It has now been a week since the break in and I'm still reluctant to leave my house. Of course, I have to - I have to go to work, I have to walk Max, I have to go to the store, I have to go to the gym. (That last one might seem odd to those who don't understand my total commitment to my workout regime, but, yes, it is necessary!)
I've heard nothing from the police about the case and, I suspect that even though I was able to present them with a traceable piece of evidence in the form of a dropped pager, I doubt if the lead was followed up on. It makes too much sense.
So, in the meantime, I make sure all of my doors are always locked and I've taken to hiding certain objects in unlikely places...just in case.
Of course, I had to spend quite a bit of time away from the house this weekend because it was the Columbia Festival of the Arts and the Boone County Art Show - the Big Event of Columbia cultural life. The festival itself is your basic tents and pavilions with mass produced "art by the yard" and pottery stands and open mike poetry readings and funnel cakes and sidewalk drawing, etc. and etc and etc. The Boone County Art Show, on the other hand is a two day exhibition of up to two works by local artists, both professional and amateur. There is usually quite a variety of work on display in the bank where the exhibition is held. And that was certainly the case this time around.
I entered an acrylic painting (photo to be added to my website soon) and an ink drawing. Neither work garnered any remarks to my knowledge. The top prize was taken by a worthy piece (a woman's corset made completely of glass) yet, many works that received prizes and the nebulous "Honorable Mention" seemed poorly executed and conceptually trite. Sour grapes? Maybe. But there were many, many works that I would have chosen over mine to have received recognition that got none. To me it seems a case of the politics of aesthetics.
But, there's no rest for the wicked. I have three paintings to finish by this coming Thursday and I must take down the show at the Columbia Realtors Association offices and install eight works at the Boone County Hospital. And then I have to have three more works done by the next weekend for an AIDS benefit.
So, by virtue of the fact that my life continues in spite of last week's violation, I leave my house regularly. I leave my home basically defenseless to the ravages of people that care only for themselves and do not see the emotional damage that they do by raping someone else's property. The world continues to spin and my mind and its perceptions continue to develop. Soon, perhaps, I will look back at a recent event in my life and wonder "who was that man, that boy, that experienced that? Why did he react that way? Is there hope for him?"
Monday, September 26, 2005
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
A Violation
I discovered it last evening when I was looking for my gym bag so I could go work out. My daily ritual at Gold's has turned into a great stress reliever and I look forward to either lifting those weights or tackling the treadmill with my favorite workout music being pumped into my ears with my handy-dandy portable CD player. (The current favorite is "Relayer" by YES.) And I suppose I should have been tipped off when I noticed an old book bag laying on the floor in the living room that had previously been upstairs, or by the fact that the back door was slightly ajar. I passed it off thinking that Max had gotten into the closed room upstairs and pulled out the bag and the back door has never been super secure. But, when I realized that my gym bag was nowhere to be found I checked the trunk of the car and then ran back into the house, knowing that it HAD to be somewhere in plain sight. I mean, I use it every day!
Then it struck me. I glanced around the room. All of my DVDs were gone. I ran upstairs. My change bucket was gone as were a few pairs of pants (nice ones - they still don't fit, but I had just laundered them in anticipation of being able to fit into them again in a few weeks if I worked real hard.) Someone had rifled through my stuff. My house had been broken into and I had been robbed. I had been burgled.
For those of you to whom this has happened, you know the sequence of feelings: the hot flash of realization, the momentary fear of something un-nameable, the oddly placed anger and frustration, then a flood of paranoia: what else did they get? What personal things did they find, did they take - what personal information did they get? Are there any credit card receipts laying around?
At first, I couldn't find my camera but then realized that it was still on the tripod in the corner. The laptop computer was still there. A favorite pair of boots were still in the middle of the room and a few choice electronic gizmos were still laying around, seemingly untouched.
I went out and announced the situation to my neighbors, all of whom were outside doing chores. No one had seen or heard anything and they all claimed to have been around all day. Together we looked around the house for evidence of the intruder's entry. They had to have gotten in the back door, but to get to it they would have had to climbed the back deck fence. Difficult, but not impossible. And then, there, on the ground, my neighbor found a pager. Right near where it would have fallen had it been dropped by the burglar.
I called the police and within 30 minutes an officer was there. He was courteous and efficient. He took notes, photographed the crime scene and made a list of what had been taken. All told it was about $1000 worth of stuff. The officer then told me that he would fill out a report and it would go on a stack of other cases.
Do I feel any safer? No.
Then it began to rain. And it poured. And the skies roared with thunder, wind and an onslaught of sheets of late summer warmed water. The clouds were deep bluish - greenish grey and it seemed almost night time. I sat on my couch, the empty DVD rack in plain sight, feeling the sticky air around me and listening to the atmospheric battle outside. I was feeling exposed and violated.
At the apex of the storm I found the courage to walk calmly outside, lock the door, walk to the car and drive to the gym. I could barely concentrate on the workout. I was wondering how safe the house was during my absence. No one would try to break in during such a gully-washing of a storm. But, then, I realized that my own sense of reason did not apply to whomever had robbed me. So, I finished quickly and went home.
By then the clouds had finished crying and the sky was becoming lighter and the air, still thick with moisture, was blowing impotently across the debris that had been washed down and deposited in the streets by the deluge. Everything was different. My house was a mess and I felt vulnerable and unhappy and the desire to escape was edging up toward the forefront of my mind.
