Lighting Patterns Reveal Who Is Home
I realized something last night that I do that I wasn’t consciously aware that I did. I looked at my neighbor’s house to determine who was home by simply looking at what lights were on.
Do you ever do that?
We all have personal styles in the lights we chose to turn on at night. Some of us like it bright while others like mood lighting. But people each have personal preferences, and those preferences can reveal who turning them on and off. Furthermore more, as a general rule, women tend towards low-light mood lighting, where men want functional bright lighting, though there are variations.
I never consciously set out to notice my neighbor’s patterns, but I realized I do know them. I seem to pick up on patterns subconsciously.
What is scary is I cannot help but questions do predators look at this, and use this information to their advantage? It’s kind of creepy in that respect. Maybe next time my husband goes out of town, I will use his style of lighting instead of mine!
Several years ago, my husband started working in a city two hundred miles away from where we lived at the time. So for about three months (until our lease ran out and we could relocate with him) he commuted that distance, traveling down there on Sunday night and coming home Friday night, while I stayed in our apartment with our children. It was a pretty lonely time for all of us!
When he was away during the week, I deliberately varied which lights I left on overnight; some nights it was the overhead and the hall, sometimes our daughters’s room (they slept in with me when he wasn’t there) and the kitchen, sometimes just the lamps, or any combination/variation of those. The TV was always on all night (with the sound muted). While I never thought of it as identifying WHO might be home, my intent was that if someone was watching the house, it would hopefully appear that actual people were awake all night rather than there just being that one light always left on.
Very cool to see here that such “patterns” are indeed identifiable/noticeable!
(BTW, I was pretty sure no one was actually watching the house, we lived in a very safe small town, but I’m paranoid.)
I only can tell if my neighbours are home or not. They often read my lights as well to tell if I’m home, but they sometimes get it wrong. I know this because when we catch up they tell me, or ask me whether I was home or not on such and such a day.
I think it’s kind of creepy that you’re looking at your neighbour’s houses.
I’d say you are lying if you never wondered if a neighbor was home!