There is no sorry to be sorry for.

*Submitted and read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

I'm sorry my husband has a such a small penis.
No, wait ... I'm no longer married to him. I take that back. I'm sorry for his new girlfriend.

*Submitted at and read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

I am sorry for not properly saying goodbye when I moved out & for leaving you a whole year's worth of NY Times newspapers to take to recycling. And I'm sorry for inflicting my pain in the ass boyfriend on you all year (and for having to endure yours).

*Submitted at and read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

I'm sorry I flew all the way from L.A. to see this shitty show.
-- Scot

*Submitted at and read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

I'm sorry I think I'm fat.
-- Helga

*Submitted at and read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

I am sorry I'm not excited about my mom's remarriage.

*Submitted at and read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

I apologize sincerely, deeply, GUT-WRENCHINGLY that I did not vote in 2000.

*Submitted at and read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

I feel that I can't control my emotions and I lash out at you often. You are the one person who has remained by me and said I love you - but even with that I continue to push you away. I get angry and then embarrassed and then even more upset because I'm 'this way'. Not sure why you stay. Not sure what I would do without you. You would be better off without me, with someone who actually made you feel like a good person - but I won't leave you. I can't. I'm selfish. I need you so badly, but apparently not enough to stop fighting.

I'm sorry.
*Read at The Apologies show on 4/6/07*

I'm sorry for offering you my wiener.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/31/07*

I'm sorry that I told you things would be ok...that you weren't over reacting and that at some point he would turn around. I'm sorry that I kept telling you it was his fault and not yours....I'm sorry that I agreed with you when you said its not you that he doesn't want its that he cant have a relationship. I'm sorry because he may be cuter then you and I am really sorry that I agreed with you that his Ex's were ugly because that was a lie. I'm sorry that I gossiped about it and we all laughed about how dumb you were because you can't see that men walk all over you and you like it. I'm sorry that I didn't say sooner that you need to grow a pair and maybe look at the inside of a person instead of the outside because inevitably the pretty ones will always break your heart.
*Read at The Apologies show on 4/6/07*

I'm sorry, black people, for the way some white people have treated you.
I apologize to the descendants of slaves for the terrible way your anscestors were treated, and for the effect it had on subsequent generations of your family.
And I apologize for Jim Crow.
I hope some day soon we can move forward from here as members of the HUMAN race.
*Read at The Apologies show on 4/6/07*

I dropped a bench on your foot in elementary school while we were moving it across the room for a party. It slipped and a leg slammed down on your toe. There was blood everywhere - no idea how it did so much damage. I ran away crying I felt so bad. Later your friend James found me and offered me some cake. He told me you were okay. And you were.

I still feel quite bad about this moment that probably no one remembers but me. I'm sorry.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

Sorry I fucked your roommate. He was nicer to me though and better looking.

*Read at The Apologies show on 4/5/07*

Sorry for saying sorry all the time. It makes the word less valuable and has now become just some sort of automatic response like, "How are you?" as you pass someone in the hall - not stopping to hear the answer.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

I'm sorry I didn't tell you why I broke up with you. I was a coward. Still am.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

To a roomate I still sadly hate.

Before you told me you were moving out, I planned to inject small amounts of urine into your mattress once or twice a week. My hope was that the smell would slowly arise over a matter of months. I hated you so much, but something stopped me from doing this to you.

I'm sorry for almost taking it that far. I guess I could say that you brought that type of behaviour out of me - but I think I can be pretty shitty at times. So, I'm sorry.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

Dear Step Mother,

When I was 12, you pissed me off and I did things that I regret. One day I got so mad at you that I snuck into your bathroom and poured melted butter into your foundation to make your face break out. I am also sorry that I poured rubbing alcohol into your contact solution. I regret these things so very much, because if I had only known that you were sleeping with my father's best friend, I would have done far worse.

*Read at The Apologies show on 4/5/07*

Hello self, you could have been more.
Sorry I let you down. I went for sex, drugs, and hair metal instead of books and shit. Now i'm strungout, overweight, and lonely.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/31/07*

I'm sorry I get jealous when I see pictures of you with guys that aren't me.
I can't help it, I'm a man, direct descendant of a cave dweller. My troglodytic jealous flares up and all goes blurry.. and red... I apologize, but I am taking steps to not be so typically male.

Please try to make one small concession for me though, and show me pics of you with other girls instead?

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

I'm sorry Hallmark corporation, for being one of the mindless devotees to your product. Ooh how cute! A fuzzy bunny card for easter! Much better than the Mel Gibson bleeding Christ box of chocolates! I coo and coddle over each new fabricated holidays' paper greetings, as if a phone call or a personal visit weren't enough.

I am sorry forbelieving in you, and keeping you in business.

*Read at The Apologies show on 4/5/07*

if there is one apology in the world it's this one for me.
i'm sorry for not trying to make it better than it could have been, and for trying to make it more than it was. you'll always be that one that got away, and i couldn't wish for you closer.

