Happy Birthday July 29, 2012

 

I won’t feign innocence. I knew perfectly well how pissed off she would be the moment I texted her “Happy Birthday.”

 Mary Ann, my west coast poet friend who’d known me since we went to kindergarten together tried to talk me out of it. But she also knew how enraged I had been over the arrogance in the Forgiveness poem.

I figured I’d take this one last shot to get even before complying with her list of rules.

Two simple and ironic words and I’d be done.

I never expected the deluge of text messages back, not from her, but from other people, one who claimed to be her step mother, another her father (no he isn’t dead), and two others, one of which I later learned from tracing the phone number, was her brother or at least his phone.

Her brother struck first:

Brother: So, you want to talk to someone? I’m free for a chat.

Father: So, you wanna chat. We can chat. Bring it on.

It took me a moment to connect these with her, though I could not imagine at first who they were, though the “wanna chat” sounded like a sexual come on, no doubt some kind of trap looking to get me to respond in a provocative way. I responded to both with:

Me: Who are you?

The responses when they came came in spurts, one caller, then the next, although it was clear that each knew what the other had said to me and what I had texted back.

I assumed they were all different people, not yet clear as to who they were and how they were connected to her, eventually connecting them to members of her family since that’s where she would have gone to celebrate her birthday.

FATHER:  Who are you? (asking my own question back).

Brother: Who the hell do you think you are?

ME: (intrigued by the attack and unable to treat them seriously and responded to her brother: I’m just an ordinary guy.

Then to her father, I said, “Don’t send me any more messages.”

BROTHER responded back: Ordinary people don’t harass other people. So maybe you should take your own advice.

Me: I don’t harass anybody.

BROTHER: Let’s keep it that way.

ME: you should stop harassing me.

BROTHER: You shouldn’t preach what you don’t listen to

ME: You don’t know what you’re talking about. Stop sending me messages.

BROTHER: Look, it’s very simple. You stop messaging her and we’ll stop messaging her. She’s not alone.

ME: She’s never alone.

Meanwhile, her father chimed in pretty much at the same time as her brother

FATHER: If you don’t, I won’t. (meaning messages)

ME: I didn’t send you any messages. I simply responded to yours. I don’t even know who you are.

FATHER: You shouldn’t be contacting certain people at any time, especially on their birthdays.

ME: tough – I mostly avoid that person. But you should mind your own business.

(I was getting a bit pissed, still uncertain as to whether I was talking to one person or two, and if they might both be her pretending to be other people)

FATHER: It would be best if you did, too (meaning mind my own business)

ME: Don’t tell me what to do. I don’t know who you are, and I don’t care. You’re just another victim. (assuming one or both might actually be her boyfriend) So I’ll forgive your foolishness. You’re learn your lessons the hard way, from her, not from me.

FATHER: As her father I would take extreme exception to your words. By the way, are you high right now? Cause you’re talking crazy.

(at this point I began to suspect she was doing the texting, because of her allusion a muscle relaxer I had used after a serious fall in a supermarket parking lot.

ME:  Thank you for the information. I still forgive you for harassing me. I actually thought you might be her friend. Peace. I won’t wish your daughter any more happy birthdays. She’ll have to invent someone else to be her stalker since I never was one in the first place.

(There came a brief delay and then the next response seemed to support my belief this was her, not her father.

FATHER: This is awesome. Keep it coming. This is great evidence. Thank you. So, by all means, send away.

(this passage alluded to a text I had just sent to her brother in the alternate conversation which went on almost simultaneously to this one during which he or she said they would continue to send me texts and I said, “Send away.” The father’s message also alludes to something his daughter said about collecting evidence against her New York stalker, using his texts against him – although I strongly suspect what she showed me had been edited).

ME: (to her father) You need evidence because your daughter’s case is weak, especially when it is primarily her talking poems from my blog and calling them harassment.

FATHER: LOL

(Meanwhile, to her brother:

ME: Send away. No one is harassing her. She comes to my website. I don’t send anything to her but work press releases, and I have a full record of all of those. the birthday wish was the first personal message I have sent to her in six weeks – except for one about our former temporary boss – and I have a record of those as well.

BROTHER: Nice try, Al

ME: I’ll show you my email record any time.

BROTHER: Don’t send any more messages.

ME: I don’t; I haven’t since early June. She gets my stuff from my blog and most of it isn’t even about her.

BROTHER: You don’t seem to get it, friend. Don’t send any messages to her.

ME: You don’t get it friend. I don’t send her message. But I wouldn’t let you tell me not to even if I did.

(At this point it felt as if I was talking to one of her boyfriends rather than directly to her)

ME: The only messages she gets from me are work related.

BROTHER: Don’t send her any messages (then repeated) Don’t send her any message, end of story.

(At this point, he or she threatened to come to my house)

Do you get my meaning? I’m not your friend. You did message her today and you need to stop that immediately, simple, end of story.

