What Dante means to me

Or: How a man who lived centuries ago and wrote pointed political satire has kept me just this side of sane.

I know, I know, good people believe in thing like the golden rule and turning the other cheek. I try very hard to follow these things as well, I do not mean to mock them. I respect more than I can say the good people who can follow such rules because among their ranks you will not find me.

Because good people do not mentally plot out elaborate revenge against people who have worked meticulously to make life more difficult. And I do. You know the kind of obnoxious troublesome people I am talking about. The ones who always manage to ruin a month running day by pawning off some emergency on you, an emergency that they have been lovingly whittling for you for weeks as you frantically try to fix the last one they foisted on you.

I work, a many people in this good world, with a great population of vastly annoying persons. I have the unenviable tasks of having until recently (and perhaps still do) have two direct supervisors in high ranking positions within the institution. And I have the bonus of many well-meaning souls thinking that they too qualify for supervisorship of my position.

And this is what Dante does for me. He gives me comfort that it i not abnormal to imagine your antagonists being tortured in various ways for their perceived sins. He provides stunning visualisations for the moments that I am so infuriated I cannot think of original ways to torture a person. And he motivates me to think creatively and put pen to paper rather than shoving pen through the eye of the person who just told me that the multi-million dollar mistake they just made is somehow my fault.