I'm not sure why I don't like to go into the ocean.

So I think I am really doing well. The thing that happened Friday was pretty scary, and I still get a little shaky at night when I am counting the tills or the safe at closing time. I am scheduled to open again on Friday, March 21. I think I will be okay. I understand that some people around me are really pretty worried that I am not dealing with what happened and I should be a total mess. Let me explain where I am coming from.
This was not the first near death experience I have ever had. I firmly believe seatbelts, airbags, helmet laws, first-aid kits, and 911 were created for people like me. I have to use my fingers and my toes to count the number of car accidents I have been in both as somebody in the car and as a pedestrian. I have cracked a helmet and ruined two jackets as results of wrecking four wheelers. I stopped keeping track of emergency room visits when they stopped giving me stickers for being a good patient and taping my stitches to Popsicle sticks. I have not been all the way dead once. Well, maybe I have, I know I got pretty close one time. You would have to ask Dr. John or Jake or Sarah about that one, I don’t remember that night very well. The point is that I am still here.
I was talking to my mother about last Friday, and she was saying that what would have scared her more was the guy exercising control over her. Pretty much I did what he said because my life was in his hands. She would have been really angry at the man. I think she had a good point. I was a little angry at the guy. It’s like who does he think he is? Coming in here and making me do stuff I don’t really want to do. Scaring the crap out of me. What a jerk. Aside from that, he didn’t really bug me. I was thinking about it and I think I figured out why. When I was in high school I went to a place called The Utah Boys Ranch. For the first two weeks the only thing I had permission to do was breathe and blink. I stood at attention all day long unless ordered to do something else, like stand at ease or move rocks, or pretend there is a chair next to the wall and sit on it. I know the staff members were not pointing a gun at my face. If I were to scratch my nose with out asking permission I would run a couple of ladders or do twenty pushups or whatever. My life was never on the line. All the same, I was doing things I did not want to do whether I liked it or not. Last Friday morning was not the first time my actions were fully dictated by somebody besides myself. I think that was why it didn’t really bug me as much as many people think it should have. Funny though, I never thought that any of the life training I got in the Boys Ranch would prepare me to handle an armed robbery.
I am not saying I am invincible. I am still kind of afraid to cross the street, even in a crosswalk. When I ride in a car with somebody else driving I usually close my eyes or fiddle with something instead of pay attention to the road. I am comfortable walking on sidewalks. Sometimes I go ahead and make the left turn instead of driving around the block to find a light. Time will eventually heal most wounds.
Am I going to remember this experience for the rest of my life? Yes. Is it going to change the way I function while at work? A little. Will it ever happen again? I don’t know. Am I going to let some strange guy with a gun run my life after he leaves the building? No.