Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Fight

I'm sorry I've been absent. My heart has been heavy. Me and Tiffany had a fight and for a while I wasn't sure we were going to make it through. It started from nothing -- a comment about dirty dishes -- and worked its way into one of the biggest fights we've had.

We've been together for ten years now and I thought we'd worked through our kinks, but I suppose now that the kids are grown and off to college we have to get used to it just being us. It's never been just the two of us.

She joked about doing the dishes after she'd cooked. If she cooks I'll usually do the dishes, but I'd had a long day and didn't have it in me to do the simplest of chores. I was short and took her joking too seriously and suddenly a joke became a disagreement, which rolled right along into a full blown fight.

She accused me of being selfish, I accused her of the same and worse. I needed a break, one night off; she needed to feel appreciated. We yelled, no one listened, doors were slammed and car wheels screeched out of the driveway. We lost each other in those moments and we lost sight of anything outside of our own needs.

I stayed away for over a week; I ignored her calls, texts, and emails. I was ashamed of my behavior and the pain I'd caused Tiffany. She didn't deserve the things I said. All my old insecurities flooded back and suddenly my angel had fallen to the darkest parts of hell. But really, I'd fallen into the darkness; unable to claw my way out, I immersed myself in it and shut out my angel's light.

But our love is strong and eventually we were able to see each other again, to see the truth of who we are and the love we share. We fell back into each other and have come out stronger for what we endured.

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Sleep


It’s 3:33 in the morning and I can’t sleep... I decided to pick up Sarah’s diary again and see if I can find any more clues... I’m trying to understand where she was coming from. What she was thinking... I’m reading between the lines and wondering if maybe I will fall asleep and dream something, a clue... something I can’t see in the waking hours...

Why? Oh my god, why? This cannot be happening to me. What the hell do they want from me? They took the last thing that I had left on this earth that I truly loved. We went to the end of time together, then held each other and cried, ‘cause there was no where else to go but back!

I just wish I understood... I’m going back to sleep. I’ll post this tomorrow maybe you guys can help me understand...

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Neighbors


It’s rare to have a happy ending to a story like Amanda Berry’s. You heard about her, right? The girl who’s been missing for a decade and was recently rescued by Charles Ramsey, the neighbor of her kidnapper… And I’m sure you've seen the video of Ramsey’s interview, it’s viral beyond viral and offers more than the superficial laughs from his unintentional one-liners like, "I barbecue with this dude. We eat ribs and whatnot and listen to salsa music." Look beyond the delivery of Ramsey’s statements to the words what they mean. They were neighbors for a year and not Ramsey, or any of their other neighbors had a clue that three missing women and a child had been captive on their street. It makes me wonder, how well do we know our neighbors?

Do you know who lives next door to you? Across the hall? Down the street? The people in this neighborhood thought they did -- they socialized with Ariel Castro, they let him take their children to the park, they ate with him and did other normal, neighborly things with him. He even helped look for one of the girls who he abducted, and consoled her family! The whole time, he had the three women and a child hostage in his house.

I remember when Erika's family was found dead. They found her remains with those of her twin sister. I remember Sarah's shock when learning Ericka had a sister that Sarah never knew about. Erika was Sarah's best friend before me -- how do you not know your best friend has a twin sister? Things aren't always what they seem.

I'm glad that the families of Amanda Berry, Michelle Knight, and Gina Dejesus have their daughters, sisters and granddaughters home. As hard as it will be to uncover the truth of what happened to them during their captivity, it will allow them all to begin to heal. I wish Sarah could have that. I wish we knew what happened to her and I wonder if we'll ever know what really happened so many years ago to Ericka, Owen, Jackie & Sarah's family. Until we find Sarah, none of us can ever really begin to heal. We don't have a lot of clues, but Sarah leaves us breadcrumbs from time to time. Between the sightings and her diary, there are clues. I still can't believe people don't believe me... how can you not believe when there's so much evidence?

The truth is revealed when we look beneath the surface. Don't be afraid to ask questions. Don't assume what you see is all there is.

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Evidence


From my experience reality is always stranger than fiction. And where fiction gets strange my guess is that it’s firmly based on reality. My bet is that the strangest scenes from movies, the ones that seem completely unreal are often based on true crime stories that boggle our minds. 

I've been studying forensic science, and I watch an insane amount of real crime shows. What have I learned? There’s no perfect crime and even when there are no witnesses the tale will be told. Little bits of evidence, blood stains that seep through the floor and aren't removed by scouring and bleaching the surface. Small spots of blood splatter revealed by keen eyes and technology. Bugs and natural processes exposing the timeline, when death occurred. Lungs filled with soot when killers attempt to dispose of bodies, burning them still alive.

