A lesson well learned

I hope and pray that we never experience another day like yesterday. Worse things have happened, but yesterday was very stressful. G and I took my car to the shop for routine maintenance - oil change, etc. We then took the "tank" because it had a recall for the cruise control, and we need it this weekend to go to the SSB.

We were returning home, and I was driving. My phone rang, but I couldn’t it right away since it was hidden in the bowels of my purse. When G finally retrieved it, it displayed K’s cell. I called her back, and there was complete panic in her voice. She wanted me to go to her house to get her bill payment file. Her purse had been stolen.

I was stunned. As I was heading to my house to get her key, she told me she left her purse in the van when she went to visit the store. Her job involved sales of a product and the store’s relationship with the manufacturer. She is provided with a van for this job. She had left her purse and laptop bag in the van - as she and most of her coworkers do. Someone broke out the van window and took her purse and the computer bag. They were efficient. They could do this without even setting off the alarm.

All credit cards were stopped. The bank was notified. The police were called. But the experience was still stupefying. The feeling was that of total violation.

About two hours later when she was home taking things out of the van, a car appeared in her driveway. Two men were in the car. One immediately held out her purse. They had found it discarded on the side of the road. The only thing missing was her digital camera. They also found the laptop bag. Everything was in place with the exception of the camera and a cd that held some recently downloaded pictures. The thieves were looking for something they could easily hock. Apparently they thought they were getting a computer, and hopefully a cell phone in the purse. They didn’t want credit cards. Too many thieves are getting busted here using stolen cards.

Things turned out to be alright. It spurred all of us to get our affairs in order: to be sure we have lists of credit card numbers and contact numbers, to be sure we never leave anything of value in plain sight in the car. Take our experience and vicariously learn by it. Prepare yourself for emergencies.