Fear

When the Honda died yesterday I should have known that this was not going to be a good day. I should have just gone back to back and started new this morning. Last night dinner with our neighbor was wonderful. She cooked the most wonderful pasta dish. Infact, I went out this morning to get all the indgredients to make it sometime this week. It was wonderful. After dinner we went out to her back deck to talk. We were probably out there for 45 minutes when there was this horrible explosion. Lynilu's dog Ali had been acting nervous for the paset 30 minutes due to people in the way distance setting off small fireworks. Well, this was about 100 feet from us and it was the loudest noise I have ever heard. My first thought was a house had exploded. Sitting out on Lynilu's deck you are looking at the side and back yard to our house. As we very carefully walked in the backyard we noticed a huge smoke cloud in front of our house. I wasn't sure what was going on.

I went inside and told Lynilu that I was going to call the police. Even if it was just a firework I was too scared to walk back over to our house. Living in the neighborhood that we live in it could have also been a gun, possibily a rifle. I was just scared. Finally, 10 minutes later the police showed up. We noticed a smell of gun powder coming from the storm drain right in front of our house. So, we concluded that some jackass had thrown either a homemade firecraker or a M80 in the drain. Stupid fuck.

Laura and I retired for the night and went into our house. All our babies were looking at us like, "what the fuck was that?" This explosion was right in front of our house, so we are talking maybe 30 feet to our house. I can't imagine what they were thinking when it went off. Walking around the inside of our house I didn't feel safe. I felt like running as rar as I could. I just wanted to get away. I was even thinking about maybe going down to Laura's parents house for the night. I decided instead to take one of my "stress" pills. I got these pills from my Dr. about a month ago due to the anxiety I have been feeling. I was watching the clock waiting for this little pill to kick in. It seemed like it took forever.

I do not feel safe in my neighborhood. Now, we have wonderful neighbors that live around us, but I think everyone was gone last night. Because after the explosion there was no one around. Most of them would have come outside to see wha was going on. I think that made me nervous as well. I was praying all night last night that there would not be another explosion like that. I don't think my nerves could take another one.

I want to move. The neighborhood that we live in at one time was very, very nice. The last couple of years (5 or so) we have had a lot of "thugs" move in that make this neighborhood less deseriable every day. I don't care if we have to move to a smaller house. I just want out of this neighborhood. It's not fair that I feel I can't go out afer dark. Just sitting on our back deck I don't feel safe.

One comfort I have is the alarm system. One touch of a button and the police will be called. When we had it installed a few months back we had a touch pad put in our bedroom. Before it was down by the front door. I always thought if I needed to press the panic button I would have to go downstairs to press it.

I think I feel silly for the way I reacted last night, but I was so scared. And I keep hearing that explosion in my head. Let's hope for a quieter evening tonight.