Every little detail tells a part of the story. Hair, finger nails wearing the nail polish last seen on the missing person, paint chips, phone records, strange behavior the list is endless. I don’t remember if Sarah was wearing nail polish the last time I saw her... Even with all of this knowledge and information, Sarah’s body has never been found. Her blood, her painted toenail, no trace of anything. I guess that’s why I believe that she’s out there, somewhere. Maybe reading this right now...   

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Terrorism

In the wake of the tragedy of the Boston bombing, I think of the terror felt by those who experienced the bombing as well as their loved ones who waited for word that their mothers, husbands, daughters, sons, brothers... were okay.

How horrible to be wrought with the fear of not knowing. I remember so many years ago, before 9/11, before shoe bombs at airports and anthrax in letters, before the world was changed forever... I remember the feeling of not knowing, it was more than some can take... how do you move forward if you can't surely say your parents are dead or alive? Sarah's descent into a terrific terror began when her parents went missing... their bodies were never found.... her brother was implicated in their disappearance... her mother's wedding ring was ultimately found in the room where they found Sarah's Diary.

So many questions remain unanswered. I still wonder why about so many things, but I know the terror Sarah felt was real. She believed she was being watched & followed by people she once called friends. She was never quite right after Erika's body was found, but that incident in San Francisco really freaked her out...

Terror comes in many forms... It dwells in the lingering question of What if? and hides around every dark corner. What if they find me today? What if they catch me today? What if they're watching me right now? What if they don't actually exist? What if it's all in my head...

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Why?

I received this anonymous email in my inbox the other day. It really made me wonder why... why I keep writing and searching... why we do anything for that matter. After all these years why I still believe when there are a lot of people out there questioning if Sarah’s diary is even real...

Hi Heather,

If that’s your real name... I recently found out about Sarah’s Diary via a friend’s facebook page. I followed the link and started to check out her videos and pictures. Some were really pretty but deep and dark, and some of the posts started me thinking about a lot of stuff from my own life. Anyway, I was curious so I bought the ebook of Sarah’s Diary and read it in a weekend. Now I’m even more confused.

When I read your blog I see you talk about your interactions with Sarah, how much you miss her and are still looking for her. Are you for real though? I can’t tell if she is fact or fiction.

The main questions going through my head are, Why would you still be looking after all this time? Don’t you want closure... I mean after all that... everyone pretty much ending up dead and the diary being found at such a gruesome crime scene, I mean if Sarah was really around however many years ago don’t you think she’s probably dead now too? Those missing persons cases you write about, most of those seem to end with a dead body...

I’m not trying to upset you I just want to know now too. Is Sarah’s Diary really real? Why do you keep looking? What makes you think she might still be out there, alive?

---

Why have I been thinking about this anonymous letter for 5 days now? I want to respond, I want to know the answers to those questions too...

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Lindsey's Devil

"Lindsey began to talk to Heather. She told Heather how smart she was for watching her all this time and picking up her habits. During school they would have to pretend that they did not talk. After school sometimes they would meet in the woods so they could talk. Lindsey and Heather began to play this game called Profile. They would pick people out of the yearbook and watch their habits. They’d watch everything—the classes they took, when they got to school, when they left, who their friends were, how they dressed, the routes they took to class, what they ate for lunch, how they groomed themselves, and basically everything there was to notice about them. ...I asked Heather where Lindsay is ‘cause we could sure use her help right now. Heather said that Lindsey just stopped going to school one day and was never seen again. Nobody even noticed she was gone. To them, she had been gone a long time ago." ~Sarah's Diary, October 15, 1993

I haven't thought about Lindsey in a long time. I knew her better than Sarah realized. I went to meet Lindsey in the woods one day after school, like we did all the time, but she never showed up. Lindsey had told me about this guy who called himself Devil. She said she saw him show up in town one day and he looked at her with the oddest expression; she said it was like two ghosts recognizing each other. Lindsey always saw more than she let on and she could disappear in plain sight; she had a talent to make herself invisible. She followed Devil and watched him, playing the same Profile game we played together at school. The day she didn't meet me in the woods was the day she was going to tell me what happened when he talked to her. All she told me was that she wasn't supposed to see him, that he moved with the shadows and that he told her if she didn't go back to being a little girl, he would make her grow up really fast. Lindsey was scared, I could tell. She wouldn't tell me over the phone what she'd seen -- that's why we were meeting. She was going to tell me what this Devil guy had been doing, where he'd gone and who he'd been with; she said I'd never believe it, but she had to tell me. She said if anything ever happened to her, I needed to know. She never showed up. I always wondered if she actually had been there, watching me. I still wonder if she's watching me and if she knows what happened to Sarah.

