In the past few months, I’ve seen a fair few security footage videos on social media, showing people stealing boxes from front porches. “Help us identify this thief” is a common caption. I keep wondering, don’t these front porch parcel bandits realize how likely they are to end up on camera, and then all over the internet, their crimes broadcast to the world?
This was all going through my mind the other day as I removed two boxes from someone’s porch and carried them across a busy street in broad daylight, taking them to my own house, with the full intention of keeping them. Did someone record me doing this? Is my image even now being impugned on the Facebook pages of strangers? See the dastardly woman making away with her neighbors’ goods!
Rest assured, I am not a package thief. I am merely a player in a small coincidence of the cosmos.
I’ve been keeping an eye on my neighbors’ house while they’ve been out of the country. On the day in question, when I went over to do my rounds and make sure everything was in order, I spotted two packages on their front porch. I thought it was a little odd that they’d order any goods delivered when they were halfway around the world, but figured I’d better take the boxes inside the house so they didn’t get stolen or weather damaged.
One was large and I hoped it wasn’t too heavy. I was relieved to see the words ‘furnace filters” printed on the cardboard. Coincidentally enough, I had just ordered furnace filters from the same company. How about that?
When I took a closer look, I saw the coincidence was of a different nature. Those boxes were mine, both of them. They were addressed to me — my name and my home address. But they’d been delivered to the wrong house. Where I happened to find them anyway, because I was keeping an eye on the place for my neighbors. What are the odds?
And what are the odds someone saw me take them and recorded the whole thing? That’s what I keep wondering. If you see a video posted of a middle-aged, curly-haired woman swiping two unwieldy boxes from someone’s porch and carrying them away, please let me know. I can explain the whole thing.
Gen BLT 