TheWay It Was Then - Part #20

 

June 12, 2024

 

August 19, 1983

On being a statistic …

I swore I wouldn’t write about this.

Enough people have listened to the Jeanne’s-house-was-hit story already.

I’ve talked so much about the horrible experience of finding that someone has been inside your home, rummaging through your possessions and taking things precious to you that I’m nearly talked out.

Suffice it to say, it’s a sickening feeling.

Now to the aftermath.

Once you, the victim, come to grips with the fact that you’ll probably never again see some of those cherished items like Grandmother’s engagement ring and childhood memory-laden charm bracelets, you have to deal with some pretty strong emotions.

And that’s the part that hangs around the longest.

First, and as far as I’m concerned foremost, is the anger.

Pure and simple rage.

The kind of anger that penetrates to the core, where you’ve never felt such strong feelings of violence. If the perpetrator of the burglary of my home had been brought in to face me during the initial hours of the shock, I can honestly say I wouldn’t have been responsible for what I did. There was hot fury in my heart. And it hasn’t cooled a lot in the seventy-two hours since I discovered the crime.

Friends who have had the same experience tell me it takes a long time to fade away.

The second emotion is sadness. A deep-down feeling of betrayal and violation that is really hard to put into words.

Sure, I’ve read about how victims of crime feel sullied, feel that their rights, indeed their fundamental rights to privacy and ownership have been violated, but it was impossible to truly comprehend until it happened to me.

This is my home. These are my things. This is where I live with my children!

How dare anyone intrude?

Now, whenever I open a drawer or a closet, whenever I dust over where a precious object once stood, I remember that some calloused criminal was there too.

It makes me ill to think of the things I’ve cared for and loved being tossed, like so much junky merchandise, into a grab bag for quick resale.

It makes me shudder to think I might actually know the person or persons responsible.

It makes me furious to contemplate the possibility that someone carefully planned to deprive me of things that are of value only to me.

It helps me to understand all those people whose personal horror stories I’ve listened to without fully comprehending the sense of loss, of devastation, of sadness.

Like too many before me and many who are still to experience this tragedy, I’m imagining my grandmother’s engagement ring, my stepfather’s high school class ring, my locket from Dad that was a Christmas, 1945 gift …. Those things that were part of me, melted down to provide a day’s worth of drugs for someone with no conscience, no conception of right or wrong.

Like so many before me and many who are still to come, I lie awake at night wondering how could put someone else through this kind of personal hell … for money!

And like too many before me, I’ve learned something that those who could still become victims might benefit from if they’d take heed … even though I never did.

Those valuable little things you so casually leave at home (after all it is your home!) could very easily be gone sometime when you open the front door, so for the sake of having something to bequeath to your children, keep them carefully and cleverly hidden.

You may, as I did, look at some of the things you own and think, “No one will ever take this …  it’s worthless to anyone but me!”

Wrong.

Even the worthless things, the insignificant things, get swept into the loot bag when the top of a dresser is cleaned off.

Even if those things are really important only to you, the lawless members of our society couldn’t care less. They’ll be gone along with everything that can be sold.

Our homes don’t really shelter us anymore.

We’re vulnerable to those to whom one’s privacy or ownership is meaningless.

We are surrounded by people that our system is powerless to control.

Being a statistic has taught me all of this very quickly. It’s been equivalent to all the civics lessons a school could dream up.

It’s left me knowing that the law abiding are at the mercy of the lawless.

It’s left me sad and fearful.

Most of all, it’s made me angry.

All that … nothing more than the price of membership in a growing club of crime statistics.

The Way It Was Then - Part #19

Wednesday, June 12, 2024

 

August 12, 1983

Just a holler away …

Our society is getting colder.

I’ve watched the progress of the dehumanizing of neighborhoods with interest and a sense of loss, wondering at where it will all lead and remembering  how it was before we began shutting one another out.

Just this weekend, one of the possible causative factors came through to me loud and clear.

It was Sunday evening in an older section of North Wildwood. There was a slight ocean breeze drifting through the trees and it seemed like every home on the block had people congregated on the porches … sitting on railings, rocking in wicker chairs, lying back on steps. Typical lazy way to end a hot summer day.

Riding along Pacific Avenue south, the neighborhoods changed and gave way to new construction … neat ranch homes, modest two-story houses and magnificent modern edifices with skylights, roof-to-floor windows and an airy, shore look.

No people in sight. Not a one.

Why?

