There are many fine restaurants that provide outdoor seating when the warm weather arrives. After my Abnormal Psychology night class, I decided on a stress management snack at one of these establishments. While enjoying my Chianti and calamari salad, I thought about calling my wife and tell her that I was running away from home again and wouldn’t be back until November. I took out my phone, that I had purchased a month before, and put it next to my salad for what seemed like a second.
Suddenly, a young man flanked by two other youths, reached across a flimsy barrier and grabbed my phone. I bolted from my seat and as I ran after the thief I noticed about five boys in the same age range who seemed to be involved. My only focus was the boy who grabbed the phone. After about three blocks I caught up to him and two of the other boys. I was angry, apprehensive and wondered what I or they would do next. I grabbed the boy by the arm to detain him for the police who were on the way thanks to the restaurant owner who flagged down a patrol car.
The child felon and the other boys protested and cursed angrily at me like deranged jackals, but I was determined to have them apprehended. Unfortunately, the smallest of the three snuck behind me and punched me in the head. It wasn’t a serious blow because the youth, who appeared to be the youngest, was small and skinny. Nevertheless, the force of the punch jolted me off the kid’s arm who I was detaining. He ran away again and I followed as the other two continued to howl and curse at me. After about another block the thief disappeared.
The cops came quickly and canvassed the area. They found the boy in a parking garage. He was promptly arrested after I identified him. I had mixed feelings when I saw his frightened face as they cuffed him. I felt good that they caught him but oddly upset because he was only a kid acting like a lunatic just like I did at his age. I returned to the restaurant and got the calamari salad to go. I lost my appetite. I did however finish the Chianti and had a cigar to celebrate an eventful evening.
During subsequent discussions of this event, acquaintances and relatives made several interesting comments and I also had time to reflect on the adventure. A few people said, “You should have punched him out.” The young man was my size and I may have been able to rough him up a bit, but this macho psychotic advice is just not me and I think I could have been charged with assault. A relative said that I was an idiot for chasing them down because the teens could have had a weapon like a knife. That could be true, but I had all kinds of corticosteroids and other chemicals stimulating my central nervous system. I was amped up, irrational and angry. Another relative said, “How did you catch them? You could be their grandfather.” I am in pretty good shape, for my advanced age, and I bet that the boys thought that their target was another overweight, middle aged smoker who thinks golf is and aerobic activity.
A day or two later these thoughts came to me. I felt violated as most people do when someone steals their stuff. I remembered having a similar feeling when someone robbed money that I had saved for a flight home from my barracks in North Chicago while in the Navy. I had another thought and recalled working with troubled youths in the New York metropolitan area and often thinking, “If I lived in their neighborhoods, was poor and had their lack of family support, I might be troubled as well.”
After a few days of feeling strangely at ease without the alien technical appendage, I ordered a new phone. The stolen one was never recovered. My only real regret regarding the whole incident was the loss of many personal family pictures. At the moment I felt that disappointment an old movie scene came into my consciousness. At the end of the classic sci-fi film “Blade Runner” Rutger Hauer’s character said, “All those memories lost like tears in the rain.”
John Ostwald is a professor at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy. His column runs every other Sunday.