Mischief in Fred Meyer

     Of all the grocery stores in the Treasure Valley, Fred Meyer has the best kiddie-modified shopping carts. They are race cars, where the "engine" holds all the groceries, and the kid sits high above it, just in front of the parent. For those not familiar with Fred Meyer, it's kind of a big box department store.  It has a grocery section, furniture, clothing and outdoor stuff.  A step up from Walmart, if you will.
     Today Clara and I were doomed to spend at least three hours there.  My shopping list covered the backs of two mass-mailing envelopes whose contents I had tossed.
     My heart sank when I realized, upon arriving at Freddie's, that they had no race car shopping carts left.  The manager told me they'd pulled a bunch off the floor to service them. Doesn't she know they're not real race cars? I wondered. The manager saw my look and sighed.
     "The seat belts are being replaced."
     Ah yes.  I could see that being an issue.
     "I don't wannu! Up der! In tart!" Clara said when I told her she'd need to sit in the front of the cart.  Sitting of any kind, for any length of time, is hard for Clara, and probably lots of other kids her age.  Sitting in any grocery cart that is not modified to look like a race car, or a police car, or a fire truck, is excruciating.
     "I don't 'ike this," she reminded me, snacking from a bag of gummy rabbit treats I'd given her as a reward for letting herself be strapped in.
     We started down the hair aisle, which in Fred Meyer abuts the accessories and clothing section.  Clara took off her pink Crocs and blithely tossed them at a circular display holding marked-down blouses.  I picked up the shoes and put them in her diaper bag under the cart.  She snatched my shopping list from my hand and began to "read" it, first making muffled observations from the corner of her mouth and then archly lecturing a pretend audience from it.
      Her hair had lately gotten out-of-control, I noted.  She could use some barrettes.
     "Do you like these sparkly barrettes?" I asked, holding up a package for her inspection.
     "Oh....yes," she breathed.  "I need 'parkly betts."
     I gave the barrettes to her to hold, and continued into the clothing section.
     "I need purses!" Clara hollered, frantically gesturing towards a purse clearance rack.
     "You do not need a purse," I said, dexterously maneuvering the cart into Toddlers.
     After a few wrong turns, I finally found toddler underpants.  Clara wears a 2T.  Barely.  Most of them are still a little big.  The waist comes up over her belly button.  They're so cute they could break your heart.  I showed her a package with Minnie Mouse on them and another decorated with Dora the Explorer.
     "Choose which kind you want," I instructed.
     She held both to her chest. "Yes," she said. "Minnie Mouse pannies.  Dora pannies."
     "Which one?"
     "Yes."
     I finally had to slip the Dora underpants back on the rack when she wasn't looking.
     Next we went to look for some winter boots.
     "Yes.  I need 'inter boots," Clara said.  She found a boot display she felt needed to be re-arranged while I browsed.
     We made it back to the grocery section.  Clara was wriggling like a little worm in her seat.  I told her if she sat still through the store, I'd let her out to help me get produce.  Meanwhile, she had fun chucking things out of the cart and onto the floor.  A package of breath-enhancing bones for Wilbur.  A stick of deodorant.  I got stern with her and she stopped.
     An elderly lady brought me one of Clara's Crocs, which had fallen out of her diaper bag in the toothpaste aisle.
     Clara managed to get hold of a can of Woolite carpet cleaner and almost squirted herself in the eye with it.  She snuggled for a moment with a package of Maxi-pads from the back of the cart.  Then she dug an old receipt out of my purse and pretended it was a phone.
     We passed a display of fresh fish.
     "Mommy," she said, pointing to it.
     "It's fish," I replied.
     "I need fish!" she yelled.
     "Are you kidding me? You don't even eat the fish I cook for you at home."
     "I need fish!  I NEED FISH!"
     "Excuse me, ma'am, is this your sock?" a woman asked me, holding up one of Clara's striped stockings.
     "Yes, thank-you," I replied, glancing around for the sock's mate.  I found it draped across a package of frozen blueberries in the back of the cart.  "Clara, you need to wear your socks at least in here.  It's cold." And people will think I'm a negligent parent, I continued silently.
     Clara wiggled her naked toes delightfully.  "No, nai no nunnu socks."
     I gave her a greeting card with a picture of a puppy on it from a nearby display to distract her while I put her socks back on.  I mentally made a note to hold off on her new pink Crocs for a while longer.  They're still a little big, which is why she's able to take them off so easily.  If she hadn't taken them off, she wouldn't have surreptitiously removed her socks also. At the end of October in the frozen foods section of Fred Meyer grocery.
     We came to the artisanal cheeses, and I got a sample of gorgonzola.
     "Me! My turn!" said Clara.  I gave her a sample and waited.  In a few seconds I was rewarded.  A glob of half-chewed, slimy gorgonzola dribbled out of her mouth and onto her sweater.
     "I don't 'ike this," she said, squinting and grimacing.  In an effort to get all the taste out of her mouth, she let creamy white drool spill out of her lips and dangle in a long string down the front of the shopping cart.  I hurriedly found a Kleenex and wiped her sweater-front and mouth.  She used the Kleenex to wipe her tongue off.