Today I was walking home from my future apartment at 4 p.m. It’s about a 25 minute walk and I was walking at a leisurely Sunday pace with no place to be. I noticed a car turn around and park in an odd spot near the beginning of my walk, took note of it, but I wasn’t feeling unsafe. I cut through the local park where some people were playing softball and kids were on the playground.
I turned on to my street and had about a 1/2 mile walk to go. I was texting my friend and noticed that there was a car parked on the side of the street, again I didn’t think anything of it but it looked similar to the one from the start of my walk. As I was walking past the car the man said something and I turned and looked to see his penis out and masturbating. I quickly averted my eyes and sped up but did not want him to know where I lived and thought it was too risky to turn around and snap a photo of the car.
I heard the car blast by me and up the street fast enough so that I could not take a photo or read the plate numbers. I immediately started crying and running towards my house. I felt violated and I ran into my house an took off my dress, put on gym shorts and a t-shirt and called my sister. For some reason I felt like I needed to take those clothes off to try and wipe my mind clean of the ordeal.
She told me to call the non–emergency line, which I did to report but I didn’t have much information. I hope that if he continues to do this someone will be quicker and take a photo so that this man can be stopped.
Optional: What’s one way you think we can make public places safer for everyone?
A tip line that people could text reporting street harassment, or a twitter/facebook feed that would alert people within an area of people that are harassing others so that we can be aware or even prepared.
– LB
Location: Brighton, MA
Share your street harassment story for the blog.
See the book 50 Stories about Stopping Street Harassers for more idea
