I Try To

Sorry for not posting for a few days; I am still recuperating from being sick. Thanks to all my readers who visit here even when I do not post.

I look back on times in my life when I was "the canary in the mine" about someone whom I knew had some sort of tendency that could turn dangerous to someone, somewhere: kids, women, me, or just people in general.  I  unfortunately seem to attract such people into my life without knowing.  The last time, I actually researched someone on the Internet before continuing a friendship with them.  I chose to ignore some troubling Internet posts and a few statements in person and in email.  In retrospect, I should have sat down with them and really probed all of what I had learned; it was important and in truth, all those things contributed to the eventual and disastrous end.  I tend to be too lenient with people, too willing to believe that the passage of time alone equals personal change.

But what do you do when someone has tendencies that are really unacceptable by any standard, when you know they have the capability of doing someone harm, who picks out unsuspecting and naive people and probably spends  the majority of their time planning on how to rope those people in.  What do you do when you see it?  There is no way to warn anyone.  I see the potential for something terrible to happen by a person who apparently has learned nothing at all, who may even like what they are doing, especially if they can get away with it.  But nothing criminal or frightening has been done yet.  Persons of their ilk do not care about anything except getting caught.  They can do the trapdoor spider thing for many years,

It is a sad fact that no one believes the ex: the ex-friend, the ex-partner, the ex-spouse, someone who has, for whatever reason, left the circle.  The trapdoor spider is good about saying that those people are crazy, mental cases, not to be trusted, have a grudge.  It is only when they get caught that people say, "Why didn't you say something?"  I don't say anything because nobody in my former circle who could be victimized or has a vulnerable person in their lives would ever believe me.  Trapdoor spiders are good at protecting themselves, until they slip up and their web is broken.  At that point, when all hell breaks loose and they get consequences for their actions, people believe you after all, realize it was not just a grudge, that this person who was seemingly so charming, so nice and benign, was so completely far from that.  They know it and do  everything possible to stay covert, to focus on their project.

I've come to two beliefs: I cannot protect anyone except the ones in my own care.  If I see a predatorial person honing in on someone young and vulnerable, I can do nothing about it except hope the young adult finds common sense.  I can do nothing except wait, because the one thing I do know is that people who are trapdoor spiders often get sloppy after a certain time and get caught.  That is my other belief: actively wait, hope, and pray, and these people trip themselves up eventually.