Part I

There is this moment of utter panic, when your eyes have trouble convincing your brain of what they're seeing, as if the sight they're taking in cannot possibly be real, and you need a moment to regroup.

Or in my case, shriek like a banshee.

"Stop!" (I contemplated saying "in the name of the law," but even in my frantic state I was able to stop myself from being that lame.) "That's my SON! Get OFF OF HIM!"

As I'm gimping along like a damn side show act in my heels and too big pants, I'm wondering what the hell I'm going to do next. How do I fend off this child snatching barbarian one handed? I cannot conceivably set Ella on the floor, quick grab a book on street fighting techniques, absorb the contents and then put them to use. There just isn't that kind of time. Unfortunately, the only thing I know about self defense is that one episode of the Golden Girls I watched where Dorothy and Blanche take a class about kicking men in the groin and screaming, "that's my purse!"

Never having been kicked in the groin, I'm not an expert on the subject, but I don't think it affects women in quite the same way.

Meanwhile, as I'm making my spastic Hop Along Sally way toward this woman who probably has kidnapped and eaten countless children without ever being caught, I'm wondering, is there a reason people are looking at me kind of pityingly? Like I'm nuts? I'm not the one who cannibalizes babies here!
Instead of, like, helping me, they stand watching this scene unfold. It's like the twentieth time this year I've wondered if I live in the damn Twilight Zone.

Finally, I reach her. (Lord, but Barnes & Noble is a long damn store.) Breathless from my little fat girl ballet across the building, I still try to sound as un-pathetically out of shape as possible. It's important that she thinks I can round house kick her Chuck Norris style if she pushes me. I'm sure she gets the memo, because when I snarl at her to "hand. him. over." she complies almost immediately.

Then she mutters something about, "just trying to help," takes two girls by the hand (she was pretending they were hers, but I'm pretty sure she was just taking them out to fatten them up before throwing them in the oven at her candy cottage in the woods) and sweeping away like Miss Offended Dignity Pants.

Pray excuse me, but picking up a child you've never seen before and holding him in your arms even as he struggles and his mother is careening about the store yelling at you to get your meathooks off? Yeah, not actually acceptable, thanks! Am I grateful she stopped him from leaving the store and running into the parking lot? Sure. But I don't know how to reclaim those twenty or so years she shaved off my life when I thought she was going to abscond with him and leave me to posting "have you seen this child" posters on every tree from here to kingdom come.

As it stands, I suppose at the end of the day, she deserves my thanks. So...

Dear Woman Whom I Will Concede is Unlikely to be a Cannibal (but we can't be sure),

Thanks for your, um, gulp, "help". It was really really far outside the realm of a socially acceptable thing to do, but I suppose it was preferable seeing him stopped by you (again in a totally inappropriate and over the top manner, ahem) than by, say, a car speeding through the parking lot. That's the only reason I'm saying "thanks" quite frankly. Because really? It wasn't necessary to heap burning coals upon my head by bringing me my purse and assorted sundry crap from the back of the store while I was desperately trying to make a graceful as possible exit. And you know how you were so nice to me about the whole thing and actually got me to snicker at myself a little over the whole incident? Uh huh. Totally the outside of enough.

Best,
Woman Whom You Would Have Wished Would Go as Easy on You as Chuck Norris if the Need Should Have Arisen