Somewhere between the cantaloupe and a box of Berry Blue Jell-O. . .

It's true I failed my first Drivers' Ed test, but at least I never crashed a car, which is more than I can say of my baby girl and a certain handicapped motorized shopping cart last Friday.

I've always been a real fan of those self-check out lines in grocery stores.   Finally I have control over the scanning/bagging speed when time is of the essence.  Lately Reese has been on a huge independent kick and so grocery stores are much more fun- usually with me walking alongside the cart, steadying her drunk driving as she plays 'mommy'.

This particular day, however, she was pretty chill.  I was buying only a handful of things- a melon, some jell-o, animal crackers- you know, the toddler staples.  Out of the corner of my eye  I could see her singing something 'princess' to the plastic M&M man at the end of the row and I figured she'd keep herself busy for the two or three minutes it would take me to finish.  And keep herself busy, she did.  Oh the curse of getting what we want!

Seconds later I heard the vroooom of a moving vehicle behind me and  turned to look in time to see her plow into the root beer extract display at the back of the store.

To say that I was shocked would be  horribly insufficient.  Floored?  Yes, but I'm still searching for a stronger word.    I dropped the bag of raisins I was holding and rushed over, whipped her out of her joy ride, and uttered no less than five hundred apologies while I cleaned up and finished checking out- faster than ever before!  I know I should have been furious or even humiliated and sick with remorse, but the look on my wild-child's  face was priceless.  Eyes wide, cheeks flushed, with her mouth opened to a small 'oh' as she stared at the Handicap Hot rod.  It was pure and unadulterated bewilderment.

'That was really fast, Mommy.' she whispered.

I'm sure it was. I remember the rush that came with almost crashing my neighbor's riding lawn mower into the side of the house- I would have sworn I was going 80mph!

At this point the daggers being sent with love from the head checker woman caught my eye so we wrapped things up and headed for the exit.  I made sure we held hands this time.

'That was really fast, Mommy,' she repeated.   As we walked out the door and into the sunshine Reese said,

'Whew!  Mommy, my face is re ally hot.'

'Yes, my child,' I told her.  'that's a special emotion--  it's called call shame.'