The “Kindness” Of Strangers

Last Friday night my wife and I dropped off my son at a friends house in a wealthy neighborhood.  After he was dropped off, we had dinner, did some shopping and headed back to pick him up after 9:00 p.m.  We arrived about 15 minutes early and decided to wait.  We parked across the street in front of a house in the neighborhood and sent my son a text to let him know we were outside waiting.    We didn’t think it was a big deal when we noticed a woman come out of the house that we were parked in front of.  She acted like she was looking at something down the street but it didn’t take a genious to figure out that she was trying to see who we were.

Not a big deal right?  I mean strangers parked out in front of your home in a quiet wealthy neighborhood, could be a concern…couldn’t it?  If it were me, I would probably have done the same thing…maybe?  She went back to her house and I could hear someone else come outside (the view was blocked the whole time by an RV).  Suddenly the bright lights of an off road pick up truck were activated right in front of us, blinding us.  From that point, all I could hear was a man’s voice from outside my open car door window ask, “Are you guys okay?”  I was a bit disoriented by the bright lights and I could hear him repeat the question.

I let him know that we were okay and just waiting for my son, what I really wanted was for him to turn off his lights.  He went back to his house and the lights of his truck eventually went out.  My son showed up and we left but part of me was still bothered by the whole ordeal considering we weren’t parked in their driveway, we didn’t have any music playing, we weren’t making any loud noises, and we were doing nothing to create negative attention. 

A lot went through my mind later that night as I couldn’t help but wonder…did they over react since we were parked on a public street for only 15 minutes?