Apologies

The Mystery within

I owed an apology for a curt phone message I left in exasperation because a message I left the previous evening wasn’t returned by the following morning.  I then continued to stew about that while taking my puppy Oliver for a quick walk and found myself exceedingly impatient with his antics.  And then I suddenly felt and saw the ugly in me.  I did not want to be ugly, but there it was.  It was an uncomfortable but ultimately rewarding revelation.

And when Oliver and I came in the door my phone message light was flashing and the caller left a lengthy list of reasons she why she did not return my call sooner.   I called her back, left a third message; now contrite, with a brief explanation that I am having twelve people for dinner tonight and that it has me anxious and pressed for time.  And then she called me back, I apologized again and she said, “Don’t worry about it, we’ve all been there.”  He words transformed my ugly into connection and communion.

A Richard Rohr daily meditation excerpt titled “Becoming Who You Are, A Riverbed of Mercy” helped me appreciate my caller’s and my interaction.  

…”There is a part of you that is patient with both goodness and evil, exactly as God is.  There is a part of you that does not rush to judgment or demand closure now.  Rather, it stands vigilant and patient in the tragic gap that almost every moment offers. …It is awareness itself (as opposed to judgment itself), and awareness is not, as such, “thinking.”

What if, when we really need it, we could all hear, “Don’t worry about it, we’ve all been there.”