The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals that Protect us from Violence (19 page)

This idea that the presence of a threat lowers risk and the absence of a threat elevates risk is hard for people to grasp, perhaps because it feels counter-intuitive, but it’s true, and it’s not the only fact about threats to public figures that surprises people.

For example, though anonymous death threats cause high concern, they actually portend less danger than accredited threats. People who send threats anonymously are far less likely to pursue an encounter than those who sign their names. There are some compelling reasons why this is so. The threatener who provides his true name is not trying to avoid attention, and is probably seeking it. Thus, he is most similar to assassins, most of whom stand at the scene of their crimes and say, “I did this.”

Still, police have historically been intrigued by anonymous death threats and apathetic about accredited ones. Since police are usually faced with the challenge of apprehending suspects who seek to avoid detection, when they encounter one who self-identifies, a common response is “This guy would never do anything—he signed his name right here.” The thinking is that if the sender were to carry out the threatened act, apprehension would be easy. This approach fails to recognize that actual public figure attackers have rarely sought to avoid apprehension. The police misunderstanding about anonymous threats stems from how different the assassin is from almost all other criminals. Who else would actually design his offense to ensure that he gets caught? Who else would hope his act would be videotaped?

To the modern media criminal, most notably the assassin, that is the description of the perfect crime, and a few people will dedicate their lives to committing it. You aren’t likely to ever face an assassin, of course, but you are likely to encounter people just as dedicated, people who refuse to let go.

“That’s what happens when you’re angry at people.
You make them part of your life.”
—
Garrison Keillor

In America, persistence is a bit like pizza: We didn’t invent it, but we’ve certainly embraced it. We promise our children that persistence will pay off. We treat it as an attribute of success and we compliment the people who hang in there against all odds. However, when persistence is unwanted, those same people we praised can plague our lives. Few situations are more confounding than dealing with people who refuse to let go. We try to predict what they might do next, we worry that they might get angry or dangerous, and we agonize over what strategies will make them stop whatever it is they feel so compelled to continue doing.

Imagine that this happened to you instead of to a client of mine: You and your spouse attend a seminar, and an acquaintance there introduces you to Tommy, a preppy-looking, energetic young man. When told about the upcoming expansion of your travel agency business, the young man lights up with enthusiasm.

This chance meeting may not sound like the start of a nightmare, but that’s exactly what it was for Mike Fedder and his wife, Jackie. Over the chatter of the seminar, Tommy told them some of his ideas about the travel business: “I’ve always been interested in unconventional travel packages, and it’s clear that people are moving away from the big hotels kind of thing, more toward camping and rafting and hiking. I have some packaging ideas that I know will double any agency’s sales. I just haven’t found the right partners to kick it off.” He told the Fedders about selling father-son vacations by marketing to lists gathered from Little League organizations.

“I work with some of these teams, and the parents put in a lot of time with their children, so they’re obviously willing to invest money in enjoyable activities. The leagues are well organized, so the packages could be offered through their newsletters and meetings. Plus, you can get one father in a group and offer him incentives to sign up others.”

Jackie told Tommy she liked the family aspect of the idea, Mike said it sounded interesting, “goodnights” all around, and that was that.

Two days later, Tommy called Mike at his successful seventy-five person travel agency. He’d gotten Mike’s number from the woman who introduced them, and he was following up on the “business discussion we started.” He wanted to have “just a brief meeting. I could stop by today. Ten minutes is all I need. I promise.” Rather than hurt his feelings, Mike agreed. “Two o’clock?” Two o’clock.

Mike was on a long-distance call at two o’clock, so Tommy was kept waiting a few minutes. He seemed a bit put out by this: “I thought we agreed to two o’clock.”

“Oh yeah, sorry, I’ve been working on a forty-person Africa excursion…”
Why am I making excuses to this guy
, Mike wondered. It was a good question. The ten minutes Tommy requested turned to twenty. He had put together some material on his idea and it was actually impressive—not so much the quality but the quantity; he had obviously put a good deal of effort into it.

Tommy said, “When we really clicked on this the other night, I got to thinking…” and then his drop-by visit became a formal proposal: He would take a leave of absence (from? Mike never did hear where Tommy worked) and he’d organize some father-son package tours to Yosemite. If it didn’t succeed, Mike would pay him nothing, and if it did succeed, Tommy would get a percentage.

When Mike told him he didn’t normally work with outside agents, Tommy said he understood: “I can join the team full time.” When Mike told him there wasn’t an opening, Tommy said, “Oh, I can start anyway, and then we’ll formalize it when something opens up.”

Persistent
, Mike thought.
Mark of those who succeed
. Indeed, it was the mark of something, but not success. It was refusing to hear “no,” a clear signal of trouble in any context.

Forty minutes into the meeting: “Listen, Tommy, my best agent, Marlene, might be leaving in the next few months—she’s getting married—and if that happens, I’ll call you and we can re-visit the matter.”

Tommy was disappointed that there wasn’t a more concrete result but said he’d be in touch to explore ways to move “into the next inning.”

He called a week later and asked if Mike had made any decisions. (Decisions about what?) “Nothing’s really changed, Tommy. Marlene and her fiancé haven’t set a date yet,” and brush off, brush off.

Tommy ended with “Well, say hi to Jackie.” This call gave some clues to another feature of those who don’t let go: projecting onto others commitments that were not expressed and are not present.

The next day Marlene asked Mike a bit hesitantly if he had a friend named Tommy. He had called and was wondering about her marriage plans! He had asked if she had “even a ballpark idea” of when she’d be leaving because “Mike and I are trying to get to the next inning.”

