Posted June 21st, 2004 by Michelle

Just when I’m feeling sorry for myself…

This morning I got a frantic phone call from a mother who couldn’t find her daughter. The daughter, let’s call her Leslie, took two classes here early last week although she wasn’t feeling well enough to complete the second one. She was supposed to have checked out of our Guesthouse last Tuesday night. The mother said she spoke with Leslie this morning at 7 AM, and that she was still here. I got on my computer and told her that it was impossible that she spoke with her daughter in her room here because someone else was booked in that room for a class this week. Mom insisted, though. She became very upset and explained that her daughter was not well, that she was refusing to take her meds and that the mother was very concerned for her daughter’s mental health.

Leslie had come to me on the first day of the second class saying she was not feeling well. I told her she was welcome to sit in the class if she wanted, but that ultimately she should take care of herself and if that meant going back to bed, she should do it. She didn’t seem terribly sick, just sort of down. She didn’t show up for the second day at all, which was the last day of class, and I assumed she just went home (which is about ten hours north). But I checked the phone number her mother had been using to communicate with her all week, and indeed it was the number to Leslie’s room at the Guesthouse. The mother said she had called her daughter very early this morning, on that number, but that now her daughter was not answering the phone. Her mother was terrified for her daughter’s health. But I knew that someone else was supposed to be in the room- the education department hadn’t had any housing complaints- so the mystery deepened. Finally I went to Security, explained the situation, and said I wanted someone to go to the room with me because frankly I was afraid of what I’d find.

The manager of Security and I were on our way to the Guest House when he realized he hadn’t checked his mailbox for keys from students who hadn’t shown up. Two hadn’t, one of which was the woman who was supposed to take over Leslie’s room. My stomach dropped. We walked over to the Guesthouse, listened at the door, knocked, and finally opened it- to find it empty and clean.

I went back to my office to call her mother who is in another country and who was trying to decide if she should fly out here or if maybe her daughter might have gone to the airport to fly home. She also asked me to canvass the parking lot, which I did, looking for her daughter’s car. It wasn’t there. This worried the mother even more because when she had spoken to her this morning, her daughter had been almost comatose.

I spent the next hour trying to find out if Leslie could have been on an airport shuttle or taxi of some kind, but I found nothing. Finally, half an hour ago, Leslie called a woman here at my place of work. Leslie could not identify where she was, or why she had left, but she did know that she felt terrible. The woman who answered the phone told Leslie to call her mom, and then Leslie hung up. I just called her mom to let her know that we’d heard from her, and her mom had just heard from her as well. Leslie managed to say she was somewhere in Napa, but she didn’t know where, and that the maid service had told her she had to leave the Guesthouse this morning. Her mom begged her to find a hotel or restaurant, and to call her back, so someone here would know where to find her.

The thing is, Leslie is operating a moving vehicle without being capable of reading a store or street sign to her mother. Her mom said she’d been “crazy” for years, but she did not say it unkindly. Over the last two weeks, I talked to Leslie several times, both on the phone and while she was here taking classes. I even got her a scholarship for her second class. She seemed so “normal” and balanced. I have a feeling that this episode will end okay- at least, I hope it does, with Leslie landing somewhere safe and one of her mom’s local friends finding her. But my god- how scary. When I was walking towards the Guesthouse room, I honestly thought I would have to deliver terrible news to the mother. It’s a pretty significant reality check, and yet another reminder that my life is just one of seven billion.