Then it struck me. I glanced around the room. All of my DVDs were gone. I ran upstairs. My change bucket was gone as were a few pairs of pants (nice ones - they still don't fit, but I had just laundered them in anticipation of being able to fit into them again in a few weeks if I worked real hard.) Someone had rifled through my stuff. My house had been broken into and I had been robbed. I had been burgled.
For those of you to whom this has happened, you know the sequence of feelings: the hot flash of realization, the momentary fear of something un-nameable, the oddly placed anger and frustration, then a flood of paranoia: what else did they get? What personal things did they find, did they take - what personal information did they get? Are there any credit card receipts laying around?
At first, I couldn't find my camera but then realized that it was still on the tripod in the corner. The laptop computer was still there. A favorite pair of boots were still in the middle of the room and a few choice electronic gizmos were still laying around, seemingly untouched.
I went out and announced the situation to my neighbors, all of whom were outside doing chores. No one had seen or heard anything and they all claimed to have been around all day. Together we looked around the house for evidence of the intruder's entry. They had to have gotten in the back door, but to get to it they would have had to climbed the back deck fence. Difficult, but not impossible. And then, there, on the ground, my neighbor found a pager. Right near where it would have fallen had it been dropped by the burglar.
I called the police and within 30 minutes an officer was there. He was courteous and efficient. He took notes, photographed the crime scene and made a list of what had been taken. All told it was about $1000 worth of stuff. The officer then told me that he would fill out a report and it would go on a stack of other cases.
Do I feel any safer? No.
Then it began to rain. And it poured. And the skies roared with thunder, wind and an onslaught of sheets of late summer warmed water. The clouds were deep bluish - greenish grey and it seemed almost night time. I sat on my couch, the empty DVD rack in plain sight, feeling the sticky air around me and listening to the atmospheric battle outside. I was feeling exposed and violated.
At the apex of the storm I found the courage to walk calmly outside, lock the door, walk to the car and drive to the gym. I could barely concentrate on the workout. I was wondering how safe the house was during my absence. No one would try to break in during such a gully-washing of a storm. But, then, I realized that my own sense of reason did not apply to whomever had robbed me. So, I finished quickly and went home.
By then the clouds had finished crying and the sky was becoming lighter and the air, still thick with moisture, was blowing impotently across the debris that had been washed down and deposited in the streets by the deluge. Everything was different. My house was a mess and I felt vulnerable and unhappy and the desire to escape was edging up toward the forefront of my mind.
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
Excuses
Okay. I have tried to start this entry five times now, each time with a different sentence and none of them have been satisfactory. The problem has been what it is that I want to say in that opening sentence. Do I want to grab the reader with a bold revelation? Do I want to slide into an interesting little anecdote without the reader realizing it? Do I want to apologize for not having made a post in so many days?
Yes.
I'm sorry that I haven't been writing much lately. There are a ton of excuses: Working too hard, out of town, complex events requiring my attention, laziness.
Amid all of the excitement that is my life I have found that, as soon as I stopped worrying about the painting that I'm trying to birth the process became much easier. It isn't finished yet, but I can see a direction. It hasn't stopped fighting back but it at least it is allowing me to get a punch in from time to time. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. Of course, it was about the time that the paint started allowing me to push it around effectively that I was informed that I had to have two extra paintings ready for an exhibition starting at the end of this month. With the painting I have to replace because it was sold and the one that I have to have ready for the Boone County Art Show, that brings me up to 4 paintings that need to be completed in the next few weeks. And then there is a drawing that I have to finish as well.
Swooooosh!
And, as they say, "When it rains, it pours." Now, I'm not one to kiss and tell...hell - there hasn't been any kissing involved! But, in the last few weeks I've gotten more responses to my online dating attempts than ever before! And what's more, some of the respondents have even been local - and they're (for the most part) nice, normal people! Wooo hooo!
In other news:
I haven't been able to work out since last Saturday. I'm feeling flabby again. Today - right after work I'm there.
I've finally started the process of getting the house refinanced. With luck I'll have it all wrapped up by the end of the month and maybe even have some extra cash to, well, buy some new clothes that fit!
I got my hair cut.
Yes.
I'm sorry that I haven't been writing much lately. There are a ton of excuses: Working too hard, out of town, complex events requiring my attention, laziness.
Amid all of the excitement that is my life I have found that, as soon as I stopped worrying about the painting that I'm trying to birth the process became much easier. It isn't finished yet, but I can see a direction. It hasn't stopped fighting back but it at least it is allowing me to get a punch in from time to time. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. Of course, it was about the time that the paint started allowing me to push it around effectively that I was informed that I had to have two extra paintings ready for an exhibition starting at the end of this month. With the painting I have to replace because it was sold and the one that I have to have ready for the Boone County Art Show, that brings me up to 4 paintings that need to be completed in the next few weeks. And then there is a drawing that I have to finish as well.
Swooooosh!
And, as they say, "When it rains, it pours." Now, I'm not one to kiss and tell...hell - there hasn't been any kissing involved! But, in the last few weeks I've gotten more responses to my online dating attempts than ever before! And what's more, some of the respondents have even been local - and they're (for the most part) nice, normal people! Wooo hooo!
In other news:
I haven't been able to work out since last Saturday. I'm feeling flabby again. Today - right after work I'm there.
I've finally started the process of getting the house refinanced. With luck I'll have it all wrapped up by the end of the month and maybe even have some extra cash to, well, buy some new clothes that fit!
I got my hair cut.
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