People You Meet...

... through your interactions on the Internet, mainly message boards.

Through the years, I met and continue to meet some wonderful people through interactions on a variety of message boards. It's been great to meet them face to face through the years. I had the pleasure this week and two weeks ago to see some of them All my interactions with message board members have always been pleasant and good. When I sign off, I always have a smile on my face. Yes, there a times when there are unpleasant happenings on the board. My rule is if I don't have anything pleasant to say for all to read walk away. It's a joy to get email from the friends I've made.

In the last several months, I got to experience my first unpleasant encounter . Very heartbreaking for me as this is the first time negativity has come my way through the internet. And I'm not talking about spam. In the beginning, I thought it would be another great friendship in the making. Things were going fine the first couple of weeks. While on a short vacation in September, I got trashed (yes, I travel with a laptop). No explanation. No apologies. I wrote a very angry email. Maybe the individual did not like me responding to the trashing by copying two mutual friends about the individual's behavior. Maybe I should have kept the correspondence between the two of us. I just couldn't because I knew I would get no reponse. I did get a response from the friend I copied. That was so very sweet. She did warn me early on that the individual was not a great correspondent. To date, no response whatsoever.

As we hang on the same web sites, I tried to keep out of the individual's way. I tried to keep the mail between the two of us to minimum. I've kept the riff between us private so unpleasantness is not spread to others. Opinions and feelings I have about the person does not need to be spread by me. Hopefully the other party has, too. Who knows how the other party has handled our riff?

Well, it seems I stepped over the line this week again and badly stomped on those toes. Yes, I could not help myself. I wrote to the individual and ruffle some of feathers. I responded back and ruffled some more. I could not keep my trap shut and responded again. I got this statement in my mail today

"You had your moment [...] and were found wanting and even now you still find ways to poke and prod people into irritation."

This did not leave a good taste in my mouth . It bothered me on and off today. That's why there's even a blog. I'm a person who tries her best to leave all interactions on a positive note. I provide help and advice and even try to share a smile or two. I must be leaving a bad taste in several people's mouths for the individual to say I'm "prod[ding] people into irritation". It's been a long, long, long time, I don't remember how long, that I've been found "wanting" and "irritating". I've always gotten the opposite opinion.

I think I'm finally getting the message to stay out of the way of them toes and the rest of the body. However, I'm not giving this being the satisfaction of removing myself from the web sites we have in common. Nope, I enjoy the web sites too much and have made friends there.

This is one friendship I do not need. I'm not the loser in this interaction.