The Lost Art of Renfield

I got fired from a temp job today.  


WHO gets fired from a temp job?


I am competent, kind, willing to accept criticism... heck, even blame.  But in all my yeehahs...I have NEVAH, EVAH been treated as horribly as I was by this woman.  My temp company says they know it wasn't me.  They've assured me I will work again.  I've assured them I'd like to take a little break from assignments.


Sitting alongside the rows and rows of other admins, I was to assist three women.  My temp company mentioned they 'needed a star!'...'it's a great opportunity to get in with a great company!'...'free breakfast and lunch!'


Sweet.


Five day gig.  The middle of day two I am writing the temp folks to warn them.  


'This woman HAAAYYTES me.'


'Hang in there.  Don't worry.'


I whisper over the divider to the woman sitting next to me and ask if it's me.  She says it's not but then almost immediately the b*&%h screams my name and yells out to: NEVER DO _________ AGAIN!!


 _________ I didn't do.  


It was pure comedy.  She shoved some papers in my hand and said, "Mark these on the spreadsheet as corrected by DME".  She may as well have walked down the hall to the elevators, through the giant marble lobby, out the spinning doors, handed them to a complete stranger and said the same thing.  The only instruction I received was a piece of paper left by the other assistant that said: 'Don't be retarded'.  


I didn't even know WHAT this woman did.  After her order, I mistakenly asked her what she meant.  I thought for a moment that maybe she had a stroke her eyes rolled so far up in her head and from that moment on she spoke to me in one word sentences in slow motion.  Day two she was screaming my name.  It was apparently becoming her sole purpose to prove to those within earshot what an idiot I was.  She continued to tell me to do things Steve Jobs wouldn't have understood.  I could feel myself degenerating.


Her:  "Make sure you put these in the appraisal files and match them with the others, then give me the department folders."  


Me:  "I like peas."


I literally ran around in circles with my head and shoulders hunched down apologizing for things either someone else did or things she wished someone else was doing.  I felt like I was in a Woody Allen movie.  No, Mel Brooks. 


I get it.  Sometimes it feels good to kick a puppy.  She smelled my fear and hated me for it.  There have been a few times in my life I let the bullies get to me.  I become the dumb cow backing into the oncoming car to 'get out of the way'.  I go into shock when people are just... mean.  It makes me understand a little teensy, tiny bit why Columbine killings happen.  Working for 'difficult' people is not a new concept and you swallow it because you get paid.  


I kissed her feet and she kicked me out.  


When I left that day, I said, "See you tomorrow!"  It was the first time she smiled at me.  


"Good night!"


Five minutes later my temp company calls.  Cruella DeVille from Great Gatsby doesn't want me back.  


I contemplated canceling a lunch reservation I'd made for her.  Then I realized that is a path that leads to eating bugs in a sanatorium.