No porches!

Almost without exception, the newer neighborhoods contained homes with the lounging areas in back, hidden in many cases by fences required to enclose swimming pools, or just desired for “privacy.

Maybe we’ve “privacy-ed” ourselves out of closeness with our neighbors!

Maybe we’re cutting ourselves off from the human factor that used to make day-to-day living bearable.

Sure, the decks and porches in the rear of the homes are beautifully landscaped and leave the fronts uncluttered, but by being behind everything, they also effectively make the houses look uninhabited … perhaps the intended effect.

In the old days (not uniformly, however, the good old days!) the front porch was the hub of the neighborhood.

My grandmother and grandfather used to while away literally hours on their front porch, a long narrow structure (I remember having to step over the feet to get to the end of the swing to join them) that looked out on the street and the porches of our neighbors. As each family took up their positions on the porches, greetings were called across yards and roadways. Comments on the heat of the day were exchanged. News of the kids or the grandkids traveled up and down the street. Occasionally, there were matters of sufficient import to warrant someone’s leaving the comfort of his or her porch to walk next door for an extended, non-yelling conversation.

Mostly, though, the older folk rocked, knitted, puffed on a pipe or daydreamed while the younger set played out front, rode bikes up and down the streets or got a baseball game or hopscotch going with other neighborhood kids.

It was quiet, friendly and close knit.

Without the porches, people would have missed the contact with each other that was fostered at dusk.

It would be like it is today in many of our neighborhoods.

Robert Frost wrote a poem one about how fences keep people from each other.

He wasn’t big on fences.

I’m not mad about decks and backyard retreats.

I’m for the return of the front porch … swing, rocker and all.

It seems to be one part of the old days that might be good to bring back.

A part that brought people together … instead of the increasing isolation we see today.

A part that helped put the “good” in old days.

 

 

The Way It Was Then - Part #18

 

August 5, 1985

Where are you going? - For Erica, Pam, Jill and Chip

The three of them made quite a picture.

There was only one mirror in the room, a smallish, old and not-so-clear oval mirror ringed by faded wood.

 They stood, in neat vertical tiers, carefully getting ready for an evening out.

 On the boardwalk in Wildwood.

 Amid literally thousands and thousands of people.

 In virtual darkness.

 Where no one, but no one, gives a good hoot how they look.

 That’s called adolescence.From hand to hand went the brushes, the combs, the blush, the eye shadow, the lip gloss (none of them being ready for actual lipstick quite yet).

 Every once in a while, one would ask, “How do I look?” and be greeted with a chorus of approving replies.

 The earrings were carefully checked to be sure they coordinated with tonight’s outfit … there was some swapping on that score to ensure more perfect results.

 There were moans that hairdos were too short, too long or lifeless because of the shore humidity.

 There were complaints now and then that one hogged the mirror too long, leaving the other two unable to get a clear view of the results of the grooming.

 The process took nearly a half hour.

 Just yesterday (or so it seemed, anyway) the three of them were putting puzzles together and playing with Barbies.

 They were gingerly testing waves and building sand castles.

 They were riding in kiddie rides at the amusement piers and darting with fright at the sight of the made-up Dracula’s castle inhabitants.

 They were little people, doing little people things … bound to stay that way forever.

 Somehow, without my knowing it, they became bigger people. Older, prettier, wiser (in the healthy sense of wise) and more sophisticated.

 They ride the waves and sit in loungers at the edge of the surf, sand castles only an occasional pastime.

 They spurn even the more challenging rides on the piers, looking for those with a genuine thrill.

 Dracula’s castle long-since lost its capability to produce dread … it’s boring now, the trappings of horror not convincing these world-wise youngsters.

 Time hasn‘t stood still at all. I don’t feel its passage at all, in fact, until I look at them, listen to them and realize how vastly they’ve changed.We walked behind them on the boardwalk on Saturday night, marveling. The three girls, long-legged and beautiful, the young man with broad shoulders and rippling muscles, and we wondered when they changed.

 When did they start being too big for being carried on the shoulders, or cradled in the arms as the weariness of too much fun brought instant, deep sleep.

 Somewhere along the way, the little ones grew up on u.

 They slipped from babyhood to teenage as we took their childhoods for granted.

 Now they need to walk fast than we, leaving us behind to watch their progress.

 They’re outgrowing their need for us.

 Hopefully, they’re taking the good things we’ve given them along as their helpmeets.

 Heaven knows they’ll need them.