REDEMPTION

I had finished my grocery shopping at one store and I pulled into the parking lot of another, just in time to see a woman leave a shopping cart adjacent to her car and right in the parking space I wanted although she could have pushed the cart the few feet to the cart corral. She got into her vehicle and started using a cell phone. I inched my car toward the shopping cart and touching it with my bumper--TRIUMPH--I was able to push the shopping cart slightly BEHIND her car! I was gleeful, because I knew she saw what I did. There was no way she could get out of the parking space without hitting the cart or alighting from her car and moving it.


I sat in my car for a few minutes, waiting for her reaction. I thought, "If I get out of the car, she will probably slam her car door against mine." I decided to out-wait her! My glee was short-lived as another person moved the cart. As I got out of the car, she gestured toward me with the "universal second-finger salute"--yes, she flipped me the bird!

Headed to the store, I saw a group of people around another car and I asked if something were wrong. I was told that a woman needed jumper cables. I volunteered that I had jumper cables. However, my jumper cables are in the trunk of the car in the the spare tire compartment which was covered by groceries. I put all of the groceries in the rear of the car. I took the jumper cables and we hooked them up. A truck driver came to assist. After a half an hour of "jumping", the car still would not start. The woman, Jacquie, said she had a small battery charger in her Jeep at home. I took her home.

During our trip to her house, I told her how mean-spirited I had been in trying to teach a lesson to the woman with the shopping cart. Jacquie decided that I had "redeemed" myself by helping her.