I'm a vindictive person.

I happened to be in Orem a few days ago and I walked past a building that used to house a scuba diving shop. It had become something else and I was really elated by this. My first thought was, "YES! They're gone out of business!" But they probably actually haven't (and have just moved to a new location), and it was a really mean thought anyway.

See, I have a vindictive streak. Back about two and a half years ago, I was hired to work at said scuba shop and I quit after four horrible days (and a few brief hours before that). I had been desperate for a job at the time and had been wandering around Orem, going into businesses to ask if anyone was hiring. The scuba shop was just random and I was hired rather quickly. What a mistake that was!

In the first place, the business was family-owned so that there was no real ethical code that I could see, and certainly no need to treat employees with anything resembling respect. I was taught literally nothing at all about what I was supposed to be doing and then was screamed at repeatedly for not doing my job. The owner was so volitile that I didn't feel safe in his presence and I was in trouble if I wasn't "busy" even though there was nothing for me to do. I spent eight hours a day mopping the floor over and over again because the man swore he could see streaks in it. And when I was paid, he gave a dollar less an hour than he had promised.

I finally blew a gasket on that fourth day and confronted my boss. I said that either he was going to start teaching me what he wanted me to do and stop yelling at me every second or I was going to walk out and never come back. He said nothing was going to change on his end, so I left.

Thereafter whenever I drove past that stupid shop, I wished (usually out loud) that it would go out of business and leave that horrible man high and dry. I don't know if vindictiveness has actually gotten me anywhere, but it sure was satisfying to imagine someone despicable actually having bad things happen to them for a change- you usually never see that in real life.