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I’m fortunate to have more friends than enemies.  But I do have one or two enemies, and I’m ruthless when dealing with them.  In fact, there are certain people whom I will “attack”  if given an opportunity.  The offenses of one such guilty party are long past, but after years of enduring baloney from that person, I just can’t let go.

Nor will this person go away.  This person, my sworn enemy, will make a big noise about leaving the community, then wander right back in, be it in a matter of days, weeks or months.  I put up with it.  I try to ignore the person.  I avoid having anything to do with them….

Then suddenly, I can’t take it anymore and I attack. Not physically, but with words and wit.  I attack, Ninja-style, sneaking up, butchering a post of the enemy, and then slipping away unseen in the night.  Muahahaha.

I try not to do this. I don’t think anybody understands how much I try to pretend the enemy isn’t there.  After a while, though, my enemy gets bolder and bolder and gets “closer” to my own online footprints.  I react with territorial instinct.   My very reaction is a form of interaction with this enemy, and so starts another round of whining and finger pointing and yers truly disgracing the proverbial badge.  

Recently, my enemy posted a story that was so gawd-awful that it defied imagination.  She posted a link to it, square on my turf.  I looked at it.  I browsed the story.   I left it alone.

Then she posted on another thread that I had started. Harmless enough, maybe, but….it was the mental effect of a twig snapping behind me when I already knew I was being followed.

I attacked!!

First, I put an extra period in the URL so the link to her story wouldn’t work.  Then, I changed one strategic word in her post, substituting it with “booger.”   This wasn’t enough to appease the riled beast within, however, and I upped the ante.

I then went into the other board where the story was posted. Like the flick of a blade, I opened the “edit” button on the post.  And then I did my dirty work.  I took a story already bad and made it ridiculous.  I had random objects spontaneously burst into flames; I had characters lapsing into Dr.Suess-like ryhmes; I changed names, I made innuendos.  Best of all, I barely had to change some sections. There’s the subtle difference of a few substitute words, and some random phrases, and a few added sentences…a few crazy descriptions….and viola!  Cheap entertainment, and the mischief-maker within me is appeased at last. 

I should be ashamed at myself, but frankly I was laughing my ass off.  When I was done, I fixed the link, so that people could get to the story from the main site.  Now the casual passerby would see my enemy as a complete loon.  And they’d be correct. 

Yet, this enemy will eventually discover my deed. I’m banking on it.  And then, there will be the inevitable appeal to a higher court.  Which could potentially get me in some hot water.   I know this circular pattern, but again I can’t stop myself.  I see this person’s ID, and everything within me screams “ENEMY!!” and demands action.

My vicious - but harmless attacks - are meant to discourage this person and get them to move on.  It doesn’t work, unfortunately, and then I end up getting baited by this person’s very existence.  Ironically, the enemy is the “wronged” party in the current situation, and I’m the one out of bounds.  So the new confrontation becomes a part of the running history of antagonism. 

Will I outlast this enemy?  Or will her shadowed presence, hinging forever on the edge of my vision, drive me to such outrageous antics, that I’m the one who gets driven away?