Dear anyone that reads this,
I have not really remained a blogger, and as you realize I am using a fairly plain blog.
On Monday night I went to a book club meeting in Footscray. This book club meeting was held in a restaurant on a main street in Footscray, but I could not get a park near it. I went around a block and parked in a side street a little distance from the restaurant, but with no people milling around. As I parked, I noticed that it was well lit and was a wide street, and was around the corner from the street I was going to. I was about five parks back from the first park nearest to the corner, and that park was a distance back from the corner. A single woman leaving a car to walk deserted street at night. How did I feel? Not frightened, but alert. No ear buds in my ears, and looking and listening as I walk past an open gate to the rear of a property. I hear voices ahead of me, on the other corner and realise that a group of men are there, but they do not come across that road towards me.
Leaving the restaurant later, a member of the book club whose car is parked across the road, asks me if I want company to go to my car, or for her to drive me. I say no, and then wonder about my choice. It is based on the desertion of the area, and the fact that I assume I will be okay for the distance that I need to walk. Why is it that as a single female I need to take this into account? What is it that says that a woman walking after dark is at risk of something happening? I obviously got to my car safely, with no problems, having noted the presence and appearance of the only male in the vicinity, opposite corner at traffic lights. Due to the fact that I walk without listening to music, I have all my facilities available.
What am I saying? I think it sad that I should have asked myself the question as I parked as to whether I felt it was an appropriate place for me to park, and if I could be putting myself in danger. I feel upset that because of this question when I was heading back to the car I was so alert to what was happening around me. At no stage was I actually unsafe, and no one threatened me in any way, and yet I was making use of my senses to check my surrounds. Why? What is it about having life in this society that tells me a female walking alone at night that I may be in danger. Surely the statistics tell me that most women on their own travel safely. It is only a minority that have something happen. What is it about certain suburbs that give them a reputation?
Is it the sort of comment made when a minority even happens, yes, it may be. Is it because the media push that fact that it is not safe after dark? Yes it may be. Thankfully I can type this tonight, and feel that I can take the chance again. It is sad to be starting to think this way, oh for societies where nothing nasty ever happens to anyone.
I am so conscious of that fact that I write this in a society at peace, and that there are those in societies at war that have far worse experiences, and I can speak fear. What is theirs like.
