I would say something along the lines of "It started as a normal day..." but it really didn't. Today was "Professional Studies Day" or something that all high schools in my district had the option of having. Whether or not you have it was based on school vote. My school voted for it, although I think not many other ones did. What this day serves as is basically an extra early release day each month. Meant for "study", I guess. I get out at 11:32 as opposed to 2:54, so all is good.

Well, it was all good. Bus was a little late, and I had two pop quizzes on a supposedly lax day, but all was fairly good.

Now to the real story. As you probably don't know, I have two half-brothers (and a few more siblings, but it really doesn't matter). They are two and four years old. The four year old goes to a free preschool at a church about 5 minutes away. He goes every day during the week for a few hours. I never go with my mom to pick him up, as I'm typically at school. But today was a bit different, as I detailed above. We got there a bit early, and we waited in the parking lot for about ten minutes before my mom went inside to pick up my older brother. I stayed in the car with my younger brother to save my mom the trouble of lugging him inside. I was orginally sitting in the front passenger seat, but I moved to the back seat after my mom left. So there I was, watching Monster Jam with my little brother on the DVD player inside the van. A 2003 Dodge Minivan, if I may add. About two minutes after my mom left, a black Dodge Minivan starting slowly backing into the space next to us (driver door to driver door). Same make and model, just in a different color. About thirty seconds after, eveything changed. He opened his van door, and hit the driver side door of the car I was in. I figured it was an accident; it happens a lot espcially with how close they make the parking spaces and how terrible some people park. So I'm thinking to myself, "Alright, what's he gonna do now?" He just hit my mom's car. I didn't have to wait long. He whipped upon the driver side door, leaned into the car, and snatched my mom's purse (which was between the driver and passenger seat on the floorboard. And he sped off. From the time he hit the door to when he drove away, 10 seconds went by. It was that fast.

So, now, to re-cap some details. I was in the back seat when this happened, and my little brother was in a carseat in front of me in a buckett seat in the middle of the van. Oh, and the car was running, with the keys in the ignition. Could've took the whole car if he wanted to. The doors were unlocked, but that was a good thing, actually. This guy would've prolly smashed the windows or something equally desperate to get the purse. Speaking of desperation, this guy obviously needed anything he could get his hands on. It seems addiction brought the worst out of this guy, if you know what I mean. I'm probably leaving other stuff out, but I think you get the point, and I don't feel like telling the story for the millioneth time. A guy pulled up, opened the door, took the purse, and left -- with me and my younger brother in the running van. I didn't even get a good look at the guy, much less catch a liscense plate number. He was a middle-aged white male, and that's I could tell the cops. Yeah, I spoke with them for abour 30 minutes. Get asked the same question thirty times each. It was real fun.

The cops were pretty cool, though. They took fingerprints of the door, and they found a huge palm print right above the door handle. It's obviously his. I just hope that this provides enough to get a suspect, because if it doesn't, nothing will happen in the case. This kind of petty theft happens all the time.

There are many "what ifs" to everything here, but that doesn't really get anything positive going.

In all, I could've died today. My brother could've died today. Human beings could've senselessly died today. Luckily, none of that happened, and I'm very grateful. But I was robbed in my own neighborhood. And I'm not all too happy about it. All because of scum. You always think, "it'll never happen to me". We all do. Fact is, scum like this exists -- it's real. To be honest, I wasn't scared in the ordeal. Happened so fast you didn't have time to be. But it opened my eyes real, real wide, and I hope this story does the same for you.