Oops!
Isay “oops” a lot. And even when I don’t say it out loud, I think “oops” a lot. Every slip of the tongue, every misstep and every misplaced item is an oops. I must say it a hundred times every day, probably more, and it’s partly a way of saying “pardon me,” I stepped in front of you and should have let you go first. Some people say “my bad” instead of oops, and my Spanish-speaking friends say “disculpe” which has similar roots with exculpate, the legal term for relieving someone of blame. These are such frequent things to say and there are so many ways to say them because we are so often mistaken, or to blame, or just plain wrong. It’s why pencils have erasers and oops is always on the tips of our tongues. And not to be too harsh about it. Oops is sometimes “oopsy daisy,” the more playful rendition of “oops” when we mean that we’ve made a mistake but it doesn’t amount to much, or when we’re trying to help the child who just tripped and we think they’re on the verge of tears. When we have really messed up it requires more than saying “oops” or “my bad.” When we have really made a mess of things or done something horrible which hurts someone deeply we need to beg their forgiveness, and this may require sincere words of apology and a fair amount of groveling. Oops isn’t so much an apology as trying to erase the errant mark on the page. Oops!
