The apology

Unexpectedly, on Sunday, I received an email from the Saturday lunch date gone wrong guy (Scott). It moves him from the dumb jerk category to the decent but misguided (and NOT for me) category.

He wrote:

Subject: Apology

I find that the price of being a knowitall is that you have to apologize when you do not in fact know it all. Hence this note.

First I am sorry for being so insistent on the substance abuse issue. Second I was wrong about [work related topic]. It did receive [certain type of funding]* (in fact the deal would have tanked if [the local agency] had not gotten the grant).

In any event, best of luck.

Scott

*Editor's note: I said the local agency in question got a certain kind of funding from my Federal Agency. Scott flatly denied it. I was right.

My response:

Hey Scott,

Thanks for writing. Apology accepted. If I could have figured a way out of that conversation, I would have.

It's funny, I'd completely forgotten about the [work related topic] thing.

Best of luck to you too.

Jamy

I give him credit for having the courage and conscience to write this. Good for him. I still don't want to see him again, but it helps expurge most of the negative feelings about the date. I really do wish him the best.

It's a little thing, making an apology in this situation, but it made a big difference to me. I'll remember that the next time I owe someone an apology.

Grateful for: apologies.