A friend, just back from Thanksgiving, said she had gone through old photographs with her mother while home for the holiday. I told her that was good, that I wished I had done more of that, while my mother was alive. I had started trying to learn something of my family’s history in a limited way before my parents died, but didn't ask as many questions as I should have. Going through my mom's house, I found photographs of people that I will never know who they are. I did get some information though from both my parents, and am glad that I did, but I wish I had done a better job of it.
Several years ago, based on what my mom could tell me, I had checked out some of the databases that the Mormon Church has assembled and made available on line. I eventually subscribed to Ancestry.com and assembled a massive family tree based on linking to trees other people had done that were of unclear accuracy. I only worked on it intermittently, and although there was something very gratifying about figuring out which of several people with the same name in the census records actually was the person I was looking for, I wasn't very systematic and didn't find out anything that was particularly interesting. Without stories or context or knowing about the people, extending a family tree back into the 18th century seemed a pretty empty exercise.
Then a couple of months ago, I started being a little more systematic, and trying to confirm some of the people and relationships that I wasn't sure about. And in the process, I got hooked, trying to reconstruct these 19th century lives from census records and engraving on tombstones and Civil War pension records. I hadn't known, before, how deep were my Southern roots (I grew up in Oklahoma and Kansas, and never considered myself a Southerner, even though I now live in Atlanta), but my ancestors over the generations made their way from Pennsylvania and Maryland to North Carolina and South Carolina and Georgia and then west to Alabama and Mississippi and Arkansas and then to Texas and eventually to Oklahoma. As best I can tell, my relatives who were here by the late 18th century were on the right side of the Revolutionary War (a great-great-great-great-grandfather, a veteran of the Revolutionary War, had trouble getting his pension because he was illiterate and couldn't read the discharge papers he needed to establish his service record) but they were uniformly on the wrong side of the Civil War. Two great-great-grandfathers fought in different units of the Confederate Army, and both had brothers (or brothers-in-law) who died. I've never been particularly interested in Civil War history, but it does make me wonder what cause these hardworking subsistence farmers were fighting for. (A cousin several times removed has relayed a family story that our great-great-grandfather said later in his life that the whole thing had been a bad idea. It may have had something to do with having been there when his nephew was shot in the head during the siege of Port Hudson.)
So I am looking for records from Marion and Fayette Counties in Alabama, and Itawamba County in Mississippi. There are other counties, too, that I haven't looked for yet. These are places whose histories are documented by local historians, working as volunteers for county historical societies, mostly. A massive amount of information is on line now, through commercial sites like Ancestry, but also through noncommercial volunteer-built sites that are part of the USGenWeb project. There are lots of local histories that are written by local historians and published in limited runs by small presses. Once they go out of print, they are really hard to find (and expensive if you do find them), but presumably there are copies in the local library or at the county historical society.
Until I got interested in places like Itawamba County, Mississippi, or Fayette County, Alabama, I never thought much about who documents the histories of small places. With so much mobility, is it doomed to disappear, without a critical mass of local people to keep it going? (My family moved to Woodward, Oklahoma, in 1969. Although I've enjoyed visiting the local historical museum over the years, the history there wasn't the history of my family, who came to Coal County and Greer County from Texas, back when Oklahoma was still Indian Territory.) Of course, now there is the internet, which I know has been huge for genealogy. Has it done the same for local history? For while most of us no longer live in the same communities that our parents lived in, much less our grandparents or great-grandparents, all you have to do is type a name in Google, and you can find more than you imagined about the people who came before you, or the places where you live. And people like me are looking for histories of Fayette County, Alabama, and seriously considering becoming dues-paying members of the Itawamba Historical Society. The baby boom generation is approaching retirement age. Maybe technology will make up for some of what has been lost with the mobility of my generation. For what it’s worth, I did mail that check yesterday.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Friday, November 26, 2010
Thanksgiving Day, 2010
The morning after. The turkey leftovers are in the refrigerator, and there is a little bit of blackberry pie and pumpkin pie left. There aren't many dishes left to do - I did, I think, 5 loads over the course of the day yesterday - but there are wine glasses and empty bottles on the table, left from the after dinner conversation.
