Someone has gone missing

and the police are trying to find her. They are putting all the resources they can into finding her...and they are not being "helped" by social media, gossip, rumour, speculation and scuttlebutt. 

A woman went missing eighteen days ago while out on her normal morning run. The police do not believe she has gone of her own free will. More than that I do not know. I would not begin to comment on what her life and family relationships are like.

Someone I once knew here also disappeared for a time. I did not know him well. Brother Cat knew him too. There was no social media back then. The police no doubt used different methods to try and find him. Certainly they eventually reached us in their long line of people who "might" know something. As both Brother Cat and I had been in another state at the time of his disappearance we were not able to offer any help. 

We "speculated" of course. That was inevitable but we didn't join in the buzz among his friends. It was not because we were not interested but because our parents spoke to us about how frantic his parents were. They were nice people. We knew them reasonably well. It might not have been on a daily basis or even on a casual cup of tea basis but we knew their names. Our parents chatted to them in the street or if they were passing each other in their respective front gardens.

I saw his father a few weeks after his disappearance. His father was sitting slumped on a chair in the local chemist. His complexion was that odd "grey" colour that comes with exhaustion. I didn't speak to him. He wasn't looking at me - or anyone else. The chemist came out with the prescription he was obviously getting filled. There were quiet words of advice and a nod of the head. 

And then, as he went to stand, the chemist placed one hand gently on this man's shoulder. That was all it took. He started to weep. The chemist took him behind the counter and I know no more. That is what that man needed, genuine sympathy. He didn't need all the chatter that was going on. Speculation wasn't helping. He was grateful for all the help they had been given trying to find his son but all the "we are so sorry" and "it must be so hard" and so many similar comments did not help. 

Nobody knows what happened to this lad. He did eventually arrive home after being missing for some months. He then spent months in hospital in a highly traumatised state. His family moved after that. There are still people who speculate but they don't know - and they still do more harm than good.