'I'm Sorry.' Of Course You're Sorry, You Screwed Up And You Aren't Really Sorry. Scumbag.

     You know how people say to you, 'Oh man, I'm so sorry'?  Yeah, you know what I'm talking about.  Well, get this.  They don't mean it.  They don't care.  They never cared, that's why they screwed you in the first place.

      See, this is what most people don't get.  People don't like you.  Maybe your Mother likes you.  Sure, she may have hit you with hangers and drank out of colored cup that contained a clear liquid that wasn't water.  But somewhere, in some little twisted corner of her heart where bad things happened decades ago, she loves you.  Ah, maybe not.  Who knows? 

      Maybe your Father likes you.  At least he says he does but thats about the end of the line.  Unless he's not a good man, your father, if he has not left you alone on dark streets while he takes a break from life inside the bar on corner of the dark street on which you are waiting - is probably one of the people who cares.  Moms have hormones and weight gain and the PTA and you and their loser husband to deal with.  Dad has very little to contend with outside the daily trek to the forrest to kill something to eat and hopefully keeping you safe from the things that go bump in the night.  So, Dad finds it easier to love you.  Still, that doesn't mean that he likes you, he's just doing another part of his job by loving you.

     Take everyone else you know from that prick at Starbucks who always gets your order wrong to the person who sleeps right next to you passing gas as if gas prices for filling up at the pump aren't already high enough.  Laying right there, ass up under a thinning blanket and a dingy sheet and they jsut have to hit that little spot on their belly button that release something akin to sarin gas on a packed subway train.  And when you groan or move slightly in the bed to limit the burn marks to your skin; they pop up with a tiny, insignificant, meaningless, 'Oh, hey, I'm sorry.'

     If they were going to be sorry for it, they wouldn't have done it to begin with.  See, here's the problem, they don't like you.  And they definitely don't like you as much as they think they like themselves.  On the list of life, you are down around the bottom of things people like the least.  Let me give you a hint, IBS is higher on the list than you are to most people.  If you doubt this, post your opinion on politics, race, sex or war on the web, watch the attacks come.  And I don't mean attacks about your opinons, I mean attacks aimed at you personally.  What did Taylor Swift ever do except write and sing songs about breakups?  Google her name and look at the venom that is wasted on her.  Even Kanye West stole her thunder.  You know why?  Because he could and he doesn't like her.  Guaranteed he wouldn't have taken the mic from DMX or one of the Bone Thugs.  Guaranteed.

     That is why whenever someone tells you that they are sorry, you have to look deep into your own heart.  Deep into your soul even and face the truth to descern the truth.  Examine their body language, their tone, the curve of their eyebrows and the number of times they repeat the words.  Do they mean it?  Do they really care?  Hell no.  See, that scumbag who just stepped on your sneaks, or cut you off in line, or took your cab, or spilled their drink on your new blouse or bumped you while you were standing far enough away from them so that they didn't have to -yeah, that half assed, swinging piece of meat- doesn't care and he or she is definitely not sorry.  That's why they voted against you for the private golf club or said your script idea was shit or said they liked your dress then laughed at you when you walked away with your ass hanging out from the large tear in the seam.  'Nothing personal,' they say.  Are you kidding me?  Everything mean, nasty, angry, ignorant and stinging is indeed personal.

      The apology is based in you making someone else feel good by you accepting their words. The apology is based on the concept that you are a forgiving, loving, kind and caring person.   Well, you aren't.  You just don't have the time or the energy to tell that son of a bitch that he or she is not indeed sorry and if you had not brought up or noticed the slight, they would have done it again.  It's the truth.  Pretend to ignore it the next time someone messes up the bathroom right before you go in.  Pretend not to notice the next time your significant other does that thing that they know you hate.  Watch what happens.  Nothing.  Guaranteed, nothing will happen.  They won't apologize because they won't think you need to hear it.

     But, you do want to hear it.  You do need to hear it.  You have to hear it and in hearing it all is well in your world.  I have a suggestion.  The next time someone crosses the line, call them on it.  Call them out.  Make a stink and stand proud in the knowledge that you are actually doing them a favor. Yeah, you're used to being the bigger person as you smile, shrug and walk away.  You're scared and so you leave thinking you were the bigger man, well, you're not.

        You see, most people are asleep.  I'm talking full on REM, down deep, dream state break into the house and kill the whole family, I won't wake up sleep.  You are an alarm clock and your snooze button is broken.  You need to know that the theater is full and although there is no fire, 'Fire!' is indeed what you're about to yell.  Wake them up and demand a sincere apology.  You want action that speaks louder than words, genuine, hearfelt, I swear to God, Jesus and that prick Judas too that I won't do it again.

      I bring up Judas because I guarantee that he did not sell out Jesus because of the silver, he did not sell out Jesus because he wanted to please the powers that were.  Judas did what he did because he did not like Jesus.  You'd think that if he was going to hang himself that he would have gone to the top of that hill and begged forgiveness at the feet of the man who hung from the cross on the top of that hill, but he didn't.  You know why?  Because from day one, Jesus was a target of his disgust.  Jesus was a good man.  He was so good that God choose him to be his son.  From the moment they met, Judas had it in for him.  Why not me?  How come I'm not the Son of God?  How come I can't heal the blind?  How come I can't feed all those people and get that standing O at the end of the act?  Judas is one of the first true examples of what people are all about.  Let me put this into context for you.  Judas had a chance to die an honorable and horrible death -as did all of the apostles- instead he decided to sell out a man that was the epitome of kindness, love, forgiveness and purity.  In short, Judas had a chance to touch grace, to embrace perfection and instead he showed his ass in such a way as to be an example to all of us that not only do people not like you but they are willing to cross you and then apologize so poorly that the sound is less than level of a moth screaming,  'Can I get a table dance?' at a strip club in Vegas.  Moths have no gold so gold diggers don't dig them and just as moths have no coin, most people have no regret for spitting in the wind in which your hair is blowing.

     So, while you want to be like Jesus, please understand, you are no Jesus.  You are not close to Jesus.  No one is going to write words about you in any Holy Book that billions of people will read and that will never go out of print.  Recognize that even though you want to be "Like Mike," even Michael Jordan doesn't like you.  He can't, he likes himself too much too.  You are just you and you deserve not to be lied to every time somone crosses the line, that thin line that leads to your heart and past your heart, down to your soul where every slight is aimed and will surely grow to reach a length that will allow it to find its way to its intended target.

     Deny the lie and wake the sleeping from their dreams.  Dreams in which you don't rate.

     Until next time, thank you for reading.  The images in this post remain the property of their owners.  This post is in honor of the man I crossed today and sincerely and passionately apologized to and then acted in a manner in which he knew that my words had meaning, weight and truth behind them.  Thank you for waking me, I was truly asleep.

D