It’s weird moving to places where the relative danger of different crimes vary.

I grew up in a place where I was mugged at knife point a couple of times. It was a pretty socioeconomically deprived area where this wasn’t normal, but it wasn’t super abnormal either. One of the times I was mugged, I was in a pretty bad place with my mental health, and I said “if you want my phone, then just fucking stab me for it, because I don’t give a fuck anymore”. The guy mugging me seemed to recognise me as someone going through some shit, and became super sympathetic. He even asked me if there was anything he could do to help. A friend who was mugged (at knifepoint) in the same rough area one responded by saying “oh come off it, mate” and continuing walking. It’s like there was a weird sense of solidarity, because we all knew we lived in a shit hole place with no prospects.

I later moved to a much safer city, where being out at night felt tremendously safe. Now, I live in a larger city, and none of my previously cultivated instincts for safety are the right fit. I know that I must be more cautious here than I was in the small, posh city I lived in, but also I feel that the kind of caution I need here is quite different to what was necessary in my home town. Without a calibrated sense of risk in this new city, I often find myself being overly cautious. I suppose that’s a safer side of caution to err on.