Thievery

Sometimes I wonder what possesses people to steal things like a tortoise. A gas-can. Two rebar posts. For eight years we have been in this rotten neighborhood and have had probably a couple thousand dollars worth of things stolen from us. At least 5 different bikes, including a vintage cruiser, a motorized mountain bike, and a bike my dad had just invested over $300 in for my brother. My scooter, I think one lawn mower, and other random things we've had in our yard.

My brother often uses his lawn mower and weed whacker on our lawn, some people who pay him for his services, and he takes the weed whacker up to my grandmother's house every weekend to help maintain her lawn. He uses those tools to keep our lot in compliance with park "policy" so we don't get nasty notices stuck to our door. Last week, the gas can was stolen, and last night, the weed eater was. Now I know we probably should have had them locked up, instead of just behind the porch. But the thing is, why should we HAVE to do this? And why were these people wandering around in our yard, more than 30 feet from the public "sidewalk"?

My aunt has recently had to move out of her house due to lack of funds and a bed-bug infestation, so we are watching her parakeet and desert tortoise for her until she and her son get back on their feet. Last Saturday we noticed that the tortoise was missing, and so was my brother's 5-gallon gas can, full of gas. WHO STEALS A TORTOISE!? Really? What's worst about that is that it's not even something of ours that was taken. My aunt was very understanding, and through some kind of twisted luck, one of our least favorite neighbors found the tortoise today after nearly chopping it up with his lawn mower. So that's one thing...

But the weed-eater is what really pisses us off. Whoever is taking things from us has to know what's there and has to be waiting and watching for the opportunity. And it's not like we can afford a new one. We very much can't. It's just so upsetting, especially because my brother works so hard and does such a good job.

This evening we were sitting on our porch just surveying everything left on our patio, and we realized that our flag rebar were missing (On the one year anniversary of the 9-11 attacks, a nearby city put together what they called "The Healing Field". They set up nearly 3,000 flags in a field in memory of those who lost their lives. After the event, the flags went up for sale, and we purchased two. They came each with a section of rebar to pound into the ground and support the flagpoles). That sent up a red light for us. There's some sleazy guy who lives a few streets down who has a junk truck. A few months ago, my brother's favorite bikes were stolen, right before our eyes (we watched this kid ride off on it, and couldn't run fast enough to get him), and one day while he was walking home from a friend's house, he noticed what looked like his bike frame stuck in the heap of scrap metal. He informed the man who owns the truck and looked through, finding his exact bike, minus pedals, handlebars, a seat, gears, and everything else. He didn't find the other bike, but this guy has unsettled us for quite some time. He constantly has a heaping pile of metal stuff and scrap on his trailer, and frequently things don't look like they had been on the curb for being thrown out, if you know what I mean. So the fact that METAL had gone missing again makes us wonder if he didn't come sauntering back onto our patio, and left with the hefty metal bars and a nice weed-eater.

We've filed a complaint with management, but they don't seem to care. The police do little if anything at all. We're supposed to have a neighborhood watch going on, but I think all anyone watches for in this neighborhood is an opportunity to snatch something up. It's quite upsetting because we were using this piece of equipment to comply with their expectations of the residents. We are one household of few who actually respond to clean-up notices  with a concentrated effort to CLEAN UP. All these other homes have litter and junk piled up around their entire lot, broken down cars in the driveway, and lawns full of weeds and grass up to your knees. For having to put our own money into our trash cans, it also sucks that the garbage men have broken both of our cans. When we get that paper taped to our front door, we mow the lawn, weed, gather up any trash that may have accumulated and make it right. And it seems like nobody else does.

And I can't help but wonder if we get picked on and screwed over because we aren't hispanic. I really do.