Going downtown and walking up and down both the north and south banks of the river had always been very pleasurable for Judy and was even a large part of her daily and weekly exercise regimen. Ever since the city had spent a lot of money building fine wide wooden walkways overlooking the beautiful river it had been a great place for citizens to enjoy the waterfront.

The great atmosphere had even drawn many and varied merchants to invest in the area with specialty shops and quaint eating establishments. These were helped in their success by other businesses who either opened or expanded in direct adjoining neighborhoods. The area became a real showplace for the city and then other cities who had deteriorating downtowns were looking at the place where hope and hard work had replaced shabbiness and despair. This had indeed been worth whatever the city investment had been as many, many citizens came every day and especially on the weekends when much entertainment was provided. Along with the automobile and bus traffic many power and sailboats would dock along the bank to take advantage of the fine facilities. Every holiday would bring hundreds and maybe even thousands more visitors to enjoy what was offered. Everybody was happy.

Then something happened. It didn’t happen all at once but gradually and when something starts it seems to develop a mind of it’s own. First, it was squabbles about parking and who was going to pay for it and then the subsidized rent stopped. But the biggest thing was that the criminal element discovered the place and suddenly people didn’t feel safe there anymore so they stopped going there in droves. Trouble feeds on itself and it seemed that the beautiful north bank and south bank walks started to deteriorate faster and faster and no one was doing the required maintenance. Assaults, rapes, etc were beginning to become commonplace and the police presence was not enough to stop it. But, still some would not be run off from their beautiful walking, jogging and strolling place alongside the flowing river. Judy was one of those.

Judy had been carrying this little “toy” for a couple of years when she was stopped under one of the bridges by a couple of muggers who were actually armed with knives as they approached her one behind the other grinning and calling her awful names. She did not hesitate as she raised the 4 ozs of Mace Pepper spray with UV and put the first burst into the front one’s eyes. And as he dropped his knife and skidded to a stop with his hands over his eyes, she calmly shot the other one in his face. He not only stopped but screamed and ran blindly away with the first one stumbling along behind.