The day was less eventful than last year, with the dishwasher performing as expected and not almost burning the house down. Last year I tried to get a heritage turkey but the farm in Elberton (the only place I could find close to nearby that raised them) was sold out by the time I got around do looking. So I ended up on the waiting list, and sometime early this year I got an email asking if I wanted to order one this year. So I paid my $25 deposit to hold my place in line.
We got an email a month or two ago, giving us the pick up dates - November 15 and 22 - so Tom and I went there on November 15. There were half a dozen cars there on a beautiful morning at Liz and Tim Young's farm. Tim was teaching a class on about how to dress your own turkey and a young woman was cooking beignets. (They were really good.) Liz had the scale and the preorder list and got a 16 lb turkey out of the freezer for us. It was bird shaped, not round like the ones at the grocery store. She told us that they had raised about 150 birds this year. As turkey lives go, this turkey had a good life, wandering a 126 acre farm; Liz said that for the last two months, their first task each morning was to find the turkeys. How to cook it? Pretty much the same way you cook any other turkey, but no basting needed as there is a thick layer of fat under the skin. Tom had brought a measuring tape to make sure it would fit inside the smoker (it would), so into the cooler it went.
So, after brining overnight, the turkey went on the smoker yesterday morning. The girls made pies and I made cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, two loaves of bread machine bread, and butternut squash with sour cream and dill; Caroline made green bean casserole. I'd gotten a folding table with the idea we'd have the kids at separate table but Iain wanted to be with the adults and I told him that was fine, as long was we could get 10 chairs around the table. So he and Tom put in all our extra leaves and we could seat 10. The tablecloth was just long enough.
It turned out that we only had 8 people (Max and Emma didn't come after all) so I was glad we were set to have everyone in the dining room. And we didn't eat the bread from the bread machine, because Fred bought a wonderful loaf of homemade sourdough bread. Angela came, and Mark, and Angela brought two of her dogs, who kept Bullwinkle company in the backyard for the afternoon. After dinner, Fred and Angela stayed til they had to go home and attend to the dogs that were still at home, and Tom and Mark and Iain played guitars. The girls wandered in and out and had seconds and thirds on pie. (Bullwinkle did get a slice of pumpkin pie that Sarah left, just for a moment, unattended at the edge of the kitchen counter.) Kathy came over to visit with Angela and the leftovers got put away.
The turkey was good - it was more like meat than the grocery store turkeys are. Of course, it lived a life more like a bird than the factory farm turkeys do, so I guess that's not unexpected. We'll enjoy the leftovers and make some more pumpkin pies. The dishwasher didn't autodestruct. It was a good day.
The day was less eventful than last year, with the dishwasher performing as expected and not almost burning the house down. Last year I tried to get a heritage turkey but the farm in Elberton (the only place I could find close to nearby that raised them) was sold out by the time I got around do looking. So I ended up on the waiting list, and sometime early this year I got an email asking if I wanted to order one this year. So I paid my $25 deposit to hold my place in line.
We got an email a month or two ago, giving us the pick up dates - November 15 and 22 - so Tom and I went there on November 15. There were half a dozen cars there on a beautiful morning at Liz and Tim Young's farm. Tim was teaching a class on about how to dress your own turkey and a young woman was cooking beignets. (They were really good.) Liz had the scale and the preorder list and got a 16 lb turkey out of the freezer for us. It was bird shaped, not round like the ones at the grocery store. She told us that they had raised about 150 birds this year. As turkey lives go, this turkey had a good life, wandering a 126 acre farm; Liz said that for the last two months, their first task each morning was to find the turkeys. How to cook it? Pretty much the same way you cook any other turkey, but no basting needed as there is a thick layer of fat under the skin. Tom had brought a measuring tape to make sure it would fit inside the smoker (it would), so into the cooler it went.
So, after brining overnight, the turkey went on the smoker yesterday morning. The girls made pies and I made cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, two loaves of bread machine bread, and butternut squash with sour cream and dill; Caroline made green bean casserole. I'd gotten a folding table with the idea we'd have the kids at separate table but Iain wanted to be with the adults and I told him that was fine, as long was we could get 10 chairs around the table. So he and Tom put in all our extra leaves and we could seat 10. The tablecloth was just long enough.
