Why am I locking my doors?

I never have the door to my house locked. I've never lived in a house where I felt I needed to lock my doors. Even with our weirdo looking neighbor who my boyfriend says hits on teenagers (he is in his 40's) I still feel pretty comfortable in my own home. I've never felt uncomfortable walking down the street, even at the crack of dawn or late at night. Actually I find walking in the middle of the night, when it's so silent very relaxing. Walking at night maybe when I feel the most safe. It reminds me of walking with my dog at night when I lived at home, one of the only times during the day when I actually was safe; away from criticism from students and teachers at school, away from yelling and abuse at home.

So the other night when I was in the backseat of my car, at midnight, breastfeeding my daughter to sleep, I kind of shocked myself for feeling the need to lock my doors.

That night my boyfriend and I had gone to a legion that has a blues open mic night. I had never been there before, but my boyfriend goes there almost every Thursday with some of his friends to play music. Since it's not a real bar it's one of the few open mic nights in the area that I can go to and bring the baby. It was actually nice to have a grown up night out, even if the baby was with us, it was nice to have conversations with other adults who didn't have young children. Through out most of the night I had people I knew around me, I felt pretty comfortable.

However around midnight everyone started to leave. The baby was getting fussy, we we're leaving after my boyfriend was done playing his set anyways and the people who I was talking to had left. I decided I should just go to the car, feed the baby and try to get her into her car seat while she was sleeping.

Once I was out there, I realized how vulnerable I was to anyone who wanted to attack me. It was really dark, a poorly lit parking lot. Because of the music, if I did scream or ask for help no one could hear me. Having my daughter in my arms feeding her, I couldn't move away from an attacker instantly, plus the car seat in the middle of the back would have made it impossible to go to the other car door and get out. Even if I did, I would have to run holding a 20 pound infant in my arms which would put me at a serious disadvantage. For the first time in a very long time, I locked the doors, turned at any noise, anxiously waited for my boyfriend to get done playing music and come to the car already.

In a way, maybe this fear is a sign that my life is semi-normal. No longer having to fear someone who lives with me attacking me physically or verbally, no longer having to worry about someone hurting me in almost any normal environment, I can now act like a normal person and project my fears on to the unknown.

However, I doubt a male in my same situation would have felt any fear at all. I have a hard time seeing a man, even with a baby sitting in a car with locked doors. Locks on car doors aren't even intended to keep people from attacking you, but rather people from stealing your car. Maybe it's just a stereotype, but men generally think they can defend themselves against any attacker. Fear is not a word in their vocabulary, fear is not a consideration when doing normal stuff. So why when doing something completely harmless, does fear arise when it comes to my own life? Is it because I have become conditioned to think everyone is out to get me? That I can't protect myself physically? That as a woman I'm an easy target for any drunken middle aged man at a legion at midnight? I'm not really sure, but I don't like feeling fear.