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Have you ever been in real danger?
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<blockquote data-quote="susiestar" data-source="post: 730798" data-attributes="member: 1233"><p>When I was a kid, my uncle was a volunteer for the ambulance and fire squad for the little towns he lived in. I lived in a neighboring town around a big city in OH. He and my dad were both safety crazy, so we had all kinds of rules for who would pick us up in an emergency, and all kinds of drills for fires, etc.... When I was 11, I was walking home from the library about a mile from home one day. I had my nose in a book as I walked, as usual. A man came by in a car and told me that my dad was injured at work and Uncle B sent him to pick me up to take me to the hospital to join my family. I looked at him and stared for a second. Then I yelled NO NO NO and ran to a house nearby. I was at a corner and couldn't run forward to get away, but I acted like I knew the people in the house and they were home. I did know them, and I knew they were not home.</p><p></p><p>He sped away very fast. I ran home (I was maybe a block away). I called Grandma to see if everyone was okay. When she answered and wasn't upset, I didn't tell her what happened. I didn't tell ANYONE about it. </p><p></p><p>In my family, I was the one who was "too excitable". I expected them to tell me I made it up or blew it out of proportion. That is what they told me when my brother come home stumbling drunk and throwing up. That is what they told me when he was smoking pot. Those were the big safety things in our world, so I figured they wouldn't listen to me on this. I put it out of my mind and buried it until I had my own child.</p><p></p><p>I was watching some Oprah episode while fixing a pair of Wiz' pants when he was a few month's old and it brought this up. I can still see the guy's car and smell his nasty cigarettes. When I described him to Uncle B, he knew who he was, but couldn't remember his name. It was a man he worked with who got very angry over something at work that Uncle B did. The guy swore to hurt Uncle B, and at the time Uncle B didn't have his own child. </p><p></p><p>I did safety drills and had a secret word with my kids so that no stranger could pick them up.</p><p></p><p>When Jess was born we lived above a family that was horrible. I think the guy was a drug dealer supplying the local cops because even when we SAW drug deal go down, the cops could not care less. Plus we saw him with the cops more than a few times, so we were afraid to call them. Then New Years Eve happened. The guy got really wasted. I saw him outside with a handgun. He was waving it around, yelling about something, mostly just ranting and raving. He would not let us down the stairs to get past him, so we could take the kids to a hotel where it would be safe. We spent the night in the bathtub (it had an old cast iron tub, so it was safer than anywhere else in the apartment) holding the kids. He fired that gun off several times. One round went through his floor and into the neighbor downstairs' apartment, killing her refrigerator. Better the fridge than her family! </p><p></p><p>Even with that, the cops would NOT do anything about him. I finally terrified him into not being a problem for my family. I convinced him I was a voodoo queen. I would go out and light black candles and incense and chant nonsense in Latin. I did all sorts of strange stuff, nothing actually authentic, but he didn't know that. Besides, isn't it the intent that matters? That man was awful! Apparently he BEGGED the apartment manager to make us move because we scared him. She told him that we had the right to practice any religion we wanted and she couldn't make us move because of that. We moved soon after that anyway. Insisted on breaking the lease with no notice and no fees/fines because of the shooting and his prior threats. A neighbor shot the drug dealer who lived below us a year later. Stand Your Ground law stuff.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="susiestar, post: 730798, member: 1233"] When I was a kid, my uncle was a volunteer for the ambulance and fire squad for the little towns he lived in. I lived in a neighboring town around a big city in OH. He and my dad were both safety crazy, so we had all kinds of rules for who would pick us up in an emergency, and all kinds of drills for fires, etc.... When I was 11, I was walking home from the library about a mile from home one day. I had my nose in a book as I walked, as usual. A man came by in a car and told me that my dad was injured at work and Uncle B sent him to pick me up to take me to the hospital to join my family. I looked at him and stared for a second. Then I yelled NO NO NO and ran to a house nearby. I was at a corner and couldn't run forward to get away, but I acted like I knew the people in the house and they were home. I did know them, and I knew they were not home. He sped away very fast. I ran home (I was maybe a block away). I called Grandma to see if everyone was okay. When she answered and wasn't upset, I didn't tell her what happened. I didn't tell ANYONE about it. In my family, I was the one who was "too excitable". I expected them to tell me I made it up or blew it out of proportion. That is what they told me when my brother come home stumbling drunk and throwing up. That is what they told me when he was smoking pot. Those were the big safety things in our world, so I figured they wouldn't listen to me on this. I put it out of my mind and buried it until I had my own child. I was watching some Oprah episode while fixing a pair of Wiz' pants when he was a few month's old and it brought this up. I can still see the guy's car and smell his nasty cigarettes. When I described him to Uncle B, he knew who he was, but couldn't remember his name. It was a man he worked with who got very angry over something at work that Uncle B did. The guy swore to hurt Uncle B, and at the time Uncle B didn't have his own child. I did safety drills and had a secret word with my kids so that no stranger could pick them up. When Jess was born we lived above a family that was horrible. I think the guy was a drug dealer supplying the local cops because even when we SAW drug deal go down, the cops could not care less. Plus we saw him with the cops more than a few times, so we were afraid to call them. Then New Years Eve happened. The guy got really wasted. I saw him outside with a handgun. He was waving it around, yelling about something, mostly just ranting and raving. He would not let us down the stairs to get past him, so we could take the kids to a hotel where it would be safe. We spent the night in the bathtub (it had an old cast iron tub, so it was safer than anywhere else in the apartment) holding the kids. He fired that gun off several times. One round went through his floor and into the neighbor downstairs' apartment, killing her refrigerator. Better the fridge than her family! Even with that, the cops would NOT do anything about him. I finally terrified him into not being a problem for my family. I convinced him I was a voodoo queen. I would go out and light black candles and incense and chant nonsense in Latin. I did all sorts of strange stuff, nothing actually authentic, but he didn't know that. Besides, isn't it the intent that matters? That man was awful! Apparently he BEGGED the apartment manager to make us move because we scared him. She told him that we had the right to practice any religion we wanted and she couldn't make us move because of that. We moved soon after that anyway. Insisted on breaking the lease with no notice and no fees/fines because of the shooting and his prior threats. A neighbor shot the drug dealer who lived below us a year later. Stand Your Ground law stuff. [/QUOTE]
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