I feel inspired to speak my own truth after observing so many come forward in the past few months in the #MeToo movement. Hearing so many women’s stories, I feel fortunate to have only experienced a mild case of sexual harassment in my 62 years on this planet. It was a simple case of attempted date rape at age 27. I told him to disappear and never come back. He listened.

But I still find the way I was treated by Regis University Libraries when my boss fired me back in 2004, to be unfair and unwarranted. Believe me, when one female librarian stands up and protests to an all male administration at a Catholic University, from the head of Reference, to the head of the Library and the head of HR, nobody listens.

“Speaking our truth is the most powerful tool we have.”  – Oprah Winfrey

I was unfairly charged with being rude to one student at the Reference desk, her word against mine. That’s all it took. I had been in my position for almost 6 years with no training, no evaluations and no previous complaints against me. It looked to me like my new boss didn’t like my uppity attitude. This from a man who had lost previous positions for being a terrible head of reference. And sure enough, he lost his position at Regis too, but in the meantime, he had the power to fire me so he did, quickly hiring a friend of his to replace me.

As it turned out, my life improved dramatically after I lost that job, so on some level I need to say, “Thank you!” I got out of a dead end job with a bunch of dead beats, got out of librarianship entirely, moved on to professional writing, a marvelous new marriage and a comfortable and happy retirement.

Whenever I meet people like that boss, who treat others badly and seem truly miserable inside I think:  Being them is its own punishment! What a dick!