Instinct and crazy Walmart people

I almost got jumped in the Walmart parking lot.

When I got out of the car, this lady was running at me, yelling something like, "You KNOW what you did! I can't believe you're such a [edited]! You took my parking spot!!"

Me, looking around at the kazillions of empty spots, some closer to the door: "?"

Crazy lady: "And I have kids in the car!"

Thinking, Poor kids. At least I'm guaranteed to be a better mom than someone. Thinking, Wow, you're a psycho. And your hair is ugly. I should say something really mean. I don't deserve this. Me, politely: "Would you like me to move?"

Crazy lady: "Uh." Deflated pause. Looking disappointed that the pregnant lady didn't want to fight with her, or even yell. "No. It's too late now. Never mind."

She got back in the minivan and parked one spot away. I kept walking. (Well, I noted the license plate in case she keyed the car while I was inside. Gold Odyssey, Alabama plates, 44C80F5.) Walking inside, I was trying to calm down. I'm sure I looked like the calmest person in the world, but I was pretty shaken. I hadn't even seen her van in the parking lot, much less cut her off, and that made the shock so much worse. Being blindsided makes it so hard to do the right thing instead of the instinctual thing.

It made me think of this other time, when I was about 20 maybe, when the mom of a guy I had dated asked me to visit him while I was visiting the town he lived in. She suspected he was taking drugs and apparently thought he would stop if I just stopped in and chatted for a while. I hadn't seen him in months, so I humored his mom and stopped at his apartment. He answered the door and seemed happy to see me. Then this tiny little screechy girl darted from across the room and started trying to hit me. I was pretty startled, and I laughed - she was about 5 feet tall and pretty skinny - because it seemed ludicrous that she was physically attacking me. Apparently laughing at a person isn't always the best move. I wanted to punch her, but she was so small and she was obviously on drugs and out of it. And, you know, I didn't really know her or know why she was hitting me. I covered my face with my forearms and got a nasty scratch down one arm.

I was angry, but the worst part was knowing I did the right thing and it still being so difficult. It would have been much more satisfying to hit her back. For weeks, it made me angry all over again every time people asked me why I didn't do anything back - it would have been justified, being self-defense and all. Having people imply I was weak or cowardly for not following my instincts was certainly the hardest part.

Then there was this one rugby game where this same girl kept illegally tackling me. Then, one of her teammates took me down, she looked me in the eye, and deliberately cleated me in the crotch. I may have punched her in the face. It wasn't more satisfying.

When I joined Dixie Derby Girls, my sense of the team was mainly confusion and chaos. Some people were friendly. Most people were indifferent. Some seemed actually mean. (I blame this impression on my natural reticence, though.) Practices were confusing, and I couldn't figure out who the coach was for months. It seemed like a lot of time was spent talking about things like, This person said this, and then this other girl got all mad. And now I'm going to get back at her for doing this one bad thing to this other girl, because she's my friend. It seemed like I spent a lot of time standing or skating aimlessly, invisible, listening to all kinds of people say all kinds of things. Mainly, it didn't seem malicious, just habitual. And when we scrimmaged, there was one player who, because of her height and unsteady skating gait, seemed to always elbow me in the face. It was hard to not take it personally.

DDG's a whole new team now, but it's still difficult to do the right thing instead of the instinctual thing. When I hear someone say something terrible about people I like - or when I was still practicing and felt like someone was targeting me (which, really, is almost always in the mind of the person who feels targeted, I think) - it's hard to not turn around and do the same back instead of addressing it calmly.

But, you know, I don't want to be that crazy lady looking for a fight in the Walmart parking lot. I don't want DDG to be that team that allows itself to be baited, to lose tempers, and to lose games because of it. I certainly don't want to be that girl who punches someone during a sporting event for no reason. (That's not entertainment, really. That's lack of self-control and respect for the game.) It's difficult to wait half a second and do the right thing and second-guess constantly about it for weeks afterward, but it's worth it.