I Am The Luckiest Man Alive

So I got robbed Wednesday night.

I had gotten a call from a theatre in California asking about my availability this season. I promised I would look at their website and see what shows I had room for in my schedule. I toodled down to 15th and K to get online. As I was sitting there, a man approached me said he had a gun, and demanded my laptop. I closed it and handed it to him. He took my bag, stuck the laptop in it, and walked up 15th street.

As soon as he was out of sight, I called the cops. Say what you will about the DCPD, but they responded immediatly. There was a car there in three minutes, and I spent the better part of an hour with two officers, driving through alleys in the are searching for the guy.

Ultimately the search proved fruitless, and I was driven home by one of the officers. I sat in my apartment as the shock wore off and I began to realize exactly what losing my laptop meant. I have some files on disk here and there, but nothing even close to a comprehensive backup of the info on that computer.

Gone are 18 months worth of email, all of my music on I-Tunes, dozens of email addresses I don't have written down anywhere, various bits and pieces of dribble I had been writing, the CAD* drawings of over a dozen theatres I have worked in. Perhaps worst of all was the loss of all the work I had been doing for the past month in preperation for the Union exam next week.

I was feeling pretty crappy about it the next day as I took a walk through the alleys in the area, looking in dumpsters and trash cans in the hopes my robber had ditched the bag and computer when he heard the cops coming. No such luck. I contacted various theatres to have them resend me info about upcoming shows, and had to call the exam committee and postpone the test until October.

I talked with both of my parents about the situation, and my mother offered to loan me the money to replace the computer.

After the inevitable second-guessing and anger one goes through in these situations, I began to reflect on how truly lucky I have been in this situation.

One, you are reading about this on my blog, and not in the obituaries.

Two, I have family able and willing to lend support, and not just through this little incident.

Probably more encouraging, I have friends willing to help out. Friday afternoon I received a call from D, whom I have assisted a lot over the past two seasons. He told me he had been discussing my situation with another designer hear in town, and they both offered to front me so I could replace my computer.

I know I have been rather morose of late, and some of you have had to deal with that a lot more than others, but I do know how blessed I am.

If I can't look at my life and see that, then I really have a problem.


BTW folks, back up your data. It really is worth the trouble.

Trust me on this.

*CAD- Computer Aided Drafting