I’m not your New Age type, but I must admit to believing that things happen for a reason. 

For instance, about ten days ago I discovered that my boxing gloves are missing. These gloves are BIG and RED and usually live in the trunk of my car. I have no idea where they disappeared to.

I tore apart my car searching for them---which is easy to do since it is a very small car---and searched my condo, which is almost as small as my car. No gloves. I had my husband retrace my efforts; still, no gloves. Ditto, my housekeeper.

So, the next day I went to the sporting goods store, but still, no gloves---at least not in my size. Finally, I gave up and ordered a pair from the inter-nets. I await their arrival...

which is why I didn’t have any boxing gloves in my car when I went to the market last Monday morning.  

Good thing.

It had been a great morning. Still riding high from my NY Giant’s sweet win over the Dallas Cowboys the prior evening, I had had a terrific workout: one hour of intense cardio, another of core training, and thirty minutes of weight training. The endorphins were flowing when I pulled into the Gelson’s parking lot. 

Then I saw it: the small square table set up at the entrance to the store, the posters of Obama sporting a Hitler mustache hanging off all four sides, the two morons standing behind the table trying to engage shoppers in “discussion.”

Let us put aside for a moment that I DO NOT GET THE ANALOGY. Instead, let’s concentrate on those flowing endorphins and the fact that this was the third of these political installations I had stumbled upon in as many days. Over the prior  weekend, I had encountered two in Malibu, both in front of local grocery stores. 

You might think that Malibu is an extremely liberal, even progressive, enclave. You would be wrong. Things to keep in mind about Malibu: (1) it is the home of the overtly religious and conservative Pepperdine University, whose dean of law is none other than Ken Starr; (2) not all the money in this town belongs to the entertainment types; and (3) even among the entertainment types, you find gun-waving, heehawing conservatives.

Still, I was shocked to see the number of people approaching the tables and engaging the protesters in friendly chit-chat, nodding in agreement. It was the day before Rosh Hoshona, and I wondered where was the anger and push back from Malibu’s large Jewish population at this trivializing of the Holocaust’s architect.

In both instances, I determined not to continue with my planned grocery shopping (which made for some pretty creative dinners, but that’s another story). Instead, I drove a few slow loops past the poster tables, my arm extended out the open sunroof, my middle finger doing the talking.

Childish, I know. Maybe even dangerous. 

Both incidents --- including my reactions---haunted me all weekend.

So, on Monday morning, when I encountered my third “Obama as Hitler” protest, it hit an already frazzled nerve.

Let me explain a little about the market I was shopping at that day.

Gelson’s is a fairly high-end chain which I have shopped at from the day I arrived in California. Back in the late 1970’s the chain went under the name Mayfair, and I shopped at its location in Los Feliz. Then we moved to Newport Beach, and I shopped the Gelson’s there. Then we moved to Studio City, and I shopped the Gelson’s there. Then Encino. Then Pacific Palisades. Then Calabasas. Now, living in Malibu, I shop the   Westlake store. 

Almost every day.

Get the picture? I’m a really, really good customer, and I consider it my market in that irrational way I sometimes get.

So, seeing the poster/protesters in Gelson’s parking lot was akin to seeing them in my own driveway. As my temper shot from zero to sixty in under five seconds, I thought of aiming my car straight at their flimsy folding table and accidently knocking it and the morons manning it to the ground. 

Instead, I screeched my car into a parking space, jumped out, grabbed my environmentally friendly tote bags and marched towards the table. 

“Despicable,” I shouted, still several feet away from the table. “Absolutely despicable.”

The morons behind the table stared at me, a look of surprise on their otherwise dumb faces.

“I don’t imagine you understand the meaning of the word despicable,” I continued, “but trust me, it isn’t a compliment.”

More surprised dumb looks in response.

“Too bad it’s not true.” I spit the words out between clenched teeth, wanting to scream, THE ANALOGY DOESN’T EVEN MAKE SENSE, but I held little hope for their knowing the definition of the word “analogy.” Then I let fly the worst invective...

”Too bad it isn’t true, because if it were, maybe first trains would take away the likes of you.”

With that admittedly hideous remark, I stormed into the store in a blind rage, grabbed the three items I needed (a package of chicken breasts, blueberries, and 3 grapefruit) and made my way to the cashiers. 

Truly, I am in this store almost daily. (It is a problem that my entire family suffers: a congenital inability to plan more than one meal at a time.) Therefore, I know these checkers in a how are you? how’s the family? how’s the dog? how’s your mom’s hip replacement? sort of way. So, the woman scanning my groceries knew exactly where I was headed with my rather pointed inquiry: “Isn’t this private property?”  

She looked at me, nodded her head towards the main entrance and said, “Isn’t that disgusting?”

Well, that certainly is one word for it.

We were off and running from there. Soon a chorus  of “disgusting,” “reprehensible,” “should be ashamed” (and, my favorite) “it doesn’t even make sense” was being sung up and down the check out stations. 

The manager rushed over, offering apologies and thrusting a letter from the president of the chain into my hands, which stated that Gelson’s personnel would make these demonstrators go away if they could, but they can’t. Not even the police, should they be so inclined, can make these morons disburse. In a split decision in 2007 the California Supreme Court upheld the rights of demonstrators (regardless of how weak their analogies) to gather in any area open to the general public, even if that area is private property and the owners object. 

I know. I know. Constitutional rights, first amendment, right to gather, blah, blah, blah. 

Let’s face it: I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I’d be all for that dither if I agreed with the protesters. 

OR, if the protests made some sense, offered up a legitimate argument, did more than just spew hate.

Still furious, I gathered my meager---but way too costly---purchases, and headed towards the exit---the same door I had recently entered. Stepping outside, I glared at the two nitwits at the poster table.

As one of the guys started to sarcastically offer up “have a nice day” (the use of said phrase being reason enough to wish him ill) I raised my hand to cut him off.

“Don’t I know you?” I asked. “Didn’t I see you before, when you used to be a skin head, neo-Nazi? That was you, wasn’t it? Or maybe I’m confused and it was somebody just like you.”

Based on the blank look on his face (think soft, doughy, senseless) I couldn’t count on his understanding my insult (let alone grasp the implied hypocrisy). So to be sure he didn’t think I was trying for polite conversation, I tossed an “eat shit and die” over my shoulder as I walked away.

Which brings me back to the boxing gloves. As I loaded the groceries into my trunk, I found myself wishing for my gloves. In a vision worthy of a canonization, I saw myself strapping on my gloves, walking back to the table, getting on my tippy toes, and socking the dumbshit right in the nose.