“Apologies” for the Past-- with a Conniving Twist

On my way to work two days ago, I was obviously reading the iPhone version of the New York Times that I had so brilliantly pre-loaded before my subway went underground. In the section that hosts the “Most Popular” articles, I touched the article on the top of the list. Turns out it was about Anita Hill, the woman who, in 1991, accused Supreme Court Justice-to-be Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment. She testified under oath that he had subjected her to comments of sexual and pornographic nature. Thomas still managed to receive the nomination to the United States’ highest court, but his ordeal with Hill has perhaps forever tainted the opinions many Americans hold toward him.

So in case you’ve been living under a rock for the past couple of days (I don’t think any of my readers are starfish or worms, but who knows...) let me inform you that Hill was back in the news because of another interesting situation. Apparently she arrived to work at Brandeis University one morning last week, only to find a voicemail waiting from Thomas’s wife, Virginia. Virginia had decided that one morning at 7:30am just 19 years after her husband’s battle against Hill would be a good time to call Hill to “make amends.” Hill, upset and concerned for obvious reasons, called campus police who later informed the FBI. But, like any girl would, she made the situation explode even further: she also called The New York Times to let them listen to the message.

“Good morning Anita Hill, it’s Ginni Thomas,” she said in the message. “I just wanted to reach across the airwaves and the years and ask you to consider something. I would love you to consider an apology sometime and some full explanation of why you did what you did with my husband.”

She went on to tell Thomas to “have a good day.”

If I were reading that out of context, I’d have assumed that Thomas were asking Hill to apologize for something that happened yesterday or maybe the day before, but not nineteen years ago. I also would have thought (rather, hoped) that someone married to someone as much in the spotlight as a Supreme Court Justice might have a little more tact and understanding in terms of which battles to pick and when.

As I went to bed that night watching the news, I realized that this situation wasn’t going to blow overly so quickly and that Virginia’s message is still reaching “across the airwaves.” Yet another newscaster was providing their commentary on the story. Now, let’s be honest. Virgina must have been able to predict that her message would have become public, and she certainly couldn’t have thought that Hill would have kept the instance private. She had to have known that this would become a rather large and well-known scandal in itself.

At least in my eyes, this is the classic scenario of not only girl-to-girl bullying, but also a pathetic cry for attention on the part of Virginia. (Likewise, we could probably argue that to some extent Hill was vying for attention by publicising the occurrence.) I would have hoped that women of their age could have matured enough to avoid not only such a public spectacle, but a public spectacle nineteen years after beginning.

But, here’s what it boils down to: sometimes apologies (or some semblance of an apology to some degree) come when you least expect it. Maybe both women were instigating their own drama, but the situation shows that people revisit the past when the timing seems unusual or random. No one knows what triggered this event, perhaps marital problems between the Thomas’s, but what matters is that the Hill-Thomas situation was revisited and, even though it involves two prominent women, they still managed to slide in a conniving and girly twist. Apparently I was wrong in thinking that women grow up. Figures.

You Ended It, Now YOU Move On.

At one point or another, most of us have been there: we’ve been broken up with. We know what it’s like to feel torn apart at the seams, and we suddenly recognize what our old stuffed animal felt like back in 1989 after we chewed him apart a little too much. Maybe it feels as if life will never be the same since that person who played such an important role will now be out of the picture. Maybe we feel hopeless-- will I ever find someone to love me as much as he or she did?

Oftentimes when someone breaks up with us they shoot off a barrage of excuses. “I just want to be young and party unattached” or “I’m just not at a place in my life where I can have someone else relying on me.” Truth of the matter is that, yes, maybe your significant other is telling it straight. Or, if you know me, you know that I always refer back to the basic premise of my favorite book: maybe, just maybe, he’s just not that into you. A lot of the time we don’t know why exactly someone chose to end things with us, especially when we haven’t done something especially wrong or offensive. It doesn’t take an episode of cheating to make someone want to make a swift exit from the relationship. Sometimes it just happens, for whatever reason, and the person ending it doesn’t provide a proper explanation. It sucks but it happens. We all deal with this.

So maybe the person doesn’t give us a good explanation as to why they’re ending things. Perhaps the breakup leaves us wondering what we did wrong or how we could have salvaged the relationship. At one point or another, though, I hope that we all come to the same conclusion: it’s over, it will be over forever, and there’s not a heck of a lot that we can do to change it. I know it sounds pessimistic (and it actually is) but hey, that’s reality. Can’t spend our lives chasing something we really shouldn’t have. As my roommate explained, “In some situations you realize that you wasted just way too much energy on something to make it work when, in reality, it was no longer worth the fight but it takes a bad break up to make you realize it.”

So months later, when you finally get over it, something interesting inevitably happens: your ex comes crawling back. Now I’m not suggesting that it ALWAYS happens, but, a good chunk of the time when things ended expectantly, it does. Usually it’s when you least expect it, like you’re sitting at your desk at work on a Thursday at 4pm and-- oh hey-- one new email in your inbox. Your heart stops because, well, that name hasn’t appeared in your inbox in months!

