The Forgotten

There was a sad and stirring article in the local newspaper recently recalling an event which occurred 9 years ago in Seattle, and has faded with time like so many other life altering events (remember Wah Mee?). In October of 1996, a 40-ish well dressed, well groomed woman checked into a upscale downtown hotel using a phoney address and phone number in New York, as well as a presumed alias. She paid for two days, went to her room, and sometime during the next 48 hours drank a cyanide cocktail, leaving a note claiming full responsibility. Besides being incredibly well written, the newspaper story chronicles the investigation following the discovery of the suicide. John/Jane Doe suicides and homicides usually launch a nationwide (in this case also involving Canada, our neighbor which actually got democracy right!) search of missing persons records. Almost all of us leave some trail; no-show at work, missing neighbor, missing relative/friend/church member, etc. which generates a missing person's report. But to this day "Mary Anderson" has yet to be matched to any record. Read the story (link above), it's both chilling and sobering to see a person leave this world without a trace of a past.

UPDATE: Found a story on this by the Wah Mee guy.