It turned out that we only had 8 people (Max and Emma didn't come after all) so I was glad we were set to have everyone in the dining room. And we didn't eat the bread from the bread machine, because Fred bought a wonderful loaf of homemade sourdough bread. Angela came, and Mark, and Angela brought two of her dogs, who kept Bullwinkle company in the backyard for the afternoon. After dinner, Fred and Angela stayed til they had to go home and attend to the dogs that were still at home, and Tom and Mark and Iain played guitars. The girls wandered in and out and had seconds and thirds on pie. (Bullwinkle did get a slice of pumpkin pie that Sarah left, just for a moment, unattended at the edge of the kitchen counter.) Kathy came over to visit with Angela and the leftovers got put away.
The turkey was good - it was more like meat than the grocery store turkeys are. Of course, it lived a life more like a bird than the factory farm turkeys do, so I guess that's not unexpected. We'll enjoy the leftovers and make some more pumpkin pies. The dishwasher didn't autodestruct. It was a good day.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Two Years and Counting
I just read a notice on one of the neighborhood listservs that someone who was moving due to foreclosure was looking for a home for his dog. It was a brief message, with some links to pictures of the dog. According to economic statistics, the recession ended last summer; since then, the economy has stopped shrinking and has started to grow, but the growing is not enough to stop the world of hurt that's still going on. It would be bad enough to tell my children we were moving, but if we had to give away the dog...it would break my heart.
There is a house around the corner on Cumberland. Several years ago (before the economy crashed) the brick ranch house that use to be there was almost but not quite completely demolished and replaced by a big box of a house, with just a sliver of the old orange brick left (is there something about the building permitting process that made them do it this way?) . The new house never quite got finished, though. It never got garage doors or a proper front door and the outside of the house never got done, either. But there were people living there - we talked to them at a couple of yard sales, and Caroline bought a wooden porch swing like my grandparents used to have on their front porch that she set on milk crates and used as a bench in her room for a while.
And then, they were gone. Last winter, peculiarly, the upstairs windows were open for a long time. At some point a Pile of Stuff appeared in the front yard, the kind of Stuff that you don't sell but maybe you want it or maybe you throw it out but you never envisioned it would be all that was left when you lose your house and then you're gone. A padlock got put on the not-really-a-front-door and the tarps that covered the spaces where the garage doors should be were replaced with plywood. The house sits there, empty, and every time I walk by in wonder who they were and why they left the orange brick there when they knocked the rest of the house down and what conjunction of bad luck and recession led to the loss of the house and where they are now.
On our street, Angela is moving because her landlord is having to sell the house she has been renting. There's a For Sale sign too at the apartments at Wessyngton and Highland that suggests they can be replaced with three luxury homes, which seems to me to be highly wishful thinking. Businesses keep disappearing in the small commercial area nearby on North Highland. Some of them moved elsewhere (Caramba Cafe lost their lease), but most of them are just gone.
It's been two years since the bubble burst, the credit markets froze up, and we were on the precipice of Something Really Bad happening. The government stepped in to Save the Financial System, and I hear they are making money on Wall Street again. But in my neighborhood - my very nice neighborhood - there is a guy who is trying to find a home for his dog because he lost his house.
It just makes me want to cry.
There is a house around the corner on Cumberland. Several years ago (before the economy crashed) the brick ranch house that use to be there was almost but not quite completely demolished and replaced by a big box of a house, with just a sliver of the old orange brick left (is there something about the building permitting process that made them do it this way?) . The new house never quite got finished, though. It never got garage doors or a proper front door and the outside of the house never got done, either. But there were people living there - we talked to them at a couple of yard sales, and Caroline bought a wooden porch swing like my grandparents used to have on their front porch that she set on milk crates and used as a bench in her room for a while.
And then, they were gone. Last winter, peculiarly, the upstairs windows were open for a long time. At some point a Pile of Stuff appeared in the front yard, the kind of Stuff that you don't sell but maybe you want it or maybe you throw it out but you never envisioned it would be all that was left when you lose your house and then you're gone. A padlock got put on the not-really-a-front-door and the tarps that covered the spaces where the garage doors should be were replaced with plywood. The house sits there, empty, and every time I walk by in wonder who they were and why they left the orange brick there when they knocked the rest of the house down and what conjunction of bad luck and recession led to the loss of the house and where they are now.
