him?” I asked, slowly unwrapping my chocolate.

He half smiled, half shrugged, leaned still closer to me, “Well, they start now, maybe, to forgive him. But so disappointed—no little grandchildren, no daughter-in-law, you know…”

“Does he forgive them?” I asked softly, breaking two squares of chocolate apart and handing him one square.

“Oh, ouf, well, he is a good boy, kind… yah, he does,” he replied with another shrug, accepting the chocolate from my hand and lifting it to his mouth as I did. He gave a deep sigh and we crunched companionably together. 

Almonds with toffee. 72% cacao.

And it doesn’t come cheap.