Silver Linings

I got the call I was waiting for. The Bloomington Police Department in Minnesota called to let me know that my camera had been pawned and they got it back!!! . Officer John B asked if he could look to see what was on the memory card. Unfortunately the jerk who stole it, deleted all my pictures and had done a few videos of his own, but none that showed his face. I explained to the officer what I was doing and how devastated I was when the camera got stolen and honestly I’d rather have the pictures than the camera (but was obviously ecstatic about the camera). He said he completely understood and that he would get the computer forensic guy at the police department to try and look at the memory card to see if he could recover those pictures.

Obviously this is not how I wanted this to go. I would have preferred to not have anything stolen from me. But I am soooo lucky that this is the way things have turned out. I’m still waiting for a call to see if they had any luck with the recovery of the photos. A HUGE thank you to everyone at the Bloomington Police Department, everyone I interacted with there was beyond amazing, from the officer who took the original report and personally went to multiple pawn shops to officer John and the fact that they are mailing my camera wherever is easiest for me. Meanwhile I keep reminding myself that I still have the memories and no one can take those from me.

Again I am so lucky with the people I’ve met along the way and am currently on my way to go meet up with Claire. I met Claire at Wind Cave National Park where she was an intern and is currently going to school in the Green Bay Area. She offered to show me around and of course I couldn’t pass that up. Just another wonderful thing this trip/journey has brought my way.

UPDATED: They were able to recover about 10 GB of photos and videos. And a friend JoHn was able to pick it up from them and I will be meeting up with him to get it!

Here is JoHn with my camera in the evidence bags.