Since her stars and stripes were stolen during Father’s Day weekend, Lyn D’Andrea has set up a security camera to make sure her new flag is still there.
She keeps an eye on it from a monitor inside her shop, The Hair After, 1316 Main Ave.
“I have had to resort to an eye in the sky (camera),” D’Andrea said.
“Now, I feel the flag is bait. I drive by on Sundays (to check on it). It’s like somebody stole the kitty. I want to make sure it’s still there. It’s just very upsetting; maybe I am sensitive because I know the sacrifices the people in the service make for us.”
D’Andrea’s twin sister served in the Air Force, and her father served in the Navy. Many of her clientele are also in the military. She clips the bangs of police officers and firefighters, too.
“I want them to know we’re right behind them. Then to see it gone is just insulting,” the hair stylist said. “I just don’t know what kind of person would steal a flag that is zip tied to a wrought-iron fence.”
She suspects it was stolen when the salon was closed between Saturday night, June 15, the day after Flag Day, and when the salon reopened Monday morning, June 17.
D’Andrea bought a classified advertisement in The Durango Herald, asking the culprit to return it with “no questions asked” but no such luck.
She spent $18 to replace it, which was “not cheap.”
D’Andrea likes to fly the flag to celebrate holidays such as the Fourth of July, but D’Andrea has begun to doubt her policy.
She is afraid someone is going to take her framed photo of Dylan Redwine that she has put out by her flag to remember the 13-year-old boy whose remains were recently found in the woods near Vallecito.
She does not want to lose the photo, too.
“I’m too damn paranoid to keep that out.”