On our street, Angela is moving because her landlord is having to sell the house she has been renting. There's a For Sale sign too at the apartments at Wessyngton and Highland that suggests they can be replaced with three luxury homes, which seems to me to be highly wishful thinking. Businesses keep disappearing in the small commercial area nearby on North Highland. Some of them moved elsewhere (Caramba Cafe lost their lease), but most of them are just gone.
It's been two years since the bubble burst, the credit markets froze up, and we were on the precipice of Something Really Bad happening. The government stepped in to Save the Financial System, and I hear they are making money on Wall Street again. But in my neighborhood - my very nice neighborhood - there is a guy who is trying to find a home for his dog because he lost his house.
It just makes me want to cry.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
What the House Inspector Failed to Tell Me
I don't remember who first explained to me - it might have been a visiting friend from medical school, years ago - the significance of the little plastic box, about six inches long and three-quarters of an inch wide, nailed to the doorframe of the back door. I bought this house more than 20 years ago, and the little box was there when I bought the house, and I didn't notice it for a while.
It is, of course, a mezuza, a tiny parchment scroll with verses in Hebrew from the Torah, in a protective container that holds it in place and protects it from the elements. I am thinking about this today because of a story in yesterday's New York Times, that because of turnover in occupants, mezuzas left by previous residents now are in doorways of many housing units occupied by people who are not Jewish. According to the New York Times article, "Jews leaving a home are expected to leave the mezuzas behind if they believe the next residents will also be Jewish. If not, they must take the mezuza with them, to guard against the possibility that a non-Jew might desecrate it, knowingly or not."
It would never have occurred to me to take it down, and I am glad that the previous owners of the house (who I am guessing are the people who put it there) didn't have their real estate agent ask me my religion; certainly it didn't come up when the house was inspected ("mezuza on rear doorframe"). I like having it there. It is part of the history of the house, and connects me and my family to the history of faith that is part of the history of our world.
It is, of course, a mezuza, a tiny parchment scroll with verses in Hebrew from the Torah, in a protective container that holds it in place and protects it from the elements. I am thinking about this today because of a story in yesterday's New York Times, that because of turnover in occupants, mezuzas left by previous residents now are in doorways of many housing units occupied by people who are not Jewish. According to the New York Times article, "Jews leaving a home are expected to leave the mezuzas behind if they believe the next residents will also be Jewish. If not, they must take the mezuza with them, to guard against the possibility that a non-Jew might desecrate it, knowingly or not."
It would never have occurred to me to take it down, and I am glad that the previous owners of the house (who I am guessing are the people who put it there) didn't have their real estate agent ask me my religion; certainly it didn't come up when the house was inspected ("mezuza on rear doorframe"). I like having it there. It is part of the history of the house, and connects me and my family to the history of faith that is part of the history of our world.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Why You Should Get to Know Your Neighbors
Our neighbor Mona moved to Vietnam last summer. We threw her a going away party, a potluck supper on Kathy's screened-in porch. Tom made ribs. So there's one reason right there to get to know your neighbors - if you move halfway around the world, we might throw you a party before you go.
Mona had turned her house over to a management company to rent out in her absence, and after a little while it did get rented. Three young women and a dog named Bosley moved in next door - although I met the human occupants a couple of times I never got the names-emails-phone numbers that nowdays constitute "knowing someone." Bosley's name I knew because Bosley's owner would call his name sometimes.
A few days ago Tom was talking to one of the young women who lived next door. Her name was Sara, and he got her last name and email address and phone number written down. I emailed her and asked if it was okay if I passed the information along to Lynsley, who actually keeps the Excel spreadsheet that is our Wessyngton Road directory. I hadn't heard back, yet, but added her to the distribution list I use to send out emails about car break ins and block parties.
This morning I woke up at 5 a.m. I got up to finish some work I hadn't gotten done yesterday. It was raining hard outside. I fed the dog, put on a pot of coffee, checked email quickly, and then let the dog out. When I opened the back door, someone was calling Bosley. It was later in the morning that I got Sara's email, that Bosley had gone outside at 2 a.m., without his collar which had been irritating his skin, and then the storm had started. She thought he got scared by the storm and had taken cover somewhere, but there was no sign of him, and she was frantic. Could I let the neighbors know? She sent a picture, too, that I could forward to help identify the missing dog:
Mona had turned her house over to a management company to rent out in her absence, and after a little while it did get rented. Three young women and a dog named Bosley moved in next door - although I met the human occupants a couple of times I never got the names-emails-phone numbers that nowdays constitute "knowing someone." Bosley's name I knew because Bosley's owner would call his name sometimes.
