I had a major fail today..
She was probably 65 year old woman with a definite pear shape…I mention the pear shape because after her non-courteous, snippy behavior at the check out, when she finally moved, I judged her for not wearing a longer blouse to camouflage the caboose. My irritation began as I stood in line while she tried to come up with pennies for change so she wouldn’t have to receive pennies back. The clerk had completely checked out my items and stacked them on the counter but I was unable to advance forward because she stood dead in her space and looked through every sack before she put them in her cart. Finally I was able to get up to the credit card machine to check out and the clerk got my groceries sacked.
…..and of course she was parked in front of me in the parking lot. When I saw her carry her case of Dr Pepper to the other side of the car, I just KNEW she was going to,leave her grocery cart sitting there. Yep. She got in the car and drove off. Dark black smoke was starting to escape from my ears. Before she shut her door, I bit my tongue instead of HEY…PUT YOUR SHOPPING CART AWAY. While I was pushing both of our carts around two cars to the cart corral I shook my head and said out loud….you lazy bitch.
What is the correct way to handle this situation?
Ninasusan 
Oh man. Such a relatable story. But I find the universe sends these people our way–and it’s more about our reaction than them . . .
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Trying to “correct” her behavior would have probably been a waste of time. I might try to tell a young adult about their behavior, but an older lady? Not so much. She clearly believes the world revolves around her. Nothing in her 65 years has convinced her otherwise. Be grateful you are not related to her.
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That’s a hard one for me too. I want to think and believe the best about people but I also think it helps me to realize that some people just don’t get it. I don’t know why. Maybe they were abused and so they went insular. Or maybe they’re doing their best just to keep up with even the most minor, no-brainer type things in life. Yeah, and sometimes, it does seem like they’re just plain self-absorbed and rude. So, I just try to pull my energy back and get in sync with myself. Sometimes I’m out of the flow, if you know what I mean, and people just bug me! So, I take a few deep breaths and just chill a bit. I’d rather have lowered blood pressure than blow a gasket over it.
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Maybe when you first knew she was going to leave her cart hurry and walk up to her take her cart and say something like, “Here I’ll take your cart because we should always put our carts in the corral so someone doesn’t hit them in the parking lot. Very important to take care of things you use.” You know kill ’em with kindness sort of thing… Then walk away and say what you said…it is perfect!
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Oh yeah the case of Dr Pepper would’ve been my undoing as well. Arrgh!
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I’ve come to believe that rude people need to be called out on their behavior. Is it just me, or were there fewer rude people back when people tended to call out bad behavior more often?
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I think you are right, Kert!!!
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Sigh….my tablet appears to have eaten m comment so I will try again. There is nothing you could do in that situation that would make any difference at all to that woman. So you did the only thing you could do, smile you put her cart away and know that you’ve built yourself some good karma that hopefully somewhere down the line will save your car from scratch from a wild cart.
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