I have gotten a few "letters" (real letters, raggedy notes, emails, bricks with stuff painted on them) from people who for one reason or another, had a problem with me. Some of them were well deserved, and some were not. I am sure everyone has gotten at least one. So, you can color me unsurprised - it's a shade of jaded - when I got one recently. Now usually, being the hotheaded person that I am, I will fire right back, but this one, for some reason just made me feel a great deal of pity, and some surprised amusement.
Let me give you some background. My DH and I are fixing up our house so that we can move out of what has really become a war zone. It was a nice neighborhood when we moved in 23+ years ago, but has become a really bad place (TM), with over 12 murders and a few other assorted deaths in just the last 2 years, all within a mile of our home. So during the process of throwing away a huge accumulation of stuff, we found things we no longer needed, from a hobby we used to be involved in. I posted about the things on a newsgroup for the hobby, and put up the previous 2 pages of pictures of some of the amber and opals I was selling...
I got several emails asking about stuff, and a few people bought some things. Great! Then I got an email from someone who I had thought was a friend. The first email was nice enough, asking about some things we had for sale, and saying how nice it would be to get together and remember the good old times, and how they wished we would reconsider not coming back to the hobby, blah blah blah. It was an email that appeared to be from a concerned friend who would like to see us participate again! Unfortunately, when we quit the hobby, it was not under fun circumstances, and I have since decided that it was a total waste of time after looking back while totally uninvolved in it. I was pretty bitter about how my DH was treated, and had no desire to talk about something that could still make me pretty angry. So, I wrote back, explaining plainly why I didn't want to talk about it to them, or anyone else. I didn't hear back, for about a week, so I figured they had changed their mind about buying anything... Ok. No problem.
Then, I got pretty damn sick. I had an abscessed tooth, and was in total misery. I was in bed for several days. During that time, they wrote back and said ok we won't talk, but I would like to come see the stuff. Being as how I was sick, well, I hadn't even sat at the computer for a while. When I did get back to it, I read the email and was trying to figure out a time that I could meet them. Our work schedule changes every day, so it's kind of hard to make a date and time that is firm, and I hate to inconvenience people. Everyone is busy. I had finally figured out when would be good, and intended to email back when I got home, only to find... da da da... The email.
Now mind you, I am a pretty blunt person. I say what I mean. Sometimes it is not too pretty, but I am not about to sugar coat things for anyone. I am also not going to be offensive, unless you really just ask for it. I was very blunt in the email I sent, explaining why I didn't want to talk about "the good times". I laid it all out in black and white, so there was no wiggle room. I guess that my blunt email must have offended this person. A LOT. My goodness. Here was a steaming pile of vitriol that might have made anyone who is not a fairy princess concrete finisher cry. It contained this person's perspective of the stuff I had so bluntly written about in my email. The more I read, the more I snorted. I completely understand that perspective is everything, and yours is going to differ from mine, perhaps greatly. That's fine. I get it. I don't expect everyone to see things my way. I do however believe that in any given situation, the only people who know what went on are the people who were there. In the situations that were being discussed, this person was mostly not there, yet just knew that they knew the facts. The longer the email went on, the more amusing their "facts" were. The single most amusing thing was they thought I had committed some heinous act against their spouse. Of course, the act itself was not named, so I have really no clue what it might have been. I do remember very vividly things being the other way around, with said spouse being the culprit in a situation. I won't go into any detail, other than to say that I was there, and they were not. Two people know what happened :)
At any rate, this Paragon of Virtue proceeded to pretty much do their best to be spiteful, mean, and just downright nasty. I was sort of surprised at just how vicious the email was. I am not big into personal attacks. It's really just a waste of time. Telling someone that they are pretty much white trash just isn't my style, and I didn't think it was theirs either, but apparently I was wrong. According to them, I am scum. The main thing that amused me so much is that over all the years we participated in the hobby, this person was just as sweet as pie to me. People who know me well know that I am not nice to people that I don't like. I am not mean, but I do not have time to speak to people who I do not like. I do not hang out with them. I will be polite, but I don't enter into conversations, or eat dinner with them, or any of the other things that friends do. They had treated me the way I treat my friends. So I was asking myself, just how long had this person I thought was my friend hated my guts? How long had this stew of meanness been brewing?
How can someone be such a hypocrite? Why would they even write the first email, asking to get together and remember all the good old times? It was obvious to me that I had things for sale that they wanted. Fine, their money is as green as anyone's. I don't care if someone likes me or not. If they want something I have for sale, they can buy it. It's all good and the world will still revolve in the morning. There is no need to try to be nice, it's business. In fact I sold some stuff to a person who has never liked me and also never kept that fact a secret. Nobody died.... The funniest thing in the whole email was being told that they didn't want my amber. I could keep it and be buried in it for all they cared. I really hate to burst their little bubble of venom, but I would be happy to be buried in it. I am not desperate to sell any of it, I'd just rather not move it if I can get rid of it. I guess that was supposed to upset me, perhaps make me cry. The only thing it did do was make me question my judgment when selecting friends.
I really just pity them. To think that they have been carrying this hatred around for all these years. It hasn't hurt me one iota, but they have been seething inside a for a long time apparently. How sad. I hope that at least they feel better for finally getting it all out. If their intent was to hurt me, it was a big fat FAIL. I stopped caring what people think about me a long time ago, so while I am grateful to finally know the person's true feelings about me, I am certainly not hurt by it.
Life goes on... I found another huge stash of amber to sell. Maybe I should email back and see if they want pics, you think?