Sometimes, in the worst of situations, it’s in public. An ex might approach you when other people are around, just so that you feel the need to be a polite and proper person and actually have a conversation. Or, unfortunately, sometimes an ex isn’t so kind. In the case of my roommate, her ex-boyfriend isn’t even attempting to put on a gentlemanly act. Rather, he’s resorted to the oh-so-mature behavior of public embarrassment, screaming at her across the room at parties and talking trash behind her back to all of her friends. Now, if he’s not embarrassing HIMSELF in public, I don’t know who is. Hello, YOU made the mistake, and now you’re taking it out on her, right after she’s gotten over you? I say let him keep shouting and making scenes. Pretty soon other people besides us will realize that he’s beating himself up for what he did and trying to place the blame on her!

As Bob Dylan sang, "I ain't sayin' you treated me unkind.You could have done better but I don't mind.You just kinda wasted my precious time." Sometimes, we just have to look back on things and realize that, yes, maybe we think we wasted some of our time, but everything usually works itself out well. We learned from our past relationships (I hope!) and, believe it or not, the person who wrongfully ended them (if that’s the case) usually learns their lesson as well, as evidenced by the ones who come crawling back. After all, isn’t it nice to realize that we’re living in the present while an ex who hurt us so much in the past is still living in it?

My Advice? Move on to the next one!

I’m not a tough person. I cry in the shower when a coworker makes a nasty comment. I endlessly replay situations where a friend issues me a backhanded compliment.

When it comes to dating, though, I’m pretty tough. Let’s put it this way: if you’re coming to me for advice regarding a guy who just isn’t treating you well, I’m not going to sugarcoat it and tell you that maybe, sweetie, he’s just going through a tough time. I refuse to allow your pretty little mind to think that, yes, it’s acceptable that he won’t label you as his girlfriend or show you off to his friends.

Know why? Because it’s not. Nope, not acceptable at all.

So after he finally breaks up with you (or you’re lucky enough to break up with him) I’m not going to be sympathetic when you keep running back to him. You miss him—I get it. It’s downright painful to cutoff all ties with someone who you’d text midday from the bookstore because you saw something they’d like. You’re probably used to checking on him during his lunch break at work and maybe he called you every night before bed.

But listen, sister, a breakup is just that: a BREAKUP. Don’t you even think of running back to his cozy bed dressed in plaid, unwashed sheets. You can do better—at the very least you can sleep in your own WASHED sheets— and you know it.

Whenever an applicable situation comes up I like to reference one of my favorite books of all time, He’s Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys by Greg Behrendt. (Please note that I’m not talking about the movie with the same title. It was based off the book but failed to sufficiently convey the book’s messages accurately.)

Anyway, this summarizes my above-referenced feelings, which some might perceive as my nasty-bitch side, to a T:

Breakups, I've heard, are supposed to be just that. Breaks. Hard, clean breaks. No talking, no seeing, no touching ... keep your hands to yourself. The relationship is over. Half the people I know move after a huge breakup, and frankly that makes perfect sense to me. You're not supposed to sleep with the guy who just broke your heart a week ago. Fine. Next time I'm in this situation I'll cry. Stay in bed and wail. Go to the gym if I can. Call all my friends and burden them with my misery. Sleep too much. Cry some more. See my therapist more often. Get a puppy. Do whatever I have to so eventually I can move on. –He’s Just Not That Into You

So what if you get that, you’re following the rules and not talking to him, and he’s the one calling you to tell you that he ate a fabulous corned beef sandwich on rye with spicy mustard, ran an amazing 4.667 miles and, oh yea, by the way, he misses you, baby?

Yes, he broke up with you, but he’s still the one running back for comfort. He made the conscious decision to not be with you, but he still feels like it’s alright to call to ask you about your day.

I have no explanation for why this happens, but it seems to happen frequently. Really, a lot. Now I never advocate for retaliation (it’s better just to let things go and, as idealistic as this might sound, “be the bigger person”) but sometimes it’s best to in your own way dig it back to him.

Don’t answer his calls. Don’t run out when he emails asking to meet at Starbucks to catch up. Allow him to miss you, to consider what he gave up. Certainly don’t rerun your dramatic relationship ending where he called you fat and you told him that his member was small over and over. Don’t wish him anything bad or even be rude or short to him. Just don’t. It’s not worth your time.

Over time, I’ve learned that the sooner we let go of these freaks, the ones who treat us poorly and forget that they can’t just have us anytime they so please, the sooner we’ll get closer to finding Mr. Right. I’m not saying that we’ll ever find Mr. Perfect, but with each bad egg we crack, that’s one down and we’re one person closer to discovering someone kind and compassionate.

So, if nothing more, remember this: the next time a guy blows you off for balcony seats at an NBA game, consider what he really means to you and, more importantly here, what you mean to him. I mean, really, he’s not even ditching you for courtside seats, but balcony seats? Come on! Move on.

XOXO,
R.