Be Warned!

I have come to the realization that a specter looms over me. It is one most tangible, though it takes on a new face and name with each malevolent, insidious attack. I now believe it to be in truth the mythical Minotaur of Crete. I know this now because it employs a labyrinth to entrap me. I say the Minotaur is insidious because the labyrinth now is a metaphorical one rather than a real one of brick and mortar. My most recent brush with the villainous thing took a mild toll, but made me realize that I may be left in no condition to tell the tale the next time. That being the case, permit me to outline the Minotaur's methods.

As I said, it changes forms regularly, but always poses as someone at a social event which I am attending. It lures me in by giving the impression that it is an interesting person to whom I will enjoy talking, but this is merely its new labyrinth. Once I am in the conversation, I discover a bewildering array of pitfalls and dead ends. I valiantly labor to go somewhere in it, finding only that this brings me face to face with the Minotaur itself.

I bravely engage the monster, enlisting the element of surprise and coming at it from different angles with various clever gambits, but it will not be tricked into saying something interesting or betraying any common ground which might lead to an ongoing relationship either professional, friendly or romantic. As the encounter goes on, it wears me down with unrelenting waves of boredom and negativity.

In the end, by dint of blood and sweat and luck, I find my way out of the labyrinth, cursing its keeper and licking the psychological wounds it inflicted. I keep a watchful eye so that I may give it a wide berth in future, but will undoubtedly encounter it again and again, leaving it defeated in my wake only when I pass on to my immortal reward.