Missing

While the impending swine flu pandemic is stealing all the headlines these days (I'm trying not to get freaked out but I've read The Stand by Steven King twiceand am familiar with Captain Trips.) there's another story in my city that's getting attention. It's a case of a teenage girl who went missing while spring breaking in Myrtle Beach.

Brittanee is 17 and a junior in high school who asked her mother if she could go to Myrtle Beach with some friends last week for break. Mom said no. Brittanee then asked if she could stay with some friends in town for a few days. Mom said yes. Now I'm not judging anyone, I feel horrible for this mother but when your kid asks to go out of town with friends, you say no, she then asks to stay with local friends for a few days doesn't your mom antennae go up? As a 17 yr. old I also told my mom I would be one place knowing I wasn't going to be there but never left town. I'm lucky in the fact that I have great kids but I would still think something didn't ring true if they did that. But it's a known fact that teenagers don't always make good decisions and it's been proven that is has to do with the development of the frontal lobe of the brain.

Brittanee made the decision to deceive her mother and go to M.B. to the extent that she called home every day pretending to be in town. In one of those conversations she told her mom she was at the beach. Since we have a beach here on the shore of Lake Ontario mom didn't suspect anything. Brittanee left Rochester on Wed. April 22 and was last seen in Mytrle Beach on Saturday evening April 25. Apparently the group of friends were changing hotels and when she didn't show up someone finally notified authorities. Her clothes and cell phone were found in her hotel room. What teenage girl isn't joined at the ear with their phone?

Per her mother, Dawn Drexel, Brittanee has never run away before. She's getting national exposure on CNN with Nancy Grace, weeknights at 8 pm. I hope this has a happy ending and not turn out to be a Natalee Holloway story.