The Girl at the Pool - Part 9

My cursor was headed for the "pokes" button, I poked back all the people that had poked me. As soon as I was done, I was off back to the newsfeed, with every intention of logging off. Something stopped me, a comment from my old coach at my old school. She was telling me that she was dealing with the issue, and that I have no reason to write a response. She understood my anger, but cautioned me against writing the email. Though I am not sure of the exact timeline, I believe that my ex-partner private messaged me to say that I was putting my debating career in jeopardy, if I were to send this letter. I expected him to say this, so I didn't think anything of it. I thought however, that my old coach would be more supportive and she wasn't. I don't blame her, in fact, she may be right. Okay, okay, credits to my ex-partner too.

Alright, I obviously had to explain the circumstances to them fully. So I did, and I added that I was forced to apologize by Mr. Forman, and I implied that he needed to do something about it, just like my old coach had done for her school. Look, he made me apologize for something that was actually fairly justified, but was he going to do anything about this crazy woman who was making unjustified, false allegations against my ex-partner and I? I didn't know yet, it was already around midnight, and I didn't expect any sort of answer from him until morning. I went to bed that night with a clear conscience.

I woke up in the morning, and had a really good breakfast. I gobbled it down, despite the fact that I wasn't hungry. Then, I proceeded to logging onto Facebook. I was interested in seeing if Mr. Forman had responded or not. Surely enough, there it was; a scalding, scorching, rage-filled comment from him. He told me that my comment was "out of line" and that he hadn't "forced" me to apologize, but that that was the right thing to do! I was in utter shock. I mean, I know that he isn't an English teacher, but still, is he unaware of the meaning of the word "force"?

First of all, I don't believe that my post, or comment, was out of line. I simply responded to a person's comment with clarification for why I would need to write a response to this tournament director. Secondly, I was indeed forced to apologize. Maybe I'm retarded, but from what I know "forcing" is when you make someone do something against their will. I apologized to that woman because Mr. Forman requested it of me, not because I felt like it. Mr. Forman forced me to apologize. Regardless of whether or not apologizing was the right thing to do, I didn't want to do it, hence I was forced. Also in his comment, Mr. Forman told me that he would speak to me after the weekend about the remarks I made. I was excited. I loved getting in trouble when I was right!