Mean People Suck **updated

What is it with me and psychos? Remember this incident? Or this one? Today another one went off on me in the school parking lot of all places. It happened after school. I was corralling all my kids plus the neighbor boy into the van. I went around to the other side to buckle Little Miss in and the boys were all filing in on the other side. Little Man got kind of shoved to the back of the pack and in the process, got pushed up against the Explorer's driver side door that was parked in the space next to us (a handicap space, I might add, even though no one in the car was handicapped). His backpack rubbed on the door (he had been at speech therapy so that is why he had it). The next thing I know I see the lady inside pushing open her door and kind of reaching out kind of swatting at Little Man (she didn't touch him - that would have been a whole new ballgame) and yelling to get off her car. This all happened in about 3 seconds.

I look up and she has gotten out of her car and is literally yelling at me through the other side of the van, "YOU NEED TO WATCH YOUR KIDS! HE WAS SCRATCHING MY CAR ALL UP! GIVE ME YOUR NAME AND NUMBER! GIVE ME YOUR NAME AND NUMBER!!!" I was shocked and I was pissed. I snapped the last part of Little Miss' car seat in, told the boys to finish getting in the van, looked at her and said, "You can talk to me in a civil manner." She yelled again, "GIVE ME YOUR NAME AND NUMBER!!"  I said still calmly but, shall we say, firmly, "You better get out of my face and when you can talk to me civilly I will talk to you."

She huffed off across the cross walk to get her daughter. I considered just leaving, but she was such a psycho I was scared she would stalk my kids at school or something to track me down. So I found a notebook and pen in my car and waited for her. I was seriously biting my tongue and trying to be the civilized one, especially since I had a car load of kids with me. I was so shocked she was acting that way that I wasn't really thinking straight.

She got her daughter and put her in the Explorer and then comes around the side of it and yells again, "GIVE ME YOUR NAME AND NUMBER RIGHT NOW!" I said, "You need to calm down. First of all, he is four years old. Don't you start yelling at him and then get all in my face. IF there is any damage (*which there wasn't - I looked), I will be happy to discuss things with you from that point on and take responsibility for it, but the way you are handling things is way out of line."

"GIVE ME YOUR NAME AND NUMBER!"
"You can talk to me with some manners."
"GIVE ME YOUR NAME AND NUMBER!!!"
"You calm down or we WILL handle this a different way."
"I will report that you are harassing me."
"(slight laugh) What is your problem?"
"What is YOUR problem?"
"I told you I will give you my information and take care of it if needs be so why are you still yelling at me? What is your name?"  She just stood there glaring at me.  I go, "Because what are you going to do? Call me up and say, "hi, I'm the lady that bitched you out in the school parking lot?" What is your name?"
She finally told me and I handed her the paper with my name and number on it. I said, "If there is damage you can send the estimates to me. But don't you ever yell at me or my son again. It is a car. He is a 4 year old child that made a mistake."

She grabbed the paper and screeched out of the parking lot. As I was pulling out a man flagged me down and handed me a piece of paper and said, "Here is MY name and number and I am happy to be a witness for you. I saw it all from the beginning." I thought that was really nice of him and was extremely appreciative. I'm sure there are other witnesses, like the teachers that were serving as the crossing guards and anyone else within a 1/2 mile radius that heard her screaming.

After I left I started thinking of all the things I should have done (like take a picture of the door with my cell phone or say, "Fine. Let's call the police and settle it right now. I'm sure they would be happy to note you are parked illegally in a handicap spot.") But I was so taken back I couldn't really think of anything except that I didn't want her to go crazy and start shooting me and everyone else in the school parking lot - because she really was THAT kind of crazy.

I guess I will see if I ever see or hear anything from her again. I'm still pretty shaken up about it. My boys were appalled. And I feel really bad for her daughter. I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, but when she came back and was STILL yelling at me like a psycho that kind of went out the window.

**Update: Tonight there was a message on my voice mail from the lady. This is word for word what she said:

 "This is the lady who you talked to in the parking lot. Um, I didn't mean to yell at your son. I'm sorry I did that and I didn't mean for it to go as...um, for it to escalate. But, uh, I can, uh...I checked out my car... um, um, and it all ... um, uh ...don't worry about it. Bye."

I guess I can rest easy that I am not going to get stabbed in my sleep tonight. Or maybe it's a ploy to make me take my guard down?? Hmmm... jk. I'm glad I wasn't here to get the phone call, but I am also glad she owned up and called to apologize. Hopefully this is truly the end of it.