A few days ago Tom was talking to one of the young women who lived next door. Her name was Sara, and he got her last name and email address and phone number written down. I emailed her and asked if it was okay if I passed the information along to Lynsley, who actually keeps the Excel spreadsheet that is our Wessyngton Road directory. I hadn't heard back, yet, but added her to the distribution list I use to send out emails about car break ins and block parties.
This morning I woke up at 5 a.m. I got up to finish some work I hadn't gotten done yesterday. It was raining hard outside. I fed the dog, put on a pot of coffee, checked email quickly, and then let the dog out. When I opened the back door, someone was calling Bosley. It was later in the morning that I got Sara's email, that Bosley had gone outside at 2 a.m., without his collar which had been irritating his skin, and then the storm had started. She thought he got scared by the storm and had taken cover somewhere, but there was no sign of him, and she was frantic. Could I let the neighbors know? She sent a picture, too, that I could forward to help identify the missing dog:
So I forwarded the message, and 33 minutes later Lynsley responded that one of her neighbors had told her he had found a pug sniffing around the trash last night. Although he didn't have a collar on, he obviously was someone's pet, and he was safe with Lynsley's neighbor. Sara had him back soon thereafter.
We now have the names and email addresses and phone numbers for Sara's roommates. We are glad to have them as neighbors.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
News from the Back Yard
I have had backyard bird feeders off and on for years, but a year or so ago I got a little more serious about it. I got a couple of new feeders and hung them from the privet tree in the back yard. (Iain and I spent several hours cutting privet in the Morningside Nature Preserve yesterday morning with Trees Atlanta. I am no longer sure I want privet in my back yard.) But it was making me crazy, seeing the squirrels emptying the feeders. I put a feeder on the ground, by the back fence, with food that the squirrels and the chipmunks could get to easily, but I did not want them on my bird feeders.
So last fall I got a so-called "squirrel-proof" bird feeder from Droll Yankees. They have 4 different ones. The one they had a video for at the stores is equipped with a motor that is activated by the weight of a squirrel. If a squirrel gets on it, it will whirl around at high enough speed to hurl the squirrel off. It's funny to watch on the demonstration video, but I wasn't sure how durable it would be, in the long run, so I got the Yankee Dipper, which deters squirrels by its physical size (it is too wide and long for them to climb down it) and by hinged perches, that collapse even under the weight of a larger bird, much less a squirrel.
It worked really well for 6 months or so. The squirrels tried, but just couldn't get to the small openings at the bottom where the sunflower seeds are. Then, about a month ago, I found the feeder lying on ground, with seeds spilling out (and feasting squirrels). I assumed the wind had knocked it off and put it back up. Then the next day it was on the ground again. The squirrels had figured out, somehow, how to knock it off. I thought maybe they all jumped on it together. So I attached it more securely with a carabiner and it has not come off the tree (except when I removed it for refilling) since. I did see a squirrel on top of it, trying to push it off by pushing against a higher branch. For having brains the size of peanuts, they really are pretty devious.
So now they have learned a new technique. They sort of slide down the tube, and when they get to the bottom, hold on to it by wrapping themselves around the bottom and putting their feet in the openings where the seeds come out. I have seen them do this several times and will be on the lookout to catch it on video. When I do, it will be here.
The other news is better. The blueberry plants that I got from the plant sale sponsored by the Virginia Highlands group that was raising money for the new park actually have blueberries on them. The apple tree is doing well, I think, and a few of the bareroot strawberry plants that spent too long in a plastic bag before they got planted also appeared to have survived.
Years ago, both Caroline and Sarah built bird houses at a Girl Scout meeting. At home, they painted them gray, and they sat around for years until last fall (around the same time that I put up the bird feeders) I decided to put them up. There weren't great places to put them in the back yard - since the two dogwood trees died, we don't really have any real trees in our back yard - but I used wire to attach one to a small tree of unknown variety (probably something nasty that we shouldn't be encouraging) in the back yard, and the other to a Japanese maple that Tom had planted just beyond the back fence. During the fall and winter, I did occasionally see a bird exploring the one in the back yard, but of course it wasn't nesting season, and as I understand it, bird houses are really nesting boxes, that birds only use - and need - for eggs in the spring and baby birds in the summer. So I didn't expect to see any birds actually using it.
