Seeds of Discontent

Someone's been stealing our flowers. Who steals flowers? Damn good question. And these aren't rare blooms imported from a Laotian rice paddy. We're talking geraniums, the pigeons of summer annuals.

My wife and I first fell victim last summer, when a mid-size pot vanished from our Jamaica Plain triple-decker, snatched in the dark of night. At first I had one of those I-must-have-parked-somewhere-else moments. But, no, it was swiped, a saucer-shaped ring of grime etched into our wooden steps like a chalk outline. The zinc pot, a housewarming gift from a close friend, had sentimental value, too. And then it happened again a few weeks later with a slightly larger clay pot, with, if I remember right, three red geraniums in a neat triangle. Now I was feeling homicidal. But what could I do – trawl the neighborhood? (I actually did that earlier this year when some lowlife stole our jogging stroller off the front porch.)

At least with the stroller, the motive was comprehensible: We had something of value that someone wanted. Flowers? The reason we bother planting them is we want our neighborhood – in this case, Paul Gore Street – to look good for the public. Stealing a flower is like stealing a park bench.You're stealing from yourself, you fool! After the two thefts, we abandoned portable pots for larger planters that couldn't be lifted without busting a major artery. This spring, my wife and I filled them with some standards – not just geraniums, but impatiens, marigolds, and begonias. Take that!

They did. Leaving the house on a recent morning, I noticed a grapefruit-sized hole in the planter staring back at me. Another brilliant red geranium gone. That's right, someone actually dug up a single geranium and walked off with it. A single geranium. My upstairs neighbor left me a note, asking me if I noticed. Um, yeah, I noticed, and I just don't know what to say.

I do, however, take comfort in knowing I'm not alone. My neighbor Sharon, who lives two doors down, told me she's had many things stolen over the years. Last year, after someone uprooted her white diamond sedum, she was so livid she stuck a sign in the muddy void wishing terminal illness and a slow, painful death on the perpetrator. Other neighbors thought this pox extreme, and Sharon says she was embarrassed enough to take the sign down after three days. But, she says, "I wanted that person to know how angry I was."

Listen, you don't have to tell me. I mean, I know we hate the Taliban and all, but aren't there rare occasions when their justice system makes some sense? Under their rules, a flower thief would have his pituitary glands removed or some such thing. You wouldn't hear any objections from me or my condo association.

Now let's be clear. I'm not suggesting that Boston cops suddenly divert their attention from the gangs to my geraniums. It has, though, provoked genuine anger among the victims on my street, and it goes to the heart of that enduring battle in the city between civility and vulgarity. For my money, Boston has no better neighborhood than JP, because of the real commitment its residents make to building community. At times, though, when you suffer even a small indignity like getting your flowers snatched, it can be easy to start dreaming about the suburbs: This stuff wouldn't happen if we lived in Newton or Andover or Dartmouth.

Fortunately, every time I've felt that impulse, it's fallen away almost instantly after encountering a friendly crowd at a local cafe or pondering the towering sunflower stalks stretching out of our community garden. When our city seems to turn against us, we must be one another's – our own – balm. So thieves be damned, we've replaced that poor old red geranium – I hope she's at least been repotted – with a brilliant white impatiens. As I write this, it's still there, sending its roots deep into the soil to drink from the long, verdant summer.

Scott Helman covers the presidential campaign for the Globe. E-mail him at shelman@globe.com.