Mother Knows Best

I've been know to say on occasion that you can tell a person's character by whether or not someone puts their cart in the away in the cart corral in the parking lot. Last week, my quasi adage came true. While pulling out of my spot at Target a soccer mom was closing the trunk on her overpriced luxury SUV and simply pushed her empty cart into a vacant parking spot, which just happened to be in front of my car. She quickly realized that the her gentle push must have been more of an adequate shove as the cart began to pick up a bit of speed, and momentum for that matter, and was headed to a collision course with the car parked next to the vacant spot.

She watched as the cart latched onto another rouge basket and continued on it's fiendish path towards metal mayhem. I turned to look at her as she climbed into her vehicle and with the flash of a blink made eye contact. I saw no remorse nor intent to rectify the situation. I threw my car into park and began to get out to rescue the already beat-up car from another battle wound, when she knew she had no choice but to intervene. Begrudgingly she crawled out and hastily walked over to the cart milliseconds before contact. She rolled the two carts to the middle of the spot and wedged them together so they could move on their own volition. She threw up a neighborly wave and went about her way knowing she did the right thing.

I got out of my car, pried the carts apart and rolled them to the corral three parking spots away. Proud of myself for taking the higher road and going above and beyond to help my fellow man, and vehicle, I realized that I put one of my pieces of merchandise back in the wrong location because I didn't want to go to the other side of the store to put it back where it belongs. I blame that pattern of behavior on my mother, which leads me to my next adage: do as I say, not as I do.