Within five minutes, Mike had Tommy on the phone: “Listen, you’re a nice kid, I know you’re just excited about the business, but I have to be clear with you:
If
we ever want to pursue your idea, and
IF
it fits into our plans, I will call you. There’s no need to call me anymore, and I certainly don’t think you should have called Marlene. Understand?”

Tommy didn’t seem at all dejected. “Oh, I understand completely, sorry for the confusion. I just thought I should get a time frame from her so I’d be ready to come to work, that’s all, no big deal. I won’t bug her again.” It sounded as if he had gotten it until he added: “She said about eight weeks, so I’ll plan for that.”

“Um, well, listen, Tommy, don’t plan for anything. The travel business isn’t like that; you never know what might happen. I hope our paths cross sometime, and I wish you all the luck in the world, and thanks again for your suggestions.”

Finally, that was that.
What a persistent guy
, Mike thought,
but I’m sure he got the message
.

About three months later, Mike came back from lunch to find three messages from Tommy on his voice mail.
Mr. Persistent
. Before Mike got around to calling him back, Tommy was on the line again. He seemed agitated: “That was really kind of a surprise, Mike, and not a good surprise—more like a shock. When I called this morning to touch base, they told me Marlene had been gone for two weeks. Two weeks! We had an agreement, you know, so I was a little disappointed. I can’t believe we lost two valuable weeks. I’m very committed to making this idea work and I’ve put a lot more time into it, refining things. It’s really come a long way. I sure hope you haven’t hired anybody to replace Marlene.”

Mike felt bad for the guy because it obviously meant a lot to him. How to let him down easy? “Well, first of all, Marlene’s position is not filled yet (
Why’d I say that!?
), but, uh, that’s not the point. We didn’t have an agreement. We had a chat, really.”

“Well, maybe that’s what you think it was, but I’ve put my heart and soul into this thing. You know, I thought you’d have the kind of commitment it takes to stick with something, but maybe you don’t.”

An opening
, Mike thought. “Maybe I don’t, Tommy, so let’s just agree to go our separate ways and chalk it up to experience. I’m sorry you went to so much trouble.”

Mike hung up.

The next day, Tommy called again, twice, but Mike didn’t return the calls. One of the messages said it was urgent, but what could be urgent with somebody you hardly know?

Tommy left five more messages that week, and Mike finally discussed it with his wife. “I don’t feel like I led him on, but obviously I must have said something or done something that gave him all these hopes. I don’t know what else to tell him and I can’t just not return his calls. I don’t want to get him angry.”

“He’s already angry,” Jackie said wisely. “He was angry the moment we didn’t become his best friends and go into business with him. I don’t think anything you can say will be heard by him the way you mean it to be.” Jackie, like most women, had much more experience than Mike in dealing with unwanted persistence. She knew that “maybe” is sometimes perceived as “definitely,” that “like” can be taken as “love,” and that people who don’t hear you don’t hear you. You get to the point that it doesn’t help to keep trying, in fact, it makes matters worse, because it encourages attachment when you are seeking detachment.

If Tommy could read a life-long partnership into almost nothing, then a response could be taken by him in who knows what way. Contact is fuel for the fire, and Tommy was someone who didn’t need much fuel.

“I’ll give it another week, and then if it doesn’t stop, I’ll call him back and lay it on the line.”

“But Mike, you did that,” Jackie reminded him. “You told him point-blank not to call you again. You said, ‘Let’s go our separate ways.’ That all seems pretty clear to me.”

Jackie was right. If you tell someone ten times that you don’t want to talk to him, you
are
talking to them—nine more times than you wanted to. If you call him back after he leaves twenty messages, you simply teach him that the cost of getting a call back is twenty messages.

For two weeks, there were no calls, and Mike was glad it was finally over. But then another message: “It’s urgent I speak with you immediately.” Mike felt that he really had to put a stop to this now. At each step, he was making predictions about how Tommy would respond, but he was doing it by applying his own standards for behavior. Mike reasoned that not calling back would be insulting but that somehow calling back and
being
insulting would make things better, and that’s what he decided to do:

“What is it with you? You flake! We aren’t going to be working together, period. Do you hear me? That should have been clear, but you don’t listen. I don’t want to talk to you about it anymore, okay?”

Tommy reacted in a way Mike hadn’t predicted. He said he was just calling to apologize because he didn’t want to burn his bridges behind him. “I still think we can hit a home run with this thing someday,” he added.

“No, Tommy, you should move on to something else. If I hear of any interesting openings, I’ll let you know. (
Oh, god, why’d I say that?
) But this will be our last call, okay? Can we just leave it at that?” Mike was asking, not telling.

Finally, finally, Mike thought he had gotten through to the guy. That night he told Jackie, “I called that guy back today, and it turns out all he wanted to do was apologize.”

Jackie said, “Good, and I hope that’s the last call you ever have with him.”

“Of course it’s the last call. He has apologized and it’s over.” Until a week later, when there was a Federal Express envelope from Tommy. It contained a note requesting that Mike sign an enclosed letter of reference, which Tommy said would help him at his bank.

Even though Mike had assured Jackie that he’d made his last call, he decided to respond to Tommy’s request. To Mike’s relief, he reached an answering machine and left this message: “I don’t feel comfortable signing the reference letter you sent, but I wish you the best of luck.”

People who refuse to let go often make small requests that appear reasonable, like Tommy’s letter of reference, though the real purpose of such requests is to cement attachment or gain new reasons for contact. Within a few hours, Tommy left a message for Mike: “I’m not surprised you didn’t have the courage to talk with me directly. You know, it would have taken less time to sign that letter than it did to leave me your condescending message. No wonder you’re in the travel business; everybody wants to get away from you. Please mail the unsigned letter back to me.” Unfortunately, Mike had thrown the letter away. Now Tommy had another issue to chew on.