*Read at The Apologies show on 4/5/07*

Damn, i'm so sorry i told you I liked your band. I was underpressure, had too much to drink, no, fuck that. i just straight lied to you man. take it like it was meant. your band is awful. i'd rather listen to new country. sorry i was shifty about it. i should have just told you instead of being fake like everyone else. well fuck it i say, i'm no longer like them all. i just told you how it is..... in an email

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

Hey Geordie, it's been awhile. Hopefully you'll actually read thisunlike the last 4 emails, 2 pieces of certified post, and 1 skywritingescapade. I wanted to tell you first off, that i seem to be cured, andsecondly how truly sorry i am. If i had known she was your Aunt, iwouldn't have looked at her that way, i swear. I know, it may seemempty, considering what happened betwixt your sister and I, but youknow as well as I do that most cultures consider her extremeflexibility an open invitation to the carnal carnival. at any rate,i'm sorry, my doctor and my priest seemed to have cured me of myproblems. i hope to see you in church, please give my best (no notlike that.. again) to your mother Beatrice, she was/is a trulyoutperforming woman.
*Read at The Apologies show on 4/6/07*

I'm an apology addict. Case in point: one time I said "Oh my God, I'm so sorry" to a friend when I interrupted our conversation by sneezing. As I'm sure you're aware, this sorry-excuse for a "sorry" and others like it taint bigger, more serious "sorries." Luckily, I have come up with a solution to my problem. Instead of saying "sorry" after small mishaps or things beyond my control, which I have no buisness saying "sorry" for anyway, I now say, "kittens." You can't not smile when you either say or hear the word "kittens." Go ahead. Try it. You'll thank me later. (But if it doesn't work...kittens!)

--Claudia

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/30/07*

I'm sorry that I told all of the deacons in the church that you were gay. I'm sure they already knew, but coming from your wife, man...that's confirmation.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/31/07*

Terry, when we were both 12, you used to terrorize our neighborhood as the self-proclaimed Bully of 56th Street. Remember that? I sure do. And remember that day I'd had enough and decided to take a swing at ya to stop all the fighting? Yeah, well, I was 12 and less adept at face-punching than you were--if you'll recall, as I'm sure you do every day when you look in the mirror, instead of a nice clean pop on the cheek, I managed to just swipe your eyeball with my fingernail, leaving you with a bleeding, and very scratched cornea. I'm sorry about that, Terry. I really am. I wish to this day that I had actually clobbered you properly. It was my first punch, you see, and it's a missed opportunity that haunts me still. Seems to me that things were different after that. You calmed down a little, maybe you even moved away. I stopped noticing. But, I hope you learned your lesson that day, Terry. There were a lot of frightened little kiddies who dreaded that walk to the bus because of you and your reign of terror as the Bully of 56th Street. Anyway, I sure hope you're sorry.
*Read at The Apologies show on 4/7/07*

I'm sorry for lying every single day. I do it for work, in an attempt to fit in among the people with whom I am forced to network, but it makes my stomach drop every time. I hope it doesn't make me able to lie as easily in other areas of my life. So to all the people to whom I've said that I do or don't watch a particular show they want to talk about, or who have heard me acknowledge the greatness of a book I've never read, or to whom I've said the words, "I know; I just love Maroon 5!"--I'm sorry.

*Read during The Apologies show on 3/29/07*

sometime last month, but six years ago last month, you phoned me and i didn't return your call. it was my last chance to make a difference - a difference to you.

did you feel that no one would understand? did you think that i wasn't someone you could come to with your worries or saddness or frustrations about the way your life was working out? did you phone a lot of people that month or the months before and did none of them return your call? did any of them understand?

it's frightening to think that you were left alone with your choice and no one knew what you were going through. i am so thankful for the time that you spent in my life and i wish i would have let you know that. you helped me so much as my doctor but i didn't return the favour. if i'd have returned you call it might have made a difference, i could have returned the favour, and maybe you wouldn't have made the choice you did and end your life.

i'm still sorry, six years later, and i don't know how or when i'll learn to stop being sorry for something i might not have been able to change. it's the 'might' that torments me, and it's the 'might' that keeps me sorry.

Dear Betsey the chicken,

When we bought the farmhouse in 1993, all the otherbuildings on the property, including your chicken coop,became ours. Because the previous owners were unwillingshove you in a pet carrier for the long drive up to Vermont,you, like your coop, became ours. It must have been hard tobe passed onto our family, treated like the old tools leftin the barn. Although my mother, who rejoices in St Francis,would talk to you and pet you, I ignored you completely. Asa self-centered 13-year-old, I could only find it in myheart to hate you, and for this I apologize.

I was so embarrassed of you because, even though SouthWindsor, CT is a rural town, the “livestock” peopleowned were more along the lines of Golden Retrievers andbeta fish. Instead of rejoicing in your uniqueness as a pet,I thought having a chicken was “lame and stupid.” Whatdo we need a chicken for when there’s a Stop-and-Shop inthe town center?! I protested to my parents.

When the kids on the bus called me “Chicken Girl,” Ishould have defended you. But at the time all I did wasglare as I marched down the driveway before slamming thescreen door to the house.

I’m not sure if you knew, since you never saw the insideof the house, but I also refused to eat your eggs. Althoughmy mother swore they were the most delicious (and obviouslymost fresh) eggs that had ever touched Teflon, I would skewup my face at the thought of something that came from yourbutt.

Now, I know you were just living your chicken life the onlyway you could. You never did anything to purposely embarrassme and I’m sorry I not only rejected YOU, but the wholeidea of chickenness. And like the honorable beast you were,you went on laying a single egg every morning, never showingthe deep hurt I inflicted upon you.

So, Betsey, I’m sorry. I would give anything to watch youbobbing for grubs in our backyard or to hold one of yourbutt-warm eggs in my hands again. I hope you’ve got a nicecoop up in Heaven.

Love,
Catherine
*Read at The Apologies show on 4/7/07*