Well, this morning a pair of chickadees were moving in and out, with one or the other frequently visible in the round opening on the front. I haven't seen them this afternoon, but I hope they are napping or out hunting for furnishings. It would be great to have a chickadee family in the back yard.
So last fall I got a so-called "squirrel-proof" bird feeder from Droll Yankees. They have 4 different ones. The one they had a video for at the stores is equipped with a motor that is activated by the weight of a squirrel. If a squirrel gets on it, it will whirl around at high enough speed to hurl the squirrel off. It's funny to watch on the demonstration video, but I wasn't sure how durable it would be, in the long run, so I got the Yankee Dipper, which deters squirrels by its physical size (it is too wide and long for them to climb down it) and by hinged perches, that collapse even under the weight of a larger bird, much less a squirrel.
It worked really well for 6 months or so. The squirrels tried, but just couldn't get to the small openings at the bottom where the sunflower seeds are. Then, about a month ago, I found the feeder lying on ground, with seeds spilling out (and feasting squirrels). I assumed the wind had knocked it off and put it back up. Then the next day it was on the ground again. The squirrels had figured out, somehow, how to knock it off. I thought maybe they all jumped on it together. So I attached it more securely with a carabiner and it has not come off the tree (except when I removed it for refilling) since. I did see a squirrel on top of it, trying to push it off by pushing against a higher branch. For having brains the size of peanuts, they really are pretty devious.
So now they have learned a new technique. They sort of slide down the tube, and when they get to the bottom, hold on to it by wrapping themselves around the bottom and putting their feet in the openings where the seeds come out. I have seen them do this several times and will be on the lookout to catch it on video. When I do, it will be here.
The other news is better. The blueberry plants that I got from the plant sale sponsored by the Virginia Highlands group that was raising money for the new park actually have blueberries on them. The apple tree is doing well, I think, and a few of the bareroot strawberry plants that spent too long in a plastic bag before they got planted also appeared to have survived.
Years ago, both Caroline and Sarah built bird houses at a Girl Scout meeting. At home, they painted them gray, and they sat around for years until last fall (around the same time that I put up the bird feeders) I decided to put them up. There weren't great places to put them in the back yard - since the two dogwood trees died, we don't really have any real trees in our back yard - but I used wire to attach one to a small tree of unknown variety (probably something nasty that we shouldn't be encouraging) in the back yard, and the other to a Japanese maple that Tom had planted just beyond the back fence. During the fall and winter, I did occasionally see a bird exploring the one in the back yard, but of course it wasn't nesting season, and as I understand it, bird houses are really nesting boxes, that birds only use - and need - for eggs in the spring and baby birds in the summer. So I didn't expect to see any birds actually using it.
Well, this morning a pair of chickadees were moving in and out, with one or the other frequently visible in the round opening on the front. I haven't seen them this afternoon, but I hope they are napping or out hunting for furnishings. It would be great to have a chickadee family in the back yard.
Crime on Wessyngton Road
It was week before last that someone broke into my car. I had gone outside to put something I didn't want to forget in the car before heading to work, and on the front passenger's seat was a pile of shattered glass. I have had stuff taken from my car before, when I left it unlocked, but never had it broken into before. A few weeks before someone had taken the little bit of money I had left in the armrest compartment between the two front seats - it wasn't much - maybe $12 - but whoever had taken it had left the compartment open and the other contents scattered.
So this time, there was no cash in the car, and nothing else that anyone would want to take - but the compartment was open again. Nothing else seemed to have been touched, except of course for the window, which had been reduced to a glittering pile of tiny geometric shapes, at the curb, inside the door of my car, and on the sweater I had left on the passenger's seat.
I had to go to work, so I took the Cavalier. Tom said he supposed insurance wouldn't cover it; I said I had no idea, and asked him to call. It turns out that not only was it covered, but that State Farm it down to a fine art, the business of fixing cars that have been broken into. Two guys with a van and a vacuum cleaner came and replaced the window, and got rid of almost all the broken glass that was inside the car.
