the inner ghost...

i got mugged on saturday night. at my house. with my mum. by three guys. with guns. they took my purse and my car. they pushed us to the floor of my garage and told us to stay quiet. two of them got into the car and started backing out while the third one stood over us. he then got into the car and they drove away.
i choked. i couldn't move nor react to what they were telling us to do. they wanted me to start the car, but i only remember saying 'no' and standing there paralyzed. that's when they yanked the keys out of my hands. they punched me in the jaw, but it was quite weak, and i just remember thinking "i can't believe i'm being assaulted by three little kids that don't even know how to punch".
i remember my mum and i rushing into the house as soon as they drove away. we called the police. i struggled to remember my license plate, and screamed the description of my car over and over, so i wouldn't forget. we called my dad. i talked to the operator and i thought i would faint. my breathing was ragged, and he told me to calm down, that he had already dispatched the information and a patrol car was on the way. they arrived just before my dad did. i remember pacing a lot. i remember hugging my dad and crying, but no tears would come out.
i don't have a mobile phone. i don't have an id or a driver's license. i don't have makeup, and i don't have my iPod. i don't have a car. and i don't have any sense of security right now. i'm afraid to go out of my house. i'm afraid of arriving at my house. i don't mind walking around the streets or being elsewhere in the city. but i can't stand in my garage for even a few seconds. my heart starts pounding. i have no energy. i keep playing stuff out in my head. i try to comfort myself by remembering that it could've been so much worse, but that's not comforting at all, because i REALLY start thinking about how much worse it could've been, and i get more scared, and i think of my mum, my dad, my sister and her baby, my brother-in-law, my grandmother, my grandparents, my aunts and uncles and cousins, my friends and coworkers all the other honest, hard-working people who don't stand a chance either when faced in situations like this. where's our safety? where's our protection? when will there come a time when we can enjoy the product of our honest hard work without being afraid that some little perp with a gun will take it away without remorse?
i've cried so much my head hurts. every time i tell the story to someone who asks, my eyes well up, and i get cranky, and i want to run away and crawl into bed and sleep and pretend it never happened. i want to move away from this city to a place where this sort of thing doesn't happen but i know those places are hard to come by. i want to know where my mum and my dad and my sister and my family and my friends are at all times, but i know i can't.
i know this isn't the most awful thing that can ever happen to me. i keep thinking that this was quite horrible, and i remember i'm only 25 years old and i have a lifetime of shit that hasn't happened to me yet. and i tell myself "that's what we're here for, in this world and in this life, to experience a lot of shit inbetween a lot of good times, and take it in stride", and that thought is comforting for a while, and i remember i don't care about my car or my iPod as much as i'll ever care about my mum and how glad i am nothing happened to her or to me, but then it goes away and i remember i'll never get the hang of it. if i'm alone i remember that i could be alone next time some shit happens, and i'm scared to be alone, because i won't know what to do. and it sucks and i'm scared. i don't want to live like this. i can't.
i cry until i can't breathe. i cry when i'm alone. i've cried many more times in the last couple of days than i have in the last couple of years. i don't know how to stop.
i feel a piece of my soul has been sucked out of my body and it's out there somewhere and i don't know how to get it back. i'm not sure i will ever find it. if i find it, i might not know how to put it back. there's only a ghost there, where that part of my soul used to be.
i feel i am not myself. i feel in disarray...