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Body


Have you ever seen a dead body? I feel like I’m not sure anymore what Sarah saw, but I know my own experiences... I’ve personally seen a crime scene after the fact. After the police came in and thought they got all the evidence, and the body was gone. The dogs were gone, the drugs were gone... There was hair on the floor in a few places, and  shoes and things, clothing - we picked out the last outfit she would wear and which pair of chuck taylor shoes, books, self-help books...

And then one of us cleaning up, she found the broken murder weapon. We couldn'tdidn't know what to believe and didn't believe and even the cops told us to “just throw it out, (they had)... everything,” thinking the murder weapon was a tool from the fireplace, it wasn't. We threw it out and within a few months it was confirmed by the killer himself. We had touched it, tossed it into the trash.

I remember the tomatoes chopped on the counter and the big knife... I remember a lot of little details. I wonder about the rookie cop who answered the missing persons call and found her. Saw her body through the sliding glass door and the dogs running around the yard. I've lost too many friends at this point. Even years later the memory is like last week.  Like yesterday...
I wish Sarah would just come home and face the truth, get some help and let us all move on in our lives. We can’t forget, but can we forgive?

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Justice

Here in America our legal system says you're supposed to be innocent until proven guilty. I look at Sarah's situation and wonder how many people have read her diary and automatically think she's guilty of those horrific murders. Yes, I've seen her videos and I know some of them make her look kinda crazy, but in my heart I know she must be innocent.

I ran across this story about some guys who were convicted of murdering some kids a long time ago and throughout their years in prison, they kept telling people they were innocent. They had movies made about them and still they sat in their jail cells, innocent men convicted. After more than a decade of fighting to prove their innocence, they were successful and are now free. There's a new movie coming out about their journey and the fact that whoever killed those boys is still out there.

Sarah's still out there too. I've always thought her story would make a good movie. So many questions remain unanswered, but there's so much in her diary, so many clues and history. Why not show the world her story? If nothing else, I bet it'd help us find her and that's really the point of all this.

I miss you Sarah. I know you still read this. I won't give up on you, I promise.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Missing Persons


Alerts for missing persons show up in my email once a week. It may sound weird, but it makes me feel productive to search over the news stories looking for clues, if not for Sarah for anyone who’s gone missing. Someone who’s already lost everyone with hardly anyone who cares to look for them, after they disappear themselves...

I look them over then read more from Sarah’s Diary: April 14, 1994 Jason scared me last night! He came into my room while I was sleeping and was just standing over me. I lay still, frozen with fear, because when I said his name he did not reply. He just turned around and whispered, “You shouldn't have come back.” Then he walked out of the room. I was too terrified to go back to sleep...

It was like Sarah felt she had nowhere to go after a while. How crappy to feel completely unwanted... I don’t think she would have gone so far as to... I don’t even want to think it much less type it. I still want to believe she just left; disappeared, figured something out and got far away from the insanity following her like a shadow... sometimes you could see it, sometimes you couldn’t, but it could show up at any time. That’s enough to drive anyone crazy and inspire them to run. I hope that’s what she did. I hope she didn't end up like in this drawing, or some of the people in my alerts... sometimes they are never found. I’m going to bed. Comment and tell me if you've seen any clues, every little thing helps.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Have You Ever...

...Felt like this?

My father and I got into an argument today about me spending so much time with Ericka or in my room. I’m sorry if I don’t fit into this perfect family, but what do they expect me to do-- sit and watch TV with them and tell them about my day? My dad said that I look like crap ever since I’ve been hanging around that girl, and that my attitude has changed. Maybe I just woke up to what bullshit this world is all about.

I've been rereading Sarah's Diary and this entry stood out. I remember feeling just like that -- I remember how my parents thought they knew everything, but they had no idea what was really going on in my life. They thought because they'd "been my age" that they understood... how could they understand what I was going through?

I knew Sarah. I was her best friend. I'm still looking for clues in her words. Have you felt like she did? Do you feel like she did? Please read her diary and tell me if you see any clues. We need to see through your eyes just like Sarah wants us to see through hers.