I no longer talk to a person that I don’t talk to. If that sentence doesn’t make sense, let me explain. This can only happen on the Internet.

I was sitting at my desk a few weeks ago when I received an email from a 66-year old friend I grew up with. I’ve known him since he was 10 and I was 9. I saw him a few times a week till we were 20 and 21. He was one of 80 who attended my Sweet 16 on the same day JFK was murdered in Dallas. I have only seen him three times in the last decade, and before that not for 30-plus years.

The email he sent instantly pissed me off on two counts. First, it was a forwarded email and I had to scroll down three pages of headers and addresses to find his message. Memo to seniors: When you forward emails, please delete all former email addresses before sending to new recipients. It is considered rude and lazy by Internet standards to expose people’s addresses to strangers who can then use them for future spam.

Secondly, when I finally got to the message, I was absolutely astonished that he had forwarded some rhetoric against the Presidential candidate of my choice. He hasn’t spoken to me in years, has no idea who I prefer, and as a result insulted everything that I stand for.

Now, I am not saying that I don’t campaign for my choice on Facebook and to people that I have had long discussions with many times. But, this guy didn’t have any idea where I stood politically. It was extremely presumptuous. I told him so in a response and then the war of words broke out over email. We had never had an argument before, but this one was meant to forever cut our ties.

So I did something I never did before. I let him get the last word. His final email was so ridiculous that I decided not to answer it. He probably thinks he insulted me. For some reason, that gives me great satisfaction.

I don’t recommend email wars if you are the sensitive type. Be careful what you say before you press “send.”