I called 911 to report it, just to get it on the record that it had happened, and a police officer came by to take my report. By the time I called, the window was fixed, but the pile of broken glass next to the curb in front of Sally's house and the bent place on the window frame was left as evidence. She looked at the car and said, they popped it, they put a tool in right there and pried the glass, which shatters it without making any noise. She pointed to the plastic disk on the dashboard and asked if I had a GPS. Yes, I told her, but it wasn't in the car. As far as I know, they didn't take anything at all. I told her about the $12 that had disappeared a couple weeks before, that I hadn't bothered to report. She thought most likely they were looking for the GPS. Maybe I can take that off the dashboard and stick it to the windshield, I said. She said it wouldn't help, that the suction cup would leave a circle on the window that would be visible, and that is what they looked for. Crackheads, she said, this is a crackhead kind of crime. Only crackheads would break into a car looking for a GPS that they can hock for $10. Had we seen anyone suspicious on our street? No, I told her, but I would let the neighbors know to call 911 if they saw anything.
I am not completely sure what a "suspicious" person would look like - on our street, I guess it would be someone walking who didn't have a dog. I suspect crackheads who break into cars for $10 GPS units (or $12 cash) do not have dogs. So I sent out an email to my neighbors, and I don't keep cash in my car anymore. Tom took the car to the body shop last week, and the bent frame around the window got fixed, so you can't tell by looking at the car that anything ever happened.
One good thing did come out of this. About a year and a half ago, I hit the brakes and my Ray-Ban sunglasses flew off the passenger's seat next to me and I never saw them again. I really thought they were in the car, but maybe they ended up in the Alon's bag that was sitting on the floor on the passenger's side, and got thrown out inadvertently. I looked several times and never found them.
But the guys who replaced my car window did find them. When they left, there they were, sitting on the passenger's seat.
So this time, there was no cash in the car, and nothing else that anyone would want to take - but the compartment was open again. Nothing else seemed to have been touched, except of course for the window, which had been reduced to a glittering pile of tiny geometric shapes, at the curb, inside the door of my car, and on the sweater I had left on the passenger's seat.
I had to go to work, so I took the Cavalier. Tom said he supposed insurance wouldn't cover it; I said I had no idea, and asked him to call. It turns out that not only was it covered, but that State Farm it down to a fine art, the business of fixing cars that have been broken into. Two guys with a van and a vacuum cleaner came and replaced the window, and got rid of almost all the broken glass that was inside the car.
I called 911 to report it, just to get it on the record that it had happened, and a police officer came by to take my report. By the time I called, the window was fixed, but the pile of broken glass next to the curb in front of Sally's house and the bent place on the window frame was left as evidence. She looked at the car and said, they popped it, they put a tool in right there and pried the glass, which shatters it without making any noise. She pointed to the plastic disk on the dashboard and asked if I had a GPS. Yes, I told her, but it wasn't in the car. As far as I know, they didn't take anything at all. I told her about the $12 that had disappeared a couple weeks before, that I hadn't bothered to report. She thought most likely they were looking for the GPS. Maybe I can take that off the dashboard and stick it to the windshield, I said. She said it wouldn't help, that the suction cup would leave a circle on the window that would be visible, and that is what they looked for. Crackheads, she said, this is a crackhead kind of crime. Only crackheads would break into a car looking for a GPS that they can hock for $10. Had we seen anyone suspicious on our street? No, I told her, but I would let the neighbors know to call 911 if they saw anything.
I am not completely sure what a "suspicious" person would look like - on our street, I guess it would be someone walking who didn't have a dog. I suspect crackheads who break into cars for $10 GPS units (or $12 cash) do not have dogs. So I sent out an email to my neighbors, and I don't keep cash in my car anymore. Tom took the car to the body shop last week, and the bent frame around the window got fixed, so you can't tell by looking at the car that anything ever happened.
One good thing did come out of this. About a year and a half ago, I hit the brakes and my Ray-Ban sunglasses flew off the passenger's seat next to me and I never saw them again. I really thought they were in the car, but maybe they ended up in the Alon's bag that was sitting on the floor on the passenger's side, and got thrown out inadvertently. I looked several times and never found them.
But the guys who replaced my car window did find them. When they left, there they were, sitting on the passenger's seat.
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