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

Being Sucked into a Tragedy

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.