By Jacqui Flint

The other day, I received an email from a stranger. The stranger claimed that he knew where my sister was and that he knew people who had seen her. If I was interested in his help I could email him. At first I wanted to believe this stranger. When someone is missing, it is easy to grasp onto anything, anything that will help to keep hope alive. After realizing it was just a scam artist probably looking to make money off someone else's grief, I was angry.

My anger was directed not only at the scam-artist, but I realized I am angry at what has transpired this past year. As of January 9, 2003, Danice has been missing for a full year. I am angry because someone took her away. This anger is coupled with frustration. I am frustrated because there are still no new leads, no new evidence; even the rumors about how she disappeared have subsided. Whoever took this wonderful sister, mother, daughter, granddaughter from our family is free.

Anger and frustration are just a minute part of the wave of emotions that have hit me in the past year. While the anger seems like something I can control, the sadness I feel comes without warning. It is hard to control a feeling that is always lying right there in your heart. It is hard to walk down the street and find yourself bursting into tears and wondering when the pain will stop. It is such a mysterious loss that often I find myself wondering what to feel at all. There are other days when I am in denial and just want to ignore that this tragedy is real. The whole experience just seems too surreal to fathom.

Some nights Danice appears in my dreams. The latest dream was Danice walking in the forest. There was a slight breeze running through her blonde hair. Her slender body moved gracefully through the trees. The only problem was that she couldn't escape. Significant in her life I suppose. She loved her two children and would have done anything for them, but there were other things in her life she wanted to escape.

As I look back on my journal entries from the past year, I realize that every day Danice's name is written somewhere. Mostly I just wrote, "I miss Danice!" I will continue to write this because it helps. My whole family misses Danice. My whole family wonders what really happened to her. Sometimes I'm ashamed to say, I get tired, tired of thinking about her absence, tired of feeling guilty about the things I should have said, and tired of wondering when some kind of evidence will appear and help investigators with her case. I realize I am being selfish because this isn't about me, but it is about a young life cut short with no explanation.

I know I am going through the normal cycle of mourning. Then again, I believe that it is hard to mourn someone's death when it is still such a mystery. I look forward to the day when I get a call from investigators and they announce, "We found her." Perhaps, that is the day that the real mourning can begin. I have faith that no matter how long it takes, the investigators will keep this case open and someday the anger and frustration I feel will subside. For now, it is just an inconspicuous loss for which I am not sure how to grieve. My family and I can only pray that a new year will bring new answers.