Alan S. Oser

If I were ingenious I would choose to be an inventor. Inventors do useful things. Or, with a different kind of ingenuity, I would do crossword puzzles. That is not a useful activity, except perhaps in the likelihood that it sharpens the mind. But I don’t do crossword puzzles either.

Instead my ingenuity is most remarkable in the manufacture of excuses for oversights and poor performance. These come to me with a swiftness and unpredictability that amounts to inspiration. I am the Mozart of self-exculpation.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” I told a roomful of morose-looking bankers as a colleague and I rushed into a private dining room where they were waiting for us for lunch for half an hour. We were two editors from the real estate news department of the New York Times, and the bankers had invited us to brief them on the real estate market at a private lunch. Liveried waiters stood behind them, ready to serve, but the atmosphere was gloomy. “I couldn’t break away from a Page One editors’ meeting,” I announced.

This was a bald-faced lie. As a junior editor I did occasionally go to Page One meetings, but I had not been to one on that day. The lie nevertheless suited the occasion. A Page One meeting would have justified my rudeness, at least in my own mind. And after all, should I have told the truth? Which was that I had forgotten all about that luncheon invitation.

The invitation came at a time when banks were overstuffed with shaky mortgages. They were getting a poor press and our hosts obviously were hoping to improve matters by explaining the situation from their standpoint after feigning interest in what we had to say about the market. At the time, in the early 1980’s, some savings banks in New York were actually failing. Apartment buildings were going into foreclosure under the weight of soaring fuel costs, rent regulation and falling rent collections. The bankers too had to make excuses, and these would require, if not lies, then a strong tendency to find silver linings.

The estimable Rusty Crawford was the president of the Bowery Savings Bank at the time. The luncheon was his idea. At the table, he assured us that all would be well in the housing market before long. What actually happened before long was that the Bowery went out of business. It was taken over by another bank and Rusty was forced to retire.

The following is a list of possible excuses for arriving late for dinner dates:

“I was walking near a rose bush and brushed against it and it tore my pants. I had to go home and change.”

Personally, I have never used this as an excuse, although a real incident gave me the idea. A few years ago I tore my pants on a rose bush planted close to our host’s driveway as my wife and I approached the house en route to a dinner party. We were not late, but we were distraught by the accident, and spoke about it as soon as greetings were exchanged. This did not get the visit off on the right foot.

“Just as I left home my mother called and said she needed me immediately. She’s 85 and she’s been very sick. I had to go to her.” This does not sound entirely plausible, so it is a desirable choice only if the host knows your mother and that she can be a difficult person.

“I’m very sorry I’m late. Has anyone got an aspirin? I have a horrible headache.” Now that’s a good one. It does not require an implausible excuse, and it diverts attention from the late arrival. It permits irritation to change on the spot to sympathy. In a half hour one can say “I’m fine now,” and the party will proceed smoothly, no harm done.

The deeper issue is why excuses for one’s conduct are so frequently required. Is it because of a psychological need for reassurance from the people one deals with? The need to hear “Oh that’s all right, I assure you,” or, “It isn’t your fault at all”? Or is it because you really did screw up, you idiot.

We are now approaching the truth. The sense of perpetual, inexplicable screwing-up requires the invention of excuses. Though they may be of little use if offered to those who know our tendency well and have been victimized by it already, they may postpone the enlightenment of strangers about this aspect of our character.

Before there come excuses for bad behavior there must come silence about our undesirable proclivities. When interviewing for a job, it is neither necessary nor wise to inform your possible employer of your tendency to oversleep in the morning, to miss appointments, to get sick, to gossip, to take criticism badly, and to utter ill-advised comments in the presence of your employer’s customers.

Once you have won the job through a well-judged silence, however, the need to have shrewd excuses at the ready will shortly become obvious. Here are some suggestions for the oversleep problem, all starting with the generic line, “I’m sorry I’m late, I“: 1. “. . . had to work very late last night.” 2. “. . . had to stay up all night with our daughter – she couldn’t stop throwing up.” 3. “. . . got caught in an impossible traffic jam.” 4. “. . . couldn’t find my car keys.” 5. “. . . had a family emergency.” 6. “. . . thought today was Sunday.”

That last one should be used with a little laugh, indicating that you realize it’s a joke, intended to avoid a truthful explanation. Since all of the other explanations are suspect as prevarications, the “Sunday” line, delivered with an appropriate chuckle, may in certain circumstances be the best solution of all, since it is a prevarication intended to be understood as one.

In most cases, however, an attempt at humor is the worst possible ploy when an excuse for bad behavior is called for. You may think that you are being witty if you tell a customer, in the presence of your employer, “We’ve been late filling orders so many times in the past that we should be able to get it right this time.” You will be wrong. Blank stares will confirm that only the words “late filling orders” will have registered.

When called on the carpet by the boss for this statement after the customer has canceled his order, the only possible response is “I’m very sorry, I don’t know why I said such an untrue thing, it won’t happen again.” Indeed it won’t with this nasty employer, since you will be getting fired. But at least you will have given yourself a chance at forgiveness. This will not be the case if you laugh off your comment with, “I guess that guy took me seriously, eh?”

In principle, it need hardly be said, honesty is the best policy. Moreover, a reputation for honesty enhances the chances of success at prevarication. My task is not to preach the obvious virtues of honesty, but to provide counsel on intelligent prevarication.

The intelligent policy is to use the lie as an excuse sparingly, when no other choice seems possible, and when the consequences of being found out are acceptable. Good luck to you. With any luck, I will soon find another job myself.