Wednesday, December 22, 2010

About revenge


When I was about nineteen, I took proper revenge on someone for the first and only time in my life.

I’m not talking about something small like pushing a prefect into a pot plant because he was bullying me (why, oh why did I pause to admire the effect?) I’m talking about something that had serious repercussions for someone else – serious from their perspective at any rate.

The fact that they did something that affected me in the long term doesn’t matter in this case: it’s an excuse, no more. Let me explain:

When I was young and foolish (you can tell I was young and foolish because I actually got busted), I was arrested for possession of marijuana. I was at home at the time, engaged in nursing my ailing grandmother who’d had a stroke.

To say that I was surprised to see the narcotics squad, is putting it lightly: I was relatively low-profile. I didn’t get out much, but there they were, and how they came by my address, I would very much have liked to know. I did know, and this is how:

A certain couple of my acquaintance, the female half of which had taken me in considerable dislike some months earlier because I refused to dislike someone she disliked, approached a friend (who happened to be with me) for a little bit of the weed. They didn’t have any, I did. I gave them some. They thanked my friend because they weren't talking to me. I laughed like anything.

They got busted, they said where they’d got the weed and voila - the cops raided me as a 'dealer' which I definitely wasn't. I had three days in jail without being allowed to phone home (state of emergency, it was legal) the family was going spare because they thought I'd been kidnapped, and I got a criminal record to lug through life with me. All this at the supposedly tender age of nineteen.

So what did I do? I told everyone my suspicions of course! It emerged that the couple had told all their friends that they had given their names to the police. They never told me. That's because I wasn't a friend of theirs and besides, they weren't talking to me.

People liked me. They were upset about what had happened. So was I. Folks put two and two together and shared my suspicion. The couple were duly shunned. She came and cried at me.

I didn’t exactly feel bad, but I didn’t feel all that good either, so nowadays, I don’t do revenge. Might be a different story if I could get hold of a flame-thrower, though.

Today's pic: me in my teens - very eighties, hey?

9 comments:

  1. A mug shot? Revenge now-a-day is to shoot the accuser. At least here the police can't be entering your house (castle it is) without a search warrent. They would be far too busy anyway. In the sixties were did what you did in the eighties but with purpose. I have forgotten what it was though. The only real difference is you got caught, turned in by a snitch, the worst of the worst. Clinton did it but didn't inhale. Bush did it and should have inhaled.

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  2. You know what they say: revenge is a dish best served cold. After being roasted with mojo marinade. And with a side of potato salad. No, wait, that's chicken. Maybe revenge is better with green Thai curry. No, that's also chicken. Or Jamaican jerk spices? Wait, chicken again. Now I'm hungry. Damn you - I will harm you for what you've done to me here just as soon as I have lunch and remember the concept of revenge!

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  3. Sounds like you taught them a big lesson, you don't turn in your drug dealers. Just kidding.

    Love the eighties doo by the way, I think mine was a lot worse.

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  4. You were young... we all do things that perhaps we shouldn't have, whether it be revenge or other things. We hopefully learn from them, you learned from yours.. makes you awesome in my books!

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  5. I've always had a sneaky suspicion that revenge harms the revenger as much as (if not more than ) the revengee.
    It seems that, as this was the only time in your life that you exersice (exorcised?) the cold fury of the ill-done-by makes me think that you have come to the same conclusion.
    Mind you - I don't believe that revenge as a concept should be foresworn. Just judiciously used, with the knowledge that it will (if you're a healthy person) also kick you in the arse.
    Whatever. Nice photo.

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  6. I absolutely love that photo of you! Gorgeous.
    I had some trouble following the particulars of the story (I'm sure it's me) but it sounds like teenage drama ramped up by imprisonment- unfortunately, yours.
    The most disturbing part of this story for me was the three day imprisonment and your family not being notified.
    All in all, it sounds as if it were fairly traumatic.

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  7. Stonepost: Don't you guys have some sort of anti terrorism act that implies the right to search without warrants? I'm almost sure I remember such. Ours was also supposed to be 'anti-terrorism', which was real enough judging from the bomb blasts that punctuated my teens. That's history. I'm very convinced that we enjoy more more civil liberties today than Americans do, our constitution being young and still relatively untarnished.

    Grant: Got the munchies eh? I'll join you for some of those cold dishes, because I have them too.

    TK: Hah! Yes, well, you're right though. As for the hair: ever so fluffy!

    AG: On occasion, I'm pretty awful, but I don't at all mind you thinking me awesome!

    AW: Much musing. Your'e right on all counts, of course.

    PAMO: It was pretty rough, and all the time, I knew that my poor sick gran needed me, which helped me to be hysterical during interrogation (I only had to try a little bit to make the tears flow). I'm proud to say that I didn't give a single name - not even those of the people I suspected of giving mine!

    Israel: Yes of course its negative. Its supposed to be! :)

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  8. Your right on America losing their rights. Search and seizure no longer needs a warrant thanks to the very laws you referred too. I'm sure you do have many more liberties than we do. Many of ours have just become an illusion of days gone by.

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