10 year anniversary
Every year on Epiphany, our church passes out chalk that has been blessed and little prayer cards so we can bless our houses. We say the prayer and then draw the "chi rho" (letter P on top of the letter X) surrounded by the year--2007. The first time I did that was 1997--the mark is still on my door. When I saw that today, I realized that it was 10 years ago that I was face to face with a burglar in my house.
It was the Saturday after Epiphany and it snowed that morning. I'd planned on going into work for a few hours and was driving down my street when a neighbor backed his car right into me. I couldn't get out of his way with the coating of snow on the ground so the car ended up damaged. So the day started out crappy and later that evening, we went out to dinner to try and cheer ourselves up. Aimee was still home from college and Mike was in highschool that night in January. We came home and I settled in to watch some TV. Tom and both kids were upstairs--Aimee was getting ready for a date, and Mike was hanging around and talking to her. I must have dozed off for a while, and when I woke up and glanced into the kitchen, I saw someone standing there. In my drowsiness, I tried to figure out who it was--too short for my husband, too heavy for my son...maybe Aimee's date was waiting for her to get ready, I thought. I got up and went into the kitchen to see that my "visitor" was certainly not waiting for his date--he didn't belong there at all and he had my purse under his arm. Now, the thing you have to know about me is, I'm NOT a risktaker. I'm non-confrontational and not at all physical. So I'm as amazed as anyone else that I screamed at him and chased him from my house...right out of my house. In fact, I didn't stop until I felt the ice cold driveway under my stocking feet. By then, my husband had come downstairs and ran out of the house too, actually running down the street.
The police came, and they did all they could, but the thief was never found. I had to go down to the police station at midnight to look at mug shots--believe me it was quite the experience. The funny thing was, I'd gotten a good, though incredibly brief look at the guy and gave a description but later, the image was no longer clear and I found myself looking at the mugshots and trying to fit my description to the faces there. Not the memory of what he looked like, but the memory of the description I'd given. I don't understand how witnesses claim they saw someone for a split second and can identify them without a doubt.
Remember the car accident from the beginning of this long story? Well that proved to be crappy timing. My car was not drivable and we couldn't rent a replacement even though the guy who hit me had a rental rider on his insurance--you need a credit card to rent a car and the thief had gotten not only my purse, but Tom's wallet. And still I was the brave little soldier. I'd cracked jokes at the police station. I'd regaled my coworkers with the story. I begged people to drive me places. I'd dealt with the credit card companies and the got a new drivers' licence at the DMV. I was as calm as could be--I usually am in a crisis.
Three days later, my checking account was hit for $100. We'd been misinformed by the bank that the account didn't need to be closed. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was when I fell apart. I cried for two hours over a lousy $100. I know that it was actually the violation hitting home, but I felt like an idiot.
You might ask what the worst part of all of this was. Was it the fear of the intruder in our home? Was it the misery of dealing with banks, stores, the Department of Motor Vehicles? Was it losing my grandmother's rosary beads--the most beautiful antique set that she'd brought with her from Italy? No. What happened next overshadowed all of that.
Two weeks later, an article appeared in our town weekly newspaper. "43 year old woman chases burglar from Peaceful Avenue home." Now, I ask you, why the hell did they feel my age was pertinant to the matter? That was the cherry on top of the sundae.
So that was my week....ten years ago.
It was the Saturday after Epiphany and it snowed that morning. I'd planned on going into work for a few hours and was driving down my street when a neighbor backed his car right into me. I couldn't get out of his way with the coating of snow on the ground so the car ended up damaged. So the day started out crappy and later that evening, we went out to dinner to try and cheer ourselves up. Aimee was still home from college and Mike was in highschool that night in January. We came home and I settled in to watch some TV. Tom and both kids were upstairs--Aimee was getting ready for a date, and Mike was hanging around and talking to her. I must have dozed off for a while, and when I woke up and glanced into the kitchen, I saw someone standing there. In my drowsiness, I tried to figure out who it was--too short for my husband, too heavy for my son...maybe Aimee's date was waiting for her to get ready, I thought. I got up and went into the kitchen to see that my "visitor" was certainly not waiting for his date--he didn't belong there at all and he had my purse under his arm. Now, the thing you have to know about me is, I'm NOT a risktaker. I'm non-confrontational and not at all physical. So I'm as amazed as anyone else that I screamed at him and chased him from my house...right out of my house. In fact, I didn't stop until I felt the ice cold driveway under my stocking feet. By then, my husband had come downstairs and ran out of the house too, actually running down the street.
The police came, and they did all they could, but the thief was never found. I had to go down to the police station at midnight to look at mug shots--believe me it was quite the experience. The funny thing was, I'd gotten a good, though incredibly brief look at the guy and gave a description but later, the image was no longer clear and I found myself looking at the mugshots and trying to fit my description to the faces there. Not the memory of what he looked like, but the memory of the description I'd given. I don't understand how witnesses claim they saw someone for a split second and can identify them without a doubt.
Remember the car accident from the beginning of this long story? Well that proved to be crappy timing. My car was not drivable and we couldn't rent a replacement even though the guy who hit me had a rental rider on his insurance--you need a credit card to rent a car and the thief had gotten not only my purse, but Tom's wallet. And still I was the brave little soldier. I'd cracked jokes at the police station. I'd regaled my coworkers with the story. I begged people to drive me places. I'd dealt with the credit card companies and the got a new drivers' licence at the DMV. I was as calm as could be--I usually am in a crisis.
Three days later, my checking account was hit for $100. We'd been misinformed by the bank that the account didn't need to be closed. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was when I fell apart. I cried for two hours over a lousy $100. I know that it was actually the violation hitting home, but I felt like an idiot.
You might ask what the worst part of all of this was. Was it the fear of the intruder in our home? Was it the misery of dealing with banks, stores, the Department of Motor Vehicles? Was it losing my grandmother's rosary beads--the most beautiful antique set that she'd brought with her from Italy? No. What happened next overshadowed all of that.
Two weeks later, an article appeared in our town weekly newspaper. "43 year old woman chases burglar from Peaceful Avenue home." Now, I ask you, why the hell did they feel my age was pertinant to the matter? That was the cherry on top of the sundae.
So that was my week....ten years ago.