Feeling Violated
Sometime last night, after 2:30am, somebody went on a crime spree down our back lane. They smashed at least three car windows and tossed a fourth car. They rummaged through all the compartments in our car, but, since this isn’t the first time, we keep nothing of any real value in the car. Therefore, nothing was stolen.
However, there is the horror of waking up to that, the mess that needs to be cleaned up, the cost in time and money to get the car fixed, the inconvenience of driving with a broken driver’s side window. It has left us feeling violated. To think that someone damaged our personal property and then went through our stuff is horrible. There is always a human cost to crime, and one that I’m sure most criminals do not consider.
To make matters worse, I was outside at 230am and I purposefully checked the car to ensure it was locked because there was a lot of noise from people milling about after a social at the nearby community centre. I like having a park, community centre and school just out my back door, but I have to wonder now about the side effects. Normally, socials at the community centre are held by local people. It seems that wasn’t the case this time. I can only assume that these crimes occurred because of the secluded nature of our back lane and the fact that because there’s only one row of houses, nobody can see what you’re doing on the other side of the cars. You’d think someone might have heard something, but I know first-hand that all the houses are soundproof enough that you hear nothing.
Honestly, I’m at a loss as to what to do about this. How could I have prevented this? What if I had happened to be outside while this was going on? Maybe that would have made things worse. I’m by no means a small person, but even one reasonably tough thug could likely best me. If there had been more, I’d be in real physical danger. It seems nowadays that criminals are a lot more bold.
At the beginning of summer, I bought a new bike and it was stolen within six days. At that time, I bought the parts to put a motion sensitive security light on the back of the house and the back of the garage. I’ve installed the one on the back of the house, but I need to do some wiring and stuff to get the one on the back of the garage. I guess that will be my project for the day.
This makes me wonder, though, how far do I have to go to protect my property? What’s next, a patrolling security guard for the neighbourhood? I don’t know the answer. I wish I did. What I do know is that I’ll be sleeping a little less soundly for the next while. Looking out the window more often. Keeping an eye out for anything suspicious. And eventually, these feelings of insecurity will fade and things will go back to normal. Until the next time…
- Dave