First-Person: Ella, dog belonging to missing hiker Meredith Emerson, Walks into CP's Store

By now, most people have at least heard of the hiker who disappeared in north Georgia. Many have heard the name Meredith Emerson and of her dog Ella. For the beginning of this story, it was comfortably distant. The missing hiker was just another story that had nothing to do with me and my comfortable life. Then suddenly it hit home.

On January 1, college student Meredith Emerson left a note for her roommate telling her that she had taken her dog for a walk. Many others saw her that day, but sometime during that fateful hike, a tragedy began to unfold. Since that day no one has seen Meredith, and little hope is left that she is alive. This wasn't of a concern to me; I work two jobs and hardly have time to watch the news. Then Ella walked into my store and entered my life shaking things quite badly. Ella is a black lab mix belonging to Meredith.

On Friday, January 4, Meredith had been missing three days. I was working at my second job, in Cumming, Ga., which is approximately 50 miles from the park that Meredith had been hiking. Ella was timid, and settled in the foyer of the store I work for. Some customers even stop to pet her, and she definitely did not look like she had been lost in the woods for three days. There was no tag on her, and no real way to be sure of who she was. She looked like any other stray, looking for a good home but not having a owner. While the management at the store was notified, a customer took pity on Ella and took her to a nearby veterinarian. The veterinarian scanned the microchip implanted in her, and positively identified Ella.

Then the dam broke loose.

It started about an hour later with one lone GBI agent walking into the store and wanting to see a manager. He spoke to the manager for quite a while, and left. Shortly after that, a lot of GBI agents and police showed up as well as the news media. We were strictly told not to say anything to anybody. One of our other cashiers told the GBI to look over at the nearby convenience store, setting up for the GBI to find the large cache of discarded evidence that was in the dumpster. The GBI and police searched everywhere, including the dumpster in the back of our store, too. This caused our alarm to sound, reminding us that the alarm had been sounding at night for the past few days. The cashiers at the store felt nervous, and we even resorted to leaving in pairs.

What felt safe before, now doesn't. My store's policy is to park in an area further away from the store, but the cashiers that stay late into the night are mostly female and did not feel safe. We park closer to the door now instead. We are told not to talk to anyone, but so many different people approach asking us what happened, and it is hard to explain that I don't really know all that much either. I worry what will happen when they search near the store, and hope against all odds that they do find Meredith alive. The evidence is supposed to say otherwise, but in a situation like this, you never really give up hope for a happy ending. I live less than three miles from the store, and each time I look out my window, I wonder if Meredith is out there in the cold struggling to find help. I imagine myself in her place and hope that something like that never happens again.

History teaches us many unfortunate lessons though. And one of the worst lessons is something like this will happen again. I can only hope that next time it will just stay a headline, and not invade my life again. I feel sympathy for the friends and family of Meredith Emerson, and at the same time, ferverently wish to never be counted among that number when the next time happens. Bless those whose lives are affected worst than mine, for I don't know if I would have that kind of strength.