PSA: situational awareness saves lives.
I live off of Aurora Ave in Seattle, which is notorious as the strip where hookers, junkies, and serial killers go to score. It's mentioned in books about Bundy and the Green River Killer.
On my way back to my car in a dark parking lot yesterday, a guy tried to snatch me. I saw him coming out of the corner my eye and spun out of the way, but he still managed to grab my sleeve. We had a silent standoff, and he decided the fight wasn't worth it and ran.
I was unarmed and alone, and I had no idea of he was armed. My instinct is never to run, but to face the person...something about putting my back to an active threat bothers me (and my cardio is shit so I'm a terrible runner anyway). In this instance, he took my facing him as being too much hassle to be worth it, and he split. But it does not always work that way.
If I had been less aware, he would have grabbed me and pulled me into his vehicle.
Whether or not you're armed...stay aware.
@malice Howdy, ex-cop here, and I'm glad you're physically safe. Of course that is kinda the easy part much of the time.
I've seen many people, men and women alike, that would call this a "near miss" and try to just move on, but then later realize that it really did something awful to them and they didn't take care of themselves maybe as well as they should have afterwards.
This incident was a big deal.
I understand your lack of trust in police (I now am like this). I hope the guy is caught.
@malice I hope that you can "move on", but if you can't, please take good care of yourself and ask for a little help if needed. I hope you can have peace after all this.
You did very well handling the incident in that moment. It ended the encounter, nothing more, nothing less. Outstanding! I hope it can end there.
Someone I look up to still once told me "You gotta be tough to live out West." Seems to me like we should be glad to have you around here.
@malice you are the straight shizzle! So glad you did and shared.
Face the fear, not that you were afraid, is not taught enough, or, not taken enough at face value.