Quite possibly the worst apology ever (warning: psycho babble) (993 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.38 on 20 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by ohlookasquirrel (View user info) at 2004-07-26 14:48:19 EDT
[this began as a response to iddqd's apology post, http://www.ubersite.com/m/38781, but got too long and veered in directions I had not predicted]
Loose ends are what keep us all awake, aren't they?
It's a different thing every night. Variations on a theme. Theme and variations. Hauntingly familiar, frustratingly recurring, but never repetitive enough to create a feeling of intimacy or ease.
I am not of the variety that makes one large mistake, and then spends countless hours analyzing the moment of failure. I spend these same hours, but I am not fortunate enough to have everything culminate in this single slip (as far as I know, yet). I slip so frequently, so messily, that the smooth periods in between are the anomaly, not the disturbances.
It seems like there are an infinite number of people who I have wronged. I approach much of my life aggressively...from the sidelines. I see things happen. They do not happen to me, they are happening to some other girl. To the annoyance of my friends, as one part of me fights with them, arguing skillfully and throwing painful asides, another part sits back and muses, "I wonder what she thinks she's doing. This should be good for a show". Because of this unfortunate (or maybe it's fortunate, saving me from the hurt that would have occurred regardless) trait, it's never until later, that I realize exactly what has transpired.
It's in the morning - in the sober dawn of Sunday, to wax lyrical.
I'm not sure to whom I am going to address this apology, in all honesty. As I'm building up, wasting space and words in an attempt to ignore the impending guilt, I'm realizing that there's really no way one apology could suffice. There is really no way that I can pick one thing, one person, one enormous fuck up.
Instead I face the fact that I will probably end up apologizing for the wrong things, and to the wrong people. Those friends who I have most often wounded with my carelessness, are the ones who I, for some vile reason, care the least about.
On the surface at least. It's odd, there are many people out there, people who I call my best friends, who know me so well (the good and the bad, the horrible things I'd rather they hadn't grasped), and who have done so much for me.
These are the same people who I can't bring myself to love in the way I know I should. They are there, they are consistent, perhaps this is why I don't appreciate them. I know I have used them, and rather than feel guilty for this, I become annoyed with them when they occasionally bring this up. I am not yet sure whether the annoyance is with them or myself.
I feel, I think, I KNOW that this makes me a bad person. If these people were to vanish from my life, I would maybe realize their value then, but I think that it would take years, maybe more, for the panic of the loss to set in. Instead I would experience a dull, healthy sort of ache. Constant fixtures - irreplaceable?
There is only one person who has never fit this pattern. One person to whom I cling, refuse to sever the connection with. And I have never been exactly sure of why. There is nothing wrong with him, and so much right, but what is it that makes him rise above everything that others have given for and to me? We have had far more trouble than I have had with others, yet he matters the most.
If I lost him, it wouldn't be a dull ache. I know because I have lost him. It was a wrenching, unbearable, sharp and throbbing pain. It subsided periodically, as throbbing does, only to surge up again.
The things that I feel I am truly sorry for, truly repentant, and have truly spent the most nights laboring over, are all dealing with him.
So this apology becomes two fold, as it grows.
I am sorry, to everyone else, that I don't have it in my heart to apologize to all of you.
But to you, singular, one boy, who hopefully will never read this, you are to whom this apology is really directed. For everything that has already happened.
Water that has gone under the bridge is the dirtiest, after all.
It's resolved, we aren't lost to each other now (or maybe not, since everything happens in cycles and maybe it's only a matter of time before what may only be a brief reunion with you ends), but I'm slowly understanding that I can never change the things I've already done.
As we grow up, with all these instincts to reverse, and all these modern tools to undo (rewind...cut...delete....erase...empty, and suddenly we're clean), it's hard to learn this.
I'm leaving a permanent mark as I go.
I'm sorry to those of you who had to be there all the times I should have had this revelation.
[any of you who actually made it to the end of this deserve pie, and lots of it]
User Reviews
Submitted by ohlookasquirrel (user info) at 2004-07-28 18:51:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I think you're right, filthyassistant. I didn't really want to go into details, I figure I've done that enough on ubersite and that's certainly a bad habit and will come back to bite me in the ass.
Tell y'all what, I feel bad about my empty pie promise. If I ever go to an ubercon, I'll bake a pie.
Submitted by Scott_James (user info) at 2004-07-27 17:00:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Socialist_Joe (user info) at 2004-07-27 01:02:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i only registered the word pie
Submitted by dakingisdead (user info) at 2004-07-27 00:30:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Make mine apple with whipped cream AND Icecream. (French vanilla preferably)
Submitted by AlwaysAnEagle (user info) at 2004-07-26 22:01:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Life moves on, get a canoe.
I like pie.
Submitted by FilthyAssistant (user info) at 2004-07-26 20:29:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I think you're trying too hard with this. It's all art and no substance.
Submitted by Anansie (user info) at 2004-07-26 17:51:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by loki (user info) at 2004-07-26 17:20:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I think you're probably over analyzing this. Shit happens, people move on.
There is a guy out there I broke up with because he was an asshole. Later, I heard from a mutual friend that he was drunk and bitching about how it was yet another case where he treated me too well and how chicks just don't like nice guys. I don't want to go into it, but he was not a nice guy. What I'm saying here is that there are vast differences in perception and perhaps you are making too much of something that someone else has moved on from.
I'd like mine apple with vanilla ice cream on top.
Submitted by Caulaincourt (user info) at 2004-07-26 17:08:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I slept.
Submitted by I_Have_a_Kristen_Fetish (user info) at 2004-07-26 16:42:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
You lie about pie, I endured that for nothing?
Submitted by ohlookasquirrel (user info) at 2004-07-26 16:27:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
To the boring comment, hell yes of course, that's why I promised pie.
It was cathartic, and not intended to be anything else.
This is where I should admit that I do not actually have pie to send to you all.
Please don't throw me out of your village.
Submitted by I_Have_a_Kristen_Fetish (user info) at 2004-07-26 16:20:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I made it to the end. Give me my pie!
Submitted by polyamorousaj (user info) at 2004-07-26 16:04:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Uptown_Alexa (user info) at 2004-07-26 16:02:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
It's actually kinda boring.
Submitted by youarsoghey (user info) at 2004-07-26 15:59:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by William_Q_Percy (user info) at 2004-07-26 15:26:11 (#)
Ranking: 2
You are far too intelligent for the people you usually surround yourself with, it seems.
==================================================
I think that means me in particular. If my recent post is any indication of my mental state, you should cut off all contact with me. :(
Submitted by sublime (user info) at 2004-07-26 15:39:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
apology accepted
Submitted by William_Q_Percy (user info) at 2004-07-26 15:26:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You are far too intelligent for the people you usually surround yourself with, it seems.
Submitted by liquor_beaver (user info) at 2004-07-26 15:14:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This must've been very hard to compose.
It's so easy to be careless with all the truly nice people.
There's no way to change it - all the assholes of the world
always end up ahead and getting all the credit.
Look at one episode of Fear Factor or any other reality
show and it all becomes clear - there are infinite rewards
for people who step on the weak. I'm no better than you,
everybody who knows me has already called me out on being
a mega-dirtbag.
Submitted by ohlookasquirrel (user info) at 2004-07-26 15:13:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Meow?
Submitted by spedmonkey (user info) at 2004-07-26 14:54:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
So where's my pie?