Assault with a Deadly Grocery Cart


My looks are deceiving.

I am a mere 5 feet tall, 100 pounds. I’m small boned and often called “tiny” which I hate. I wear pink glasses. I look like a push over, I guess.

So maybe that’s why the woman in the grocery store thought I’d fold when she continually rode her grocery cart up my ankles and into my toes, while waiting in line to check out.

First time I didn’t acknowledge the bump. Heck, anyone can make a mistake. Second time I turned around and looked down dramatically at my ankle, now glowing an unnatural cerise. Third time I turned around and looked her in the eye and said: Excuse me but you are pushing your cart into my foot. Please stop.

Confrontation.

I was polite, but I’m sure my face had a look. I’ve been told I can stop a truck with some of my looks. I have perfected a look that can stop a misbehaving child mid-naughty-deed or warn a husband who’s taking a joke too far to back peddle immediately.

I could not move up to get away from her, for every time I opened up an inch of space between her cart and my body, she pushed her cart closer to fill in this small, safety gap.

The cart pusher was tall. Not only was she tall she was wearing high heels. She was decked out in a business suit and talking on a cell phone. She was obviously rich, important and in a hurry.

I was in jeans and a tee shirt, flip flops, which I won’t wear to the grocery store any time soon.

Her hair was highlighted and professionally coiffed; her nails long and polished and her ears held diamonds as big as gumballs.

My hair was pulled back into a loose pony tail with the red, rubber band from the morning newspaper. My nails, never to be touched again by a manicurist, were short and uncolored. My ears were sparkle free. It must have appeared to her that I was not in a hurry and I (and my body) was not important.

Fourth bump I turned quickly and said loudly: Look, you’ve got to stop running your freaking cart over my feet. (This one really hurt.)

She was still on the phone, but the volume and tone of my voice could not be ignored.

She looked at me as if I had anger control problems. She blinked once or twice in rapid succession, raised her eyebrows and then continued with her conversation.

Price checks, arguments about sale prices, coupon expirations dates etc, were keeping me in this line much longer than I would prefer, but I wasn’t assaulting the woman in front of me with my cart just so I could move up a half inch.

Then the fifth and final cart contact came.

I had two choices which ran through my mind as if on fast forward. I could turn around, take her cart and give it a big two-handed push right into her hip bones or I could feign a dropped item and bend over to pick it up.

I chose the latter, hoping not to get arrested for cart rage in the grocery store.

I accidentally on purpose dropped a package of Cello sponges and then bent over to pick them up, using my gluteus maximus muscles to send her cart sailing backwards and into her abdominal area with a thump.

She almost dropped her cell phone.

I’m not proud that I stooped to such a low (yes, I wanted to use that pun) that I used physical violence on her, but it worked. She kept her distance, after that, and the check out girl gave me a wink and a “thumbs up” hidden behind the cat litter bag she was going to scan.

If the cops were called, at least I had a witness.