Thieves

There is an empty lot at the end of our country road. There was an old farmhouse there, once. It burned to the ground about 7 years ago. There's no concrete slab, or basement walls to note that there was a house there at one time. The house was old, probably from the early 1900's, before slabs and basements were thought of. What does remain are the flowers. A long time ago, someone planted flowers in the yard of the old house. Bright yellow daffodils and deep purple Phlox (or Thrift?).

This lot sits alone on a busy road, it has a For Sale sign on it, but it hasn't been touched in years. Every once in a while someone will take it upon themselves to park a car "For Sale" - on a lot that doesn't belong to them. About a month ago, as I turned into my road I noticed a car parked on the lot, with the doors open. I then saw a man with a shovel, digging up the blooming flowers! I drove on.

When I came back by later, where there was once a few long rows of pretty yellow flowers, there was dirt. A few broken flowers were tossed around and there was one small patch of flowers left. The purple flowers were undisturbed.

The next day, a different car was in the same spot, this time it was a woman. And a shovel. She took ALL of the remaining yellow flowers. Apparently, she had seen the man taking flowers, and thought they were free game so she came back for the leftovers.

Today, a new car, a new woman and a new shovel. She dug up the entire back row of the purple Thrift.

I won't be surprised if her thievery causes someone else to take the rest tomorrow. The lot will be nothing but overturned dirt and overgrown shrubs.

So, just because someone else is doing it, it must be okay? In this world, all property belongs to someone. There is no unclaimed land. What gives people the right to steal these flowers? Just because no one is there to tell them 'NO', they have taken it upon themselves to decide that the flowers are out for the taking.

What I find interesting is that it took one person to 'go first'. Then the rest just followed and probably justified themselves by the fact that 'he did it first, so we thought it was okay'.....