Someone stole something from me today. It was my mobile phone, my old one to be exact. I had gotten a new one for my birthday last year, but I had continued using the old one as a way of separating my business contacts from my personal contacts.
That phone has been with me for the last three years, the SIM I used on that phone had been with me far longer. Needless to say, that phone and I had history. It contained my history for the better part of the decade.
So it pisses me a great deal to lose it, and what’s worse was that it was stolen from under my nose. The man who stole it casually walked into our store, under pretense that he was in need of help. He was representing a sports league that needed uniforms. I had politely declined, knowing better that sometimes these types of solicitations were completely bogus. Yet he insisted, and I thought simply, that he was just one of those pesky people who couldn’t take no for an answer. And between his incessant begging and polite declinations, I don’t when and how he managed to get his hands on my phone that was laying on the counter, a bit obscured by my pile of stuff. He did everything on a sly. How could I have been so stupid?
I had only realized that my phone was gone, when my sister was calling me on my other line, and told me that she had called my other phone and some guy kept picking up.
I rang my phone to check whether I had just misplaced it, or if it was lost in the jungle that is my handbag. But someone did pick up. It was him. And he pretended that he couldn’t hear me, though clearly taunting me.
I didn’t hang up, instead I told him he could keep the phone, he just needs to give me back my SIM card. I know it was futile to ask a thief to return something of value, but I just had to ask. That phone probably contained more information than that person’s brain could have stored in his entire lifetime.
Then it started. He kept telling me how he thought I was attractive, that he couldn’t keep his eyes off me, that he had to take my phone because he knew I would call my number and that he’d be able to talk to me again. He was bargaining- me for the phone.
And I swear if I could just reach through the line, I would have slit that guy’s throat. I am not a violent person. Nor do I endorse it. And I have no plans of committing murder over a phone. But the things that he said…
I know that what he said was meant to intimidate me. He was threatening to do me violence. Though I admit I was scared, I was so angry. But I was all the more angry that I felt so impotent in my anger.
How could people lose their sense of empathy and humanity? How could anyone simply take something just because they want something, and just because they can? How could you a person feel so comfortable at wanting to hurt other people and feel so blatantly proud about it?
How could they live with themselves? How could they face themselves in the mirror? Do they even own mirrors at all?
I am pretty certain that I will never see my old trusty phone again. Though the whole incident has left me so upset, I will try to rest on the idea that that man will someday his comeuppance. And I fervently hope that it hits him soon. Fast. Hard.
