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Message: <blockquote data-quote="nofearfactor" data-source="post: 2167394" data-attributes="member: 1535">"And it's amazing how little those statistics mean to you, when it's YOU that are one of them". This article resonated with me a little.When I was 7 yrs old I was spending the weekend at my grammas while in Oklahoma visiting relatives in the summer. It was a hot summer night and she had the windows open with a good breeze coming in. I usually slept on the couch in the living room in front of the watercooler but that night the breeze was so nice that she shut the watercooler off and had me come sleep on the other side of her bed near the open window because of the breeze. She had every window in the house raised, it was small town Oklahoma in the 60s, everyone left their windows open at night there then.Some time in the middle of the night her friend and neighbor from across the back alley her drunk son home on leave from the military crawled into a back window of the house. I was woke up from my sleep with this man holding a pillow over my face pushing me down into the mattress while beating my grandmother. Some how our closest neighbors had heard her screaming and were over at our house in just a few minutes trying to beat down the front door, so I guess when he heard them he got up off the bed to go run to the window in the back of the house that he apparently came in thru. The neighbors caught him coming out the window and held a shotgun on him until the cops showed up. Believe it or not but in what little light there was (my gramma always had those little nightlights in the bedrooms on for me to see when I went to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night) I was able to catch a glimpse of him- shirt, pants, and weirdly somehow I also saw his hushpuppy shoes. Next thing I remember was trying to help my grandmother up and out of bed with blood covering both of us and getting us to the door to get it open. She had like 3 locks on the front door I had to get unlocked. I dont remember being really freaked out or in shock or anything even though I probably was. I just knew I had to get my gramma to help. Later when I was being interviewed by the cops I told them what all I had experienced and had seen, with an emphasis on the hushpuppies. The main reason I remembered them the most was because my uncle wore them and I always liked them. So, when they took me over to the police car to get a look at the guy in the back seat (shite, he was as covered in blood as we were, what did they need with me?) I asked to look down inside the car. Bingo, he had on blood stained hushpuppy shoes. I told the cops it was him.I remember the day my mom took me to testify against him in court. I got out of school and had a nice lunch and some icecream. I went in there and told the court exactly what I went thru and saw. I dont know if anybody knew him or of him or was around Osage county in the 60s but his defense lawyer was a man named George Briggs, a total azzhole, and a pretty well known defense lawyer even outside Osage county. I had attended my grammas church with his kids. He still got convicted. When it was all over we went back home to California. (Some years ago I tracked this man down via the good ole internet. He had really changed his life after prison and is now a retired college professor. I know exactly where he is but have never once thought of revenge. I figure I'll just let Karma take care of that).After I was back in California I guess just like any little kid does I went on with life like nothing happened. I do remember going to counseling. Never have had any nightmares about it though. If I want I can vividly remember almost everything that happened if I sit and think about it. Anger issues? O ya, I have them, but I have had to try hard to keep them in check.The only residual effects that I know of from it all has been lifelong insomnia. I became a true nightowl at 7 yrs old and claustraphobic like a mthrfkr. If that man took anything away from me that night then it was the security of being able to sleep peacefully at night. And play inside empty boxes. My brothers and sisters would try to put a pillow over my head or dunk me in the pool and I would go off on them like a bomb and freak the F out- they quit that shite pretty quick. Still to this day after all these years I dont sleep much at night, if I do it is very rare.Before the incident I never had a worry in the world when I was kid. My father was my John Wayne, a big man at 6'5"x 275 who could fight and had alot of firearms- I slept like a baby when he was in the house. Until the incident. After that night I stayed up every night. I guess maybe I was waiting for other bad men to break in and figured that next time I was going to be ready for something. I also suppose I felt like I was protecting myself and my family. My father had been a Marine, a Korean vet, an MP at Pendelton, then a cop for a bit after he was out of the Marines. When he was younger he was a competitive boxer, and then later a martial artist after he came back from Korea after training there. When I grew up my dad and older half brother taught martial arts at a school attached to our home in san Diego. I was always out there hitting on the bags but didnt really take any formal classes until I was older. I wrestled all thru elementary school, practiced martial arts, and then in junior highschool started boxing training. I wrestled in JH and HS school and then boxed and kickboxed competively until I was out of HS. Later I got into JKD in Oakland as a young adult. Been at it ever since. (I used to have these recurring dreams where I was in the ring boxing but for some reason I just couldnt hit the guy hard enough. So when I actually trained I would punch and kick the bag so hard it would almost come off the chain. Still do).I havent had any other incident the rest of my life, and I dont ever plan on being a victim ever again. You can bet that every night I am up watching over my family when I am home off the road. When I am asleep during the day you can also figure where my gun AND my knife are at while Im sleeping. I guess I kind of know what these people in this article felt like when someone comes into your home and invades you in your bed in the middle of your sleep. Trust me, you will never feel safe ever again after that, no matter how badass you are or think you are. Im only 5'10" but Im 250 solid and even though Im getting to be an old dude now I still work the bag and workout with weights regularly. I figure I dont want to be that old guy who cant take care of his self if anything else ever happens again some day.</blockquote>

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