fake alarm

last night as i was drifting off to sleep, the wail of a siren blasted me awake.

groggily i wondered what it was and my brain told me that it was probably the security alarm of the house behind. annoyed, i turned around in bed, waiting and willing it to stop. after ... 5 - 10 mins of wailing, it stopped and i thanked god for it.

as i was about to fall back into dreamland, it started again. and i wondered, what's the point of the security alarm. i mean, we are so immune (??) and insensitive nowadays that even though we hear it, we wait for it to go off. and i wondered, what if it was really someone in need of help? what if it was really a burglary taking place? we got so used to 'fake' sirens and calls that we do nothing about it despite the reason for the alarm in the first place.

it's not that i'm callous. it's not that i'm apathetic. but what was i supposed to do?

call the cops and then what? i did that once. nothing happened. no cops came.

so ....?