So I'm sitting at work, updating various things about tonight's special election and some exciting news about two carjackings that happened on the same street within about an hour of each other, when my boss asks me if I'm wrapping up.
"Yeah, just waiting on video," I said, as I was still recording the late newscast.
"Well, when you leave, make sure someone walks out with you. You know, those two carjackings."
"Oh yeah!" I said. They had occurred rather close to the station, hadn't they?
Finally those two realities--the fact that there were carjackers out there, perhaps two groups of them, and the fact that I was far from home in the middle of the night and I was going to have to walk to my car--came together in my head, and slowly and steadily I began to freak out.
As I was clocking out, Female News Anchor made some comment to me about the election and I somehow managed to respond, though at that point I could care less about whether there was going to be a recount in the narrow victory of Broun over Marlow for the runoff with Whitehead. I wanted to get out as fast as possible. I hurried down the hall to the newsroom, which seemed oddly bright and cheery for 11:30 pm, and I gazed around at all the happy faces, looking for someone to escort me.
Jeremy came up the hall at that point, and he's a decent-sized guy, so I said, "Want to protect me from carjackers?" and he laughed and said sure and walked me to my car.
I thanked him and he started turning around too quickly for my comfort, so I practically flew around the car and jammed the key in and leapt into my seat. All around it was dark and quiet. Anyone could come running out of the night and try to take my car. And those carjackers, at least in the first incident, had a gun!
A car appeared on the road behind me then, so I left my headlights off lest the driver realize I was there and then, once it was past, flipped on the lights, slammed the car into gear, and jerked away from the side of the road.
The drive home was surreal. I decided to avoid my usual route, as that was the road where both carjackings had occurred, but the alternate route was dimly-lit and eerie. My eyes darted back and forth, looking for predators in the shadows. I stayed in the inner lanes whenever possible to make it more difficult for someone to suddenly run up alongside the car. When I came up on other vehicles, I tried to drive so that the drivers wouldn't be able to see into my car and tell I was a girl.
Every time I thought about relating my terror in writing, it threatened to overwhelm me, and I had to growl at myself and shake my head and force my hands not to grip the steering wheel.
Finally I pulled into my parking lot. But did I feel safe? After all, one of the carjackings happened in an apartment parking lot, and the other in a man's driveway. How could I think that anywhere was safe knowing that, even if both events had happened across town? They found the first car but not the second. If I could have driven across town in that time, so could they.
And of course, my usual spot right in front of our door was taken because I was so late in getting home, so I had to park a few doors down.
I decided to walk along the railroad ties holding our landscaping in place to get to the door, rather than walking around the cars in the parking lot. And it was with much paranoia that I fumbled to get my key in the lock.
But I'm home now. Home and safe. I suppose.
If my boss hadn't mentioned an escort, I probably wouldn't have even thought about the proximity of the carjackings to my workplace. But after she did, the fear consumed me. Funny, that.
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4 comments:
Wow, ack! And I always thought that your particular work area was a sleepy little "safe" place. Seems my third-grader impressions of the place linger with me still, huh? That's really scary, DO be safe; I'm going to remind everyone else of that same thing.
I've felt that kind of panic in similar situations, especially when I worked at the blood bank. That parking lot was a hotspot for break-ins, and still flares up occasionally, from what a friend there still tells me. I was leaving late at night, one night, when I realized that a LOT of that had been happening in our parking lot, and I was about to go walking out alone. I called someone to come watch me to my car, as I was alone at work. I had had the police dispatch number in my phone and on speed dial at the time, too, for an added sense of safety at work. I was lucky, though, and *TOUCH WOOD* my car was never broken into, and I was never confronted by anyone in the parking lot.
All of that makes me think of what it's like over here in England. ALL of the houses have awful, screamy alarms on them, but the general "street ettiquette" is to NOT go looking around at people's houses, and cars, and stuff like that. It's just a bunch of ironies. Another thing about here is, I feel very safe here, and I should, but I worry about all of y'all at home, and I feel guilty. Sure, there are illegal guns here, and truth be told, but NOT to start a debate, I'm more frightened of hearing about guns over here (referring to guns used in crimes, and those are most likely handguns, than hunting guns) than I am in the US, because the dynamics are SO different. Guns (handguns) are illegal here (hunters can have permits) whereas in the US they're NOT illegal, but it gets into sub-catagories, like some are stolen, possessed illegally for that or various other reasons which, by virtue of my having grown up in the USA, I'm more familiar with, having heard it on the news and in discussion my whole life. Things on the whole feel a tiny bit safer to me here, but then again, you hear of more physical violence and deaths resulting from such incidences here, than you do in the US, where intimidation factors seem to weigh in a bit more. The above ill-explained sentences, though, are my convoluted way of trying to say I feel guilty that these things are going on in the CSRA; I watch the Augusta news more now than I EVER did, and it scares me when bad things happen --as inevitably they will do anywhere-- and it really bothers me that I'm over here, and can't do anything about it over there. :(
Well, none of us can, really, unless we take up a new career in law enforcement. (Which I would have to say does not appear to be the thing for me. It's kind of funny now that when I was in high school I dreamed about being in the FBI.)
The crimes we tend to see near my work are armed robbery (normally down towards the downtown Augusta/highway end of that main strip where the carjackings happened). I hadn't heard of carjackings before. Even given the robberies, it did seem to me like where we are was safe, in general. But the mood of any place changes when night falls!
I highly recommend the site:
www.nononsenseselfdefense.com
Remember that these carjackings/muggings/attacks all require three things: Ability, Opportunity, and Intent. All three ingredients must be present for the attacker to even consider assaulting you.
Small things you can do to lessen your chances of attack:
- Be aware: If you are aware of your surroundings, you decrease the amount of Opportunities to attack you.
- Be confident: Attackers tend to think less of their Ability when the opponent appears confident
- Be smart: Stay in groups. Stick to the light. Check your car and surrounding cars before you get in. Make sure your ready to immediately enter your car. If anything hits your Spidey-Sense, go immediately someplace safe. All of these can hamper the AOI triangle.
WARNING: I am not a bodyguard. Nor am I amazingly cool. These are just some of my personal opinions on safety.
Are you sure you're not amazingly cool? I think that's debatable. :)
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