I was robbed this past Monday, or mugged maybe. I AM OKAY. (There is no way to say "I was robbed" without causing a lot of alarm in people. I really appreciate everyone who's reached out to me and who reads this who has a similar reaction. It is alarming. In the interim I can only tell you, I am okay.) The guy did not physically assault me, the cops actually already recovered my cell phone, I'm basically out a wallet and an inconvenient number of cards. As I have been telling people around where I live locally, if I had to be mugged, I've had really the best version of that experience. I'm anticipating someone's gonna want to hear the story and I can't blame you, so the condensed version of it is I was walking home alone at night from the bar, on a relatively well-traveled and lit path maintained by the local university. I was listening to my music and didn't see the guy approach; I think he'd been waiting for someone to come his way. He had a bandanna over his face and a gun. He got my wallet and cell phone. I could barely comprehend what happened as it was happening. There are actually police phone boxes on the trail that I could have used immediately, but all I could think was that I needed to go home and cancel all my cards. I threw up an angry/warning Facebook status, my sister and dad saw it, contacted me, got me to contact police, dad came over, we did the cop thing that night. And yesterday they got my phone back to me and I got a new license already. Several people who live nearby have reached out and told me if I ever am alone at night walking home again that they will come get me no problem, or if I need anything ever let them know, etc. And, thankfully, I'll be out of this place in a month. I honestly feel as if living here at this place has just been one shitty thing after another just piling on. I went to the basement today and it looks like a pipe is leaking in a fairly significant way. Except I'm leaving on a flight to Georgia in less than an hour. I'm going to take a video, text it to my roommate, and hope he deals with it seriously. On the bright side, maybe the water in the basement will prevent any dryer fires while I'm gone. Right? It's weird, it's like the most I can say about the experience (was i mugged, or robbed? I feel like mugging implies physical injury) is I came out of it with more XP. I guess I generally try to be positive about things but really, the most positive things I can say is that, having experienced something like this, I'll be a little more aware of "what to do" if anything similar ever happens in the future, and, "well, that was an experience. I guess I've lived a little more now." On the flip side one of my poems got nominated for a Pushcart Prize last week which was really, really flattering and encouraging. I did kind of tell you guys that in the loneliness thread, I confess.
I got mugged last year so I know how you feel. There were four of them (2 guys and 2 girls in their 20s; the main aggressor was my size and one guy was way bigger). I am a brawler historically but for some reason I just had a really bad feeling about the situation. They took a 12 pack of beer I had just bought and some $900 headphones. But not my iPod or phone? I was on a bridge so all I did was walk to the end of the bridge and called 911. One cop showed up at my end and another showed up at the other. Busted. It turns out I was right about the main guy. He had a record for pretty much every violent offense short of murder. Assault, sexual assault, assault with a deadly weapon, assaulting a police officer, etc. My favorite is that the caretaker of a cemetery showed up one morning and the chapel had been broken into and trashed. But there the guy was passed out on a pew. He got three months. And is probably back in again. Glad you are OK and congrats on the nomination!
Firstly, glad you're okay and are putting a positive spin on things. Secondly, I can't believe people risk getting caught for armed robbery, over robbery, when the maximum they are getting is a phone and a wallet. I don't know how it works where you live, but I think this automatically increases the standard minimum sentence in the UK from 1 year to 4 years - and it doesn't matter if it's a real or imitation firearm. Also, the level of police response and effort is going to be significantly different so they are far more likely to get caught.