Stolen Car Diaries: Blame the Streets or Blame the System? (Friday, April 4, 2025)

The past year, I've been deeply invested with reclaiming control — not over the world, but over myself. My inner life. The small things. The things capitalism and grind culture tell you don't matter: tending to my marriage, my child, my plants, my own mind. I even wrote a blog recently about "the simple things," not realizing that soon I would be tested on that exact lesson.

Wednesday morning, my car was stolen. Just gone. Like it never existed. At first, I thought maybe this was just a late April fool's prank. And suddenly, I was reminded how quickly the simple things get disrupted. The work-life balance tension I’ve been managing cracked open, and I had to move into survival mode. Police reports. Insurance claims. Navigating bureaucracies that don't care about me, but require everything from me.

I wasn’t just mad at the thief — I was mad at the system. The one that creates these conditions. The one that makes stealing feel like the only option for some, a sport for others, all while forcing folks like me to pay for it emotionally, financially, spiritually.

And what’s wild? I'm aware enough to know the person who took my car isn't just a "criminal." They’re someone else shaped by the same systems I’m learning to resist.

That is the cruel joke of it all.

The system creates victims and perpetrators alike. And neither of us is free.

When we talk about "the simple things" — we need to remember that simple doesn’t mean easy. It means deliberate. Choosing to still tend to my plants, my family, my inner life, and even when somebody steals my car — I tend to my Peace. That is resistance.

The real question is: How much more is being taken from us every day, just because of the systems we’re apart of?