Guest Blogger: Paralee

Crime Wave at 939 Greenwood Ave.

Just to clear the air, Aaron and I are not moving out. We love our apartment and our neighborhood, and we promise to be much more careful about our windows and lug nuts. I have never seen more strangers get together to help someone they have never met just because they saw a neighbor in need than last night. But the story is better told from Tuesday morning at 3:30 am...

Cozy in bed, then rattled awake by my faithful guard dog/scaredy cat dog barking menacingly next to my face to warn me something was going on outside. As usual, I told him it was fine and to lay down. I got in another 4 hours of solid sleep, hopped out of bed to take a shower, drank delicious espresso, then skipped outside to meet my grandmother for lunch and to pick up my tickets to Croatia only to find that my car had lost of a few key parts in the night...all four wheels. Not just the tires, but the wheels. My poor ol' jeep was sitting on broken cinder blocks on its axles just looking sad. In our very own apartment parking lot. Too bad the landlord had scheduled the maintenance guy to replace the light bulbs a day too late. The policeman actually laughed a little saying he'd never heard of someone stealing wheels in the Virginia-Highlands before, let alone the factory rims missing the jeep logo and year old Costco tires from an old jeep. Thankfully a nice retired guy in Newnan sold me some replacement rims and tires for a cool $350 and my car looks nicer than it did before...the lug nut locks were extra from Advance Auto where the checkout guy was also pretty surprised to hear of my story.

Fast forward to the weekend. Awesome Halloween party, buying lots of snowboarding gear, dinner with friends, new fancy camera lens, come home around 12:30 am and see the kitchen light is on and the window is cracked. Now Aaron and I are apparently naive thinking that it is safe to leave the tiny kitchen window open since it is a good 8 feet off the ground on a flat brick surface with nothing to grip. Aaron noticed the cracked window (odd because we usually leave it fully open) and I thought it was weird as well. "Oh shit someone broke into our apartment!" Aaron yelled as he got out of the car to hear the the jingle of the front door knob on our apartment. "Oh shit he's still here!", and he races around the porch to see a guy running out of our apartment down the walkway. Aaron yelled expletives at the burglar while sprinting after and calling to our good friend Sean who lives above us. The burglar ran down the patio and Aaron sprinted parallel along the sidewalk, forcing him to a point at the edge of the building where the patio ends into a 6 foot drop. Add 4 feet of railing, a downward graded hill and utter blackness, and the burglar leaps 10 feet. He lands hard on his ankle, ripping through bone, exposing the muscle and tendon that comprise its inner workings. His foot is detached, hanging limp, and he runs with only a stump of a leg and nothing more than his sock and achilles tendon keeping his appendage attached to his body. Impressively, he made it two apartment buildings down before collapsing. Sean came running and held the situation down while calling 911. Five minutes later, police and ambulance arrive into a scene populated by a growing collection of neighbors. Returning to the house to investigate the damage, we were incredibly lucky to find nothing stolen. He must have broken in the exact moment we pulled into the driveway. He didn't even have a chance to turn on any lights.

But someone is missing. With all the screaming and yelling and emotion, Albus, who had been to dinner with us, jumped out of the car to see what was going on and flipped out, running the opposite direction. Poor buddy was scared out of his mind with the yelling and chasing and anger and just bolted. Wonderful neighbor Sean and his equally incredible girlfriend Lindsay were with me within a minute, scouring the streets and calling out for him, poking into every dark corner in the Va-Hi for the next 4 hours. Neighbors from all over and people coming home from good times all joined the cause to search for Albus, but to no avail. Lindsay and I actually saw him once and called to him, but being in his ultra paranoid state and having terrible night vision, he had no idea who we were and took off in the opposite direction. Eventually, we had to tell everyone to go to bed, that we would restart the search in the morning after we put up fliers with his picture and my phone number. Aaron and I tried to sleep for 2 hours, but all I could do was toss and turn and think about my poor pup hiding behind a dumpster or under some moldy stairs in the cold thinking something horrible had happened to his people.

The next morning resulted in a few phone calls of leads on sightings including Briarcliff Pl. off Highland, Druid Hills Baptist church at Briarcliff and Ponce, the Majestic Diner on Ponce crossing the street at high traffic, and running down Ponce towards the city. We mobilized the guys looking for work outside Home Depot and the homeless shelter's Sunday morning service, every man looking for Albus and a shot at $50. Chase and Taylor took over the computer at Staples to design and print new fliers, Pamela and Harris checked out every driveway in the Va-Hi. My mom drove in from Toccoa! After an hour and a half of no more calls and no sightings, I trudged back to the apartment from Inman middle school where he likes to play, taking the long way home. I asked 3 people if they had seen him with no positive response, then looked up to a house on the hill to see my poor puppy cowering under a blue SUV in the driveway. After 10 hours of yelling, running, squeaking toys, clicking clickers, and walking miles and miles of the same streets, I had found my boy. Scared, dirty, and limping, Albus slowly crawled toward me to investigate the plush squeaky toy I had carried for the past 10 hours. He realized it was me and we both got so excited! We called all our awesome friends and family and had a welcome home party back at the apartment.

After a bath, a few bandages, and a good dinner, Albus is happily lying on the couch with his head in Aaron's lap as we watch South Park just like a regular Sunday night. I just don't know if this scene would be the same without the help of so many close friends, family members, and neighbors. Thank you for helping me bring my puppy home.
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