Winning Words 9/24/09
“An apology is a good way to have the last word.” (From the cigar box) Many years ago, when I began collecting Winning Words, I kept them in a cigar box. The box has disappeared, but I came across this quote rescued from the box. Not everything that is old is out of date. Apologies still make the news. I like the definition: A word of regret. We all say regrettable things from time to time, don’t we? ;-) Jack

FROM MKH IN MICHIGAN: An Apology is always the best way to have the last word, it is a lot like confession if it us pure it wipes the slate clean gives it to God and gives the opportunity to move on. Its done let it go, try harder!! Often an Apology is the best way even if you were not wrong if it heals wounds. FROM JACK: Not accepting an apology is a problem, too...another way of having the last word. I like the comparison with confession.

FROM LG IN MICHIGAN: That's a good one, Jack! I'm glad you found it! I've never found it difficult to say I'm sorry. It is a very natural thing for me. But I've known others who find apologizing to be nearly impossible. I've seen the walls this creates in their lives...I wish they could feel the joy of unburdening themselves with guilt! FROM JACK: I'm wondering (not contradicting)...Is an apology more meaningful if it's hard to do?

FROM PRJS IN MICHIGAN: An apology is often the key to a good relationship...no one is going to live without doing things that demand an apology. FROM JACK: Yes, all have sinned...and fallen short of perfection. The old Augustana Service of Confession begins: "We poor, miserable sinners...." How's that for a way to
begin the Sunday morning worship service?

FROM MOLINER CF: Cigar boxes are cool. I had one full of marbles. Wish I had it today. It would be worth a box on wheels from Germany.

MORE FROM CF: Speaking of your WW today. I was at the lunch counter of Hickey Brothers at the corner of Brady and Second Street in Davenport one day and got up to go pay my check. As I turned to head toward the cash register, I bumped in to a coat tree with something hanging on it. "oops. Excuse me." Boy did I feel foolish. So I guess you have to be careful even when you apologize.

FROM L IN ILLINOIS: Apologies are a lost art. FROM JACK: I guess that it depends. Sometimes it's just between two people and others don't know about it. I sometimes I've read about someone in a courtroom apologizing to families who are grieving. Who's to just if an apology is sincere? Your responses usually cause me to think.

FROM GOOD DEBT JON: That wasn't true for Joe Wilson. FROM JACK: I don't presume to know the mind of Joe, or of anyone who makes an apology. Also, I don't know that a regret is the same as an apology. I suppose that the two can go together.

FROM PRFM IN WISCONSIN: Too bad you lost the cigar box . . . we lost a pill box over the weekend, but that doesn't measure up to the loss you have had. FROM JACK: The box was only a container. A good thought for the funeral that I will conduct tomorrow. I still remember stuff that the box contained....."Worry is like putting today's sun behind tomorrow's cloud....A committee is a group of people who talk for hours to produce a result known as minutes....A narrow mind and a wide mouth often go together....Church members, like autos, usually start missing before they quit."

FROM PRFM IN WISCONSIN: I once thought that my mother lived though a 'lot of history'. She was born in 1888, and died in 1992. But if I live much longer, I'll probably see more change and 'progress' then she lived through. Her world changed from horse and buggy to the jet plane and space travel. I thinking of the change in the last 20 years from early cell phones to Blackberrys etc., for one example. FROM JACK: Never would she have dreamed of throwing a pass at Lambeau Field on a day when the Packers played. And an African American president, too.