Last week, I had a unpleasant awakening when I spotted myself on my new Ring security camera.

I still haven’t recovered from the realization that the old lady doddering around on my front port was me.

Last night — actually after midnight — I had another rude awakening from activity on my front porch.

I awoke to what had to be a fist pounding on my front door. I froze in my recliner and didn’t utter a word or make a sound.

After a few seconds, the pounding began again.

Still frozen in fear, I realized that my son Jeff had visited earlier and had only locked the door in the handle when he left.

I had drifted off to sleep without turning the top bolt or jamming my doorstop under the handle.

The minute the pounding ceased, I jumped to my feet — believe it or not — and turned the bolt and kicked the door stop so it fit tightly against the door.

Then I remembered my Ring camera.

I backed it up and then there it was, a strange man at my door.

And he didn’t appear to be up to any good. After walking away after the first pounding, he turned around, came back and knocked again before walking away. The next clip showed him driving away in a car that had been backed into the driveway, which takes some doing to park that way.

Jeff came back and spent the night with me after I sent him a copy of the video.

Thank you, Jeff, for spending the night with a frightened old lady, and especially to you for insisting that I purchase a Ring camera.

My worst fears when Jeff bought a house and moved into it was the dread of being fearful at night, which is nothing new to me all my life.

But I did well mainly because my colleague and friend Janet brought me a doorstop which could damage a leg that tried to kick a door in.

My son Mickey will stay with me tonight, and the night after I will learn to be brave again.

I refuse to spend sleepless nights waiting for dawn like I did in my younger days.

If I stay awake until 5 o’clock in the morning again, I want it to be because I was binge watching Downton Abbey again — not paralyzed with fear.

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