I got a bit of a scare last night.

I went to bed early. As in 5 pm. Sometimes I’ll do that, get overwhelmed by the futility of life and take half a day in bed. Then I’ll usually drift in and out of sleep and dreams. And around 11 pm I was drifting in and out and heard my doorbell ring. Seeing as though it was night and I was half asleep I decided to ignore it and try to proceed into being fully asleep. A little later, maybe just 5 minutes or so, I heard a noise. Something landed in the appartment, next to my bed. At first I thought maybe it was an animal or something. A cat or a rat or a bat, what do I know. I sat up in the bed and looked out, but couldn’t see anything in the dark. Then I took out my earplugs. I still have a habit of sleeping with earplugs. I heard noises outside, at the window/door in the other room. Where my computer stands. People there. It sounded like they were up on my balcony walk at the window. The window was open, but there’s this metal door with bars that you can close and lock. So you can have the window open but still make sure no one can get in. When it is this hot I usually sleep with both my windows open and then the metal door in the “living room” closed and locked. And the metal door at the window next to my bed, I leave that open. Anyway. I turned on my night lamp and the people at the window/door jumped off and ran away, I could hear that clearly. They were scared off by the light turning on. I got up to see what was going on. They were gone outside. On the floor next to my bed there was a little stone, about the size of a matchbox or so. That was what I heard landing in my appartment. I went out to check the front door, nothing there. Then I heard someone outside, below the window next to my bed. “Sorry?” “Sorry?”. I went to the window and there was a guy standing there. Foreigner. 17-19 years old, probably. He said “It was a mistake”. I said “what?”. He said “it was a mistake, is it okay?”. I said “I guess so…” and he walked away.

Hmm. A mistake? I wish I had asked him what kind of mistake it was. Maybe then it would have made more sense. Because the only way I can make sense of it is that they thought the appartment was empty and they were going to break in. But on the other hand, if they were potential burglars then why would they come back and try to explain it? That would just expose themselves. It would make more sense to just run away. I don’t know. Maybe they got the wrong appartment.. but they rang my doorbell, so they must have known it wasn’t an appartment of a friend or anything? They must have been checking if someone was home. And the stone they threw through the window must have been to see if there was any reaction. They must have figured that someone had left their windows open and gone out. Right? Maybe I should have called the police. But then what would the police say on a Saturday night when nothing really happened and the guys apologised and said it was a mistake. I’m sure the police have plenty more important calls to answer on a Saturday night.

Eugh. I don’t know. I just know it’s not a nice feeling. It’s sort of like when my parents’ house got broken into. A feeling of insecurity. Of violation. Even though nothing actually happened. But what would have happened if I wasn’t there. If I was faster asleep? Would they come back? Now I hear people outside in the evening and I feel insecure

I guess I just have to try not to worry and forget about it. Nothing else I can do anyway. Hopefully it really was just some kind of mistake. And if they wanted to break in then it’d be stupid to go back to a place where they’d been exposed, right? That would seem logic.

So my plan to sleep for a very long time was rather disrupted. I was obviously quite awake after that little incident. My sleep rythm broken. But eventually I managed to fall back asleep. Later on I drifted out of sleep to the sound of rain and thunder, the flashes of lightning outside. I much prefer that.

Much.

I wonder if squirting water at a burglar will make him run away?

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 3rd, 2008 at 23:25 and is filed under Blogging. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.