There is a rocking chair, passed down from mother to daughter, carted all over the United States during various family moves, from Georgia to Nebraska by way of California and Oregon. It’s been painted several colors, the most recent being an aqua blue, and it has an old fashioned woven seat that is falling apart in several places. This story has been told before… The chair was stolen off our front porch sometime last winter. Considering the depths of snow on our porch during that time, it’s no surprise I didn’t notice the crime for some time.

I noticed this time. The latest story goes like this. I walked over to my neighbors’ house Monday evening for a book shower in honor of Livia around 7:15 pm. While all the merriment was occurring, another thief (or perhaps the same one, who knows?) crept up my front steps and stole a 12 inch clay pot, full of soil, salmon-colored impatiens and some small white trailing flowers (I can’t recall their name). This pot is quite heavy, so I imagine a male committed the act. When I came home from the shower, our front porch light hadn’t been turned on and our blinds were still open. The thug could see right into our house and could plan his actions based on the absence of movement within the living room. I noticed that the pot was gone around 10:30 pm.

Just now, after checking our mailbox, I noticed something else was missing… Two small solar garden lights have also been taken. And my anger and frustration is once more aroused.

The sheer INJUSTICE of this is what gets to me. I can only imagine how angry I’d become if a drunk driver killed a family member, or if some other true atrocity was committed against someone I love. These fairly small incidents make me so annoyed! How dare someone simply take these items from my house? They didn’t pay for them. They didn’t spend 30 minutes at Earl May being particular about the color and size of bedding plants. They didn’t water them every other day with love. They didn’t install the lights and appreciate them night after night. They didn’t move around the country, carefully hauling a Southern rocking chair.

It’s not as though I live in a “bad” neighborhood where porch furniture needs to be chained to the floor or where bars should cover windows. Fortunately my neighbors don’t seem to be missing anything. We’ve only had to call the police a few times for fairly small incidents. Argh. No rhyme or reason to someone’s foolishness. I just pray that our thief will be convicted of the wrongness of his actions and that something will make him change his ways… Getting back my flower pot, solar lights and rocking chair, along with a note of apology and a more positive plan for his future, would be nice, too.

* The flowers in the photo are vinca. All pots of vinca are present and accounted for.