Into Thin Air
There has been a news story (to us, a news story; a terrible reality for the family) that has been bothering me since the day it happened. One day, approximately three weeks ago, a 50-something-year-old doctor left her medical office, was seen getting into her car, and then proceeded to vanish off the face of the earth between said office and a seminar she was planning to attend five miles away.
There has been no sign of her since. There has been no sign of her car. There was nothing in her personal life that would indicate she would leave by choice. Her husband, by all appearances, is genuinely distraught. He was home with the flu the day she disappeared. He last talked to her that morning when he tried to discourage her from going to the seminar. Apparently she wasn't a confidant driver, the weather was bad that day and maybe he worried that she would have trouble getting from her office to her five-mile-away destination (how did she get to and from work each day? I'm assuming she drove but maybe not). She has a newly-married daughter in the area (an hour away) and another daughter nearby. Nothing indicates she would "run away".
So where is she? How does a grown woman, a professional and respected doctor in the community, disappear? How is this possible? As much as this bothers me---someone completely unconnected---I can't imagine how it must torment her family. The possibilities would loom large and all of them would be terrifying. Did she drive into the Bay? (Incidentally, they have searched the waters, the section where she would have most likely driven into if that were the case, and they have been unable to find any sign of a car.) Was she carjacked? Was someone waiting in the car when she got in and kidnapped her? And what would be the motivation? Some are concerned that it could be connected to the fact that she's Muslim, and they want the FBI to become involved. There has been no activity on her credit cards which makes a carjacking/kidnapping for money purposes seem unlikely and also makes a "runaway" situation seem implausible.
It's a mystery. It's a tragedy. It's one of those things that gnaws at you and keeps pestering the back of your mind because we want answers. We don't want someone to be able to just disappear. Not a grown, capable woman. If it could happen to her.....could it happen to me? That question must be there at the back of our minds when something so horrific and inexplicable happens.
For the sake of her loved ones, I hope there are answers soon.
posted by jay are at 1:51 PM
7 Comments:
The question for me would be: Did she WANT to disappear and make her own escape into a new world or was she abducted and the victim of malevolence? In the meantime, I, too, can empathize with her family and friends; what dreadful apprehension must fill their minds!
In the local (Louisville) news today there is a story about bones that were found in a local subdivision yesterday. They have now been identified as the remains of 78-year-old man who had Alzheimer’s and wandered away from his son’s home in June of 2002. The location of the remains is about 14 miles from where his son lived. How he died has not yet been determined.
9:11 PM, December 02, 2005
that is so awful. To have been so close. To have been lost. Just imagining his confusion and fear--so sad.
9:19 PM, December 02, 2005
Hmmm,i watched a news thingy on the tv the other about young amn and woman who got married. They were at the airport ready to board the plane for the honeymoon and the husband decided to go to the bathroom. He never came back. To cut a long story short, the cops found him wandering round outside a mall, miles and miles away. He had no clue of who he was, where he was nothing. He was in hospital for ages. He had no clue who his wife was, he'd lost a years worth of memory. Dr's said amnesia due to stress. The wedding and the death of his best friend a few weeks before. It took a year before he regained his memory. It came back all at once, not in stages as usually occurs. The interveiwer spoke to him and his wife, both are really well and happily married still to each other. She perservered and he was willing to go home to their house and try and regai his memory. Seemed liked it worked!
4:05 AM, December 03, 2005
How awful. I have to think that she really wanted to get away from her life, but never expressed that to anyone. That's my hope, anyway.
5:23 AM, December 03, 2005
i am obsessed with missing person stories. i watch unsolved mysteries and memorize the faces i see on flyers. i think the reason i am like this is becaise 1) i think it is a horrible crime to take someone and then do whatever with them for whatever reason. 2) if i ever get kidnapped, i want people to memorize my face in case they spot me somewhere 3) i love it when the missing person gets found/the perpetrator gets locked away forever.
it really makes you realize that you always have to be on your toes at all times.
10:55 AM, December 05, 2005
it's a terrible, yet somehow fascinating, thought that we could be within feet, within miles of one of these victims or the scumbucket person who committed such an atrocity.
I too look intently at pictures of either victim or criminal and wonder if I might have seen either. I can't stand the thought of someone going missing.
11:12 AM, December 05, 2005
I just read today that she was found in the Oakland Estuary, possibly after making a wrong turn. While it is unbearably sad for her family, I'm sure, I hope that they find peace in knowing where she is, and knowing that she is not suffering.
12:27 PM, December 22, 2005
Post a Comment
<< Home