A Formal Apology, Offered in Good Faith and Roughly Chronological Order

To Whom It May Concern (and you all concern me, deeply, which is part of the problem):

I want to begin by saying that I am sorry. Genuinely. From the bottom of whatever is left of my heart after this week, which, and I want to be transparent about this, was not entirely my fault, though I acknowledge that the parts that were my fault were significantly my fault.

I am sorry, first, for the misunderstanding at the restaurant. I should not have told the waiter it was your birthday. I don't know why I did it. The moment felt like it needed something, and "it's his birthday" was the first thing that came to mind. You are not sixty-two years old, and in retrospect, the staff should not have been informed otherwise. The sash was too much. I see that now.

I am sorry that in fleeing the birthday situation, I reversed the car into the parking structure's ticket booth. This was an accident. What was not an accident was telling the booth attendant that the car belonged to my gynecologist. I don't have a satisfying explanation for that. I gave him a name. The name was wrong. These things happen under pressure.

I am sorry to my gynecologist, separately, for what came next.

When the parking authority called the number on the registration, which was, in fact, my number, because I had forgotten I told them it was my gynecologist's car, a detail I now recognize as a flaw in the plan, I should have simply explained the situation. Instead, I explained a different situation, one involving a catering company, a misrouted shipment of decorative garden gnomes, and a clause in an event contract that I invented on the spot and described with what I can only call alarming specificity. The gnomes are not real. There is no contract. I don't know why I said "gnomes." I was nervous.

I am sorry to the catering company whose name I used. I chose it because I had seen their van that morning and it stuck in my head. I did not anticipate that the parking authority would call them. I did not anticipate that they would be so cooperative, or that their actual event coordinator, a woman named Josie, who I understand is very thorough, would spend four hours trying to locate a gnome shipment in their system before escalating to her regional manager. Josie, if this reaches you - you did nothing wrong. You are, by all accounts, exceptional at your job. That is almost the entire problem.

I am sorry to the regional manager, who drove to the venue. There was no venue.

I had given them an address. It was the address of an OB/GYN office. This brings us, regrettably, back to my gynecologist.

Dr. Fredrickson, I am sorry. I am sorry that three people showed up at your practice on a Thursday afternoon asking about garden gnomes. I am sorry that when your receptionist called me to report this, I told her I would "look into it," which she reasonably interpreted as me being somehow affiliated with the situation in an official capacity. I am sorry that she introduced me to the regional manager as someone who would "look into it," and that I then, rather than correcting this impression, asked for a notepad and wrote several things down. I do not know why. I just felt it was important to write something.

I am sorry that the notepad was, apparently, a prescription pad.

I did not prescribe anything. I want to be clear. I merely wrote the words "ongoing" and "will follow up" and a small star, which I now understand reads, in context, as deeply medical. Nothing was dispensed. No one's health is at risk. The star was decorative.

To the parking authority, the catering company, Josie, the regional manager, Dr. Fredrickson, his receptionist, the restaurant staff who sang to you as you stared into your watered down whiskey sour while wearing a birthday sash - I am sorry.

To you, specifically: I am sorry about the sash. I am sorry about the car. I am sorry that you found out about the rest of it the way you did, which was, I'll admit, not ideal, and I am sorry that "not ideal" is how I'm choosing to describe it, which I can see from your expression is not landing the way I intended.

I love you. I think the gnomes were a mistake. I am working on being someone who, when a moment needs something, does not immediately say "it's his birthday" and see where that takes us.

It took us here.

I am sorry about here.

— Me

P.S. If Josie wants a reference, I would genuinely give her one. Five stars. Thorough.