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The apology letter I wrote to my mom after I threw her sourdough starter in the trash in 2019, and why I still keep it in my glovebox
Back in 2019 my mom gave me a jar of her sourdough starter that she'd kept alive for 11 years, and I shoved it in the back of my fridge in my Austin apartment and forgot about it for 4 months. When I finally opened it, it smelled like nail polish and had a layer of gray water on top, so I dumped the whole thing down the sink and tossed the jar. She asked about it at Christmas that year and I lied and said it was doing great. I wrote her a letter that night on the back of a pizza receipt, admitted I killed it, and said sorry for lying, then I folded it up and never gave it to her. What I found out later, and this is the trick that actually worked for me, is that I didn't need to write a big emotional confession to feel better. I just needed to be honest about one small thing at a time. I ended up telling her the truth 8 months later over the phone, not the letter, and she laughed and said hers had died twice that same year anyway. The letter is still in my glovebox and I read it when I feel like lying about small stuff. Anyone else write an apology they sat on for so long the person forgot the whole thing even happened?
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robins831mo ago
The glovebox thing is what gets me. Reading a letter you wrote to yourself so you don't lie about small stuff is basically a mood ring that actually works, so I get keeping it. But the part about not needing the big confession is where I'd push back a little. Writing the letter and never sending it isn't really being honest, it's just practicing. You said the phone call is what did it, and the phone call only happened because the letter sat there bugging you for 8 months. So the letter wasn't nothing, it was the thing that wore you down until you said it out loud. Your mom laughing about her own dead starters is the real lesson here, not the letter in the glovebox. Half the time we're walking around guilty about stuff the other person doesn't even remember, and we're the only ones keeping score.
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