// March 29th, 2010 // No Comments » // Self Defense, Thoughts
Have that tingling on the back of your neck? Is someone watching you?
I spent this past weekend keeping an eye on people. It is interesting the different habits individuals portrait when going through their daily routines. Those who aren’t, you can usually pretty readily identify.
My wife and i ate at On the Border on Sunday (who by the way, have a killer chimichanga menu). Our waitress was brand new. She didn’t tell us this but it was noticeable. She was sporadic at best with her service consistency, and didn’t keep the drinks refilled at first. When she finally figured out she had forgotten us, she brought us two full glasses each of our respective drinks and apologized profusely. In fact, she apologized during the course of the entire meal. At one point I had to tell her “You’re doing fine, it’s all good.”
Low confidence, rare eye contact, half smiles and a rush to and from the table (there weren’t many people there yet either). She was either a severely scatterbrained person or brand new. When she did engage in conversation, she seemed intelligent, so this ruled out the first possibility and decided she was new. When asked, she confirmed this suspicion at the end of the meal.
When we were in Kansas City, we were approached by a man with a tin can asking for money on the street. He was dressed in dirty rags, gloves with holes in them and a beanie hat with a big smear of something questionable on it. However, he was completely confident in his endeavor. He knew his target clientele and approached them with directness. Measured eye contact, not enough to make me feel threatened. It seemed to me that he had been doing this for a long time. He knew how to sell.
I imagine criminals fall much into the same frameworks (of course there are exceptions to every rule). A first time robber may lack confidence, be aloof, unsure, inconsistent. Whereas a long time thief will case a joint or approach you on the street without hesitation and be in/out/done before the dog sneezes.
Take this concept and extend it to violent criminals. Those cold, calculating men who have this dangerous level of comfort with their actions are to be feared but, strangely enough, probably have a measurably larger amount of psychological “training” in how to affect victims. They know what the presence of a weapon can do to people. They have experienced the freeze numerous times and are skilled at inciting it in others. Then you have the shaky fingered first time gunpoint robber who really isn’t sure what his goals in life are. Who is more dangerous? On what levels? Is there even a comparison?
