I go to the doctor in the morning in Glenwood Springs.  Morgan goes into town with her puppy while I am gone.  Morgan is really frustrated with everything going on – too much drama.  She likes to avoid drama.  She throws herself into dance – comes home after I get back, and plays the piano, and shows me her new dance steps, on her toe shoes, that she is working hard on perfecting.

Later this afternoon we start a list of suspects – we write down every single person in neighborhood on a legal pad, including people living at the ranch behind us, so we can start watching and eliminating people.  This was a tactical day.  We decided every time something happened Steve would jump in his truck and drive around the neighborhood to see whose car was in their driveway, and who was gone. Some of our neighbors are part time residents, with vacation homes, and we will continually cross them off the list as they are proven not to be involved. It’s unnerving to think of all the neighbors as “suspects” but it seems logical at the same time.

Morgan is still sleeping in our closet, except when she is staying at a friends house.  Her sister, Godparents, friends and other family members have all offered to have her come stay with them in order to get her out of state, but Morgan does not want to leave her puppy, she doesn’t want to miss a semester of classes and most of all she does not want this stalker to force her to change her life.  She thinks if she leaves he wins.  I understand where she is coming from, and her father and I are doing everything we can think of to keep her safe, but ultimately we did not have the information or experience in this sort of thing to make the right decision for her at the time.

Looking back on this day I know we should have hidden her out somewhere safe, with her puppy, and not continued on with life as though no one could take her from us…this was ultimately the worst decision we could have made.

Click here to read about the 17th day of Morgan’s stalking https://morgansstalking.com/?p=633

Photo credit Max Barbanell