Erica Pyska woke up early Sunday morning to every restaurant owner’s worst nightmare: news of a break and enter at her downtown Lethbridge business, Plum.
“Obviously, your first thought is, ‘Is everybody OK? What happened? Is this a false alarm?'” Pyska said.
Unfortunately, it was not a false alarm. The front doors were shattered, glass was strewn about the restaurant and hundreds of dollars of alcohol was missing from the bar.
“The police came very promptly and cleared the area. Once it was secure, I think those were the longest 20 steps of my life – walking from my vehicle to Plum, having no idea what I would be walking into,” Pyska said.
“That was very, very nerve wracking.”
Before long, owners of the neighbouring restaurant, Stella’s Diner, were on scene to help with the cleanup and even cooked the team a much needed breakfast. Pyska said she couldn’t believe how quickly the community rallied behind her.
“Downtown, things happen. They happen all over the place,” she said. “In our situation, we’ve seen an outpouring of love and support from all of our downtown businesses. I can’t tell you how many personal messages I have received.”
Now, those personal messages are showing up on the piece of plywood that is covering the broken door as business carries on inside.
A temporary Band-Aid on a less than ideal situation.
“You know, I need some help getting the images out of my head of what I saw that night,” Pyska said.
“I thought, ‘Hey, it’s like a broken arm!’ And we do that with kids especially – sign the cast so that our little people have something to lift their spirits and I thought, ‘OK, this can be our cast.'”
A vandal may have broken their door but they didn’t break their spirit.