Card Thefts

[Runscott]

I finally had cards stolen from me. It wasn't super-significant - someone stole an outgoing bubble-mailer from my mailbox, for a $275 sale. I am fairly sure it was stolen because no mail was left for another two hours and the mailman told me he only stopped by once. In addition, the package was never scanned and a bill that was stolen along with it never had the check cashed.

My first reaction was that now my house might be targeted for a full-scale robbery, so I protected myself. I considered hitting every card shop and antique store in the area to see if it had been sold, and checked ebay daily for a couple of weeks. Basically, I had a hard time getting over the violation. The only constructive idea I've had was to get a P.O. Box and only hand packages directly to the postman. All other thoughts involved violence. I even considered driving around looking for the thief doing the same thing to others, but I'm certain I would tackle him and beat him senseless, landing me in jail. A policeman told me that it's fairly common in the area - car drives by, they see a package, one person jumps out and steals the package. I saw this actually take place with a car break-in at the park. I followed the car around with the intention of 'catching them', but had my girlfriend and dog in the car, so gave it up. I gave the license plate number to the police, but nothing was done. Later I stopped to talk with a college student who had been one of their victims - her homework was in her purse in the car, so she lost a lot of work (not on her computer). At that point I wished I had done something more.

So here's my question (for those of you have had been violated similarly): Should I just forget about it to get over this quicker? The idea of jumping to my door every time I hear a car slow down near my home, perpetually, really kind of disgusts me, but that's where I am at the moment.

I realize that I don't post here often anymore, so perhaps I am not worthy of a serious response , but I do miss a lot of you - just don't have room for the angst of discussion forums anymore. The real world has been amazingly rewarding.