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How should I publicly handle someone holding an ancient grudge?
Fifteen years ago until about ten years ago, there was a gaming website that I frequented that allowed flaming on their boards. I used to frequently get into shouting matches with one particular user. We fought quite a bit. I can’t remember what we argued about, but I remembered that she and I were at it quite a few times and she gave as good as she got. I also remembered she got into it with quite a few other people, as did I.
Anyway, the site went down for several years and just came back a few months ago. I made the flame board invisible so I wouldn’t even be tempted to get back into the fray. I am not as young and feisty as I used to be. I’m not into fighting anymore.
Anyway, after over ten years of not even thinking about this person, I see them on the chat room with a slightly different name. I asked her if she was the same user that had a similar name 15 years earlier. She gets really defensive and says, “Yeah, so what are you going to do about it?” I didn’t bother to address her tone and just said hi and moved on with another conversation.
After several silent minutes, she makes a few snide comments and tells everyone in the room that I was verbally abusive to her, as if she were a poor innocent victim and I just heaped abuse on her for no good reason. I told her I got too old for fighting, I had a kid now, and I didn’t want to get into it. I didn’t defend myself, but I didn’t apologize. I didn’t think it was worth my time. She was silent for a long time, then mentioned that her kids were older than mine. Then she left the room.
I’m wondering if I handled that situation well. It kind of rattled me to have someone dredge up biased ancient history in a public room. I worry about seeing her again and having the old news broadcast over and over. I haven’t been on the site in ten years. I think it’s time to let old grudges go and just be happy the sites back up.
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