We asked readers to tell us the meanest thing they have done to someone and/or the meanest thing done to them. One of our favourite stories in the latter category came from reader Tim Scammell who, after talking to his son about meanness, used the Internet to find someone he had been mean to 40 years before. Here’s an edited version of his apology to his childhood chum.

Dear Ephraim

You and I were in McNicoll Public School together and I have thought about you many times over the years.

Earlier this evening I was talking to one of my 14-year-old twin sons about how mean kids can be to one other. I told T. the story of something I did to you that has stuck in my mind all these years. He told me I should look for you on Facebook, LinkedIn or Google and apologize.

I believe it took place the summer between Grades 3 and 4. It was a hot sunny day and my friend Andy and I had gone to play in the schoolyard. They had cut the grass after a long spell and we were playing around in the huge piles of clippings. We both became hot and thirsty.

I don’t know which one of us thought of it but we knew you lived just across the road. We decided to go to your house and see if you would give us something to drink.

Your mother answered the door and called you. We asked you if you wanted to come out and play. You agreed, but had to put your shoes on. Before you did that we asked you if we could have a drink.

Most likely my mind exaggerates, but I remember you giving us the biggest, coldest glasses of milk I had ever had. We finished our drinks and said we’d go outside to wait.

For the life of me I will never understand why we did this but we took off across to the schoolyard and jumped behind a huge pile of grass clippings to hide from you.

The bizarre thing is I remember that you and I were friends. We weren’t best friends but pretty good school friends. Why the heck did we do that to you?

I have a lousy memory, which drives my wife crazy, but I still have the vivid memory of watching you coming out of your front door and looking for us for a minute or two before giving up and going back in your house. I remember the feeling of guilt I had and thinking that we should go back and get you but we didn’t.

That event is one of the biggest regrets from childhood. When you think of the horrendous terrible things that some kids do to others, I guess this is minor. But I think that at that moment we made a really nice kid who welcomed us into his house and gave us a fantastic glass of milk feel bad. That was a lousy thing to do.

If this type of thing happened to one of my kids it would break my heart.

So Ephraim, 40 years later I want to say sorry. I wish we had not done that to you.

If this is all a little too weird for you I understand completely. Lol.

Take care,

Tim

The next day Ephraim emailed back, and wrote, in part.

Wow, thanks for reaching out. Big thanks to T., too. You must be proud of your boys.

Tim, your name sounds familiar. That said, I have no recollection of the event you’ve described. The fact that you have struggled with it for so long — in that way we all hopelessly struggle with regrets, reliving events we can’t change — saddens me. But I get it; we’ve all got some of those.

Your email opened up a flood of childhood memories from Canada. We moved to South Florida after the completion of Grade 4, during the summer of 1973. I lived there until college, when I moved up to the Northeastern U.S. I’ve lived up here since. My memories of early life in Canada are those of a child. I’ve been to Toronto on business multiple times over the years, but not back to North York or McNicoll Avenue.

I remember those days with such fondness. That said — there’s no denying it — we were odd birds, my family. We moved there in the late 1960s from Israel. There was no one around similar to us. I grew up feeling my foreignness. But man, I loved hockey.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

What you said in your email is very meaningful to me. Not because I remember the incident, but more because it helps me access that part of my life. I appreciate the warm spirit you and your son have shared with me.

All the best,