(He or she said they would unveil all the evidence they had and spread it around)

ME: And I could share all the stuff she shared with me. Don’t contact me again. I agree not to contact her anymore.

BROTHER: Share anything you want. My message isn’t going to change. (There were continued back and forth talking about my “Happy Birthday.”) That wasn’t work related, was it? So, it’s simple we have a copy of everything, and we will share it.

ME: You don’t take “yes” for an answer.  Check back a few messages ago, when I agreed to not contact her, You’re nearly as ruthless and unforgiving as she is (I was convinced at this moment I was talking to her) I never had the illusion there was any kind of relationship between us. That’s her fantasy.  All she wants is for people to adore her. She’s rather sad.

(At this point, the conversation with her brother ended. But a new voice came into the mix claiming to be her step mom, although the phone exchange was from Newark – suggesting one of the political operatives from the town she covered who had worked several campaigns in Newark)

STEP MOM: Al, I’m her step mom, and I’m a professional advocate. Leave her alone or you’ll regret your abusive actions.

ME: There is no abuse, never was. I only had a foolish hope for peace. I fully regret having ever met your step daughter for all the abuse she’s heaped on me. I have done nothing wrong, and I can prove it.

STEP MOM: the fact that you’re writing to me, and other members of our family prove that you are problematic.

ME: I’m only responding to messages you and your family are sending to me. I did not seek you out. You came after me. Clearly, you’re acting out of love for your step daughter, but she’s wrong and I hate being falsely accused. I pushed her out of my life or tried to, and have sought for peaceful co-existence, something clearly unacceptable to her. I now know this is not possible.

At this point, her father came back on, and I texted:

ME: I agree not to communicate with her

FATHER: Good. Thank you. I’ll be watching. We all will.

ME: I don’t like being falsely accused or threatened.

FATHER: It is not a threat; it’s a fact. Good night.

At the conclusion of all this, I came to believe all of the texts came from her, possibly switching phones, although I might be wrong.

I had a police captain from Jersey City trace the numbers, none of which corresponded to the part of New York State where her parents lived. One came from West Nyack on the western shore of the Hudson River. The most ruthless of the three traced back to Hackensack, while the number for her father came out of Ramsey – not far from where she was raised in New Jersey. Since all the phones were mobile phones, it is difficult to know if they were different people or just her playing games.

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter.


email to Al Sullivan

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Taking control Aug. 2, 2012

Image
The poem she posted today echoes in tone if not in content that of her quicksand poem. While as short at the previous poem, this poem about compassion is much more structured, using parallel phrasing to give it power and impact. Yet despite its brevity, it is incredibly complex, and creates a number of possible alternative interpretations, depending partly on for whom the poem is written. My ego (my narcissistic self as she referred to me in an earlier poem) would like to think the poem is directed at me, and so like the poem about quicksand, offers a certain measure of condolence or compassion for a clearly defeated man. But the poem may well also be directed at herself, about the idea of compassion or perhaps pain. While the overtly it claims to be about compassion, in fact, the poem goes beyond both pain and compassion and may well allude of a philosophy of survival. As with the quick sand poem, this poem seems to be offering advice, although less fatalistic. The most
Read more

Reflections of Coelho March 2, 2013

Image
    At some point in all of this mixed up, jumbled up world of hers, she posted a saying by Paulo Coelho, which said, “If you’re brave to say ‘Good Bye’ life will reward you with a new ‘Hello’.” Coelho de, born in August, 1947is a Brazilian lyricist and novelist and a member of the Brazilian Academy of Letters since 2002. Coelho wrote the best-selling novel, 'The Alchemist,' which sold 35 million copies and is the most translated book in the world by a living author. He has been frequently described as an author that “thrives on contradictions and extremes,” which may well be why she is attracted to him, and why she recently got into the role of Mata Hari in her real life, perhaps influenced by Coelho’s fictional take on the well-known temptress and spy. Born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Coelho attended Jesuit schools and was raised by devout Catholic parents. He was obsessed at an early age with the idea of becoming a writer, something his parents frowned on, and his i
Read more

Forgiveness is not possible July 13, 2012

Image
   By far this is the most painful of all the poems she has directed at me to date, partly because it is dismissive, and in some ways inaccurate, and uses some of my own statements taken out of context against me. I need to resist trying to defend myself here and attempt to focus completely on the statements she is attempting to make, dealing later in other pages of this journal in an attempt to set the record straight. Right from the opening lines, she dismisses the need for forgiveness, largely because she said it would imply the possibility of a “next step” or somehow getting back to a previous stage before all the hostility transpired, when it is clear that is not possible. While the poem does not explicitly say so, there is no going back, too many bad feelings, too many unforgivable things said. She describes the “ugly mornings” and the “sweat-streaked days of locking and unlocking” her door. The implication here is fear of violence, something she alluded to in an earl
Read more