Where is Emma Fillipoff (Two)

previous segments of Where is Emma Fillipoff
ONE: The Grieving Mothers of Perth, Ontario    

Two: She’s Missing

So many things run through my mind every minute of every day. Emma’s life essence courses through my veins so I can feel her being within my own. So many fears haunt me. There will never be a moment’s peace until my beautiful, amazing daughter is found. She is everywhere I look and yet nowhere to be found.” (Shelley, Facebook Status, May 2015)

 

Shelley and I sit on the couch where Shelley spends most of her days. The couch is covered in dog hair.

 

“You can only imagine how little I care about keeping the house clean,” Shelley says. Cash, her bulldog lies between us and snores loudly. Shelley curls herself into a corner and starts smoking, an old habit she took up again, after more than thirty years. Throughout the interview, she smokes rather vigorously and barely ever smiles.

 

Shelley was my fantastic grade six French teacher. Grade six was wonderful year. Unlike so many French teachers, Shelley taught with enthusiasm, humour and creativity. I remember her being so vibrant and beautiful. She is still beautiful, but there’s a weariness in her face and in her eyes. She looks very tired and very sad. Her voice is so soft that sometimes it’s hard to hear her above the sound of the dog snoring.

 

Shelley

Photo Source: Times Colonist

I asked Shelley what Emma was like growing up. Artistic and free-spirited, Emma was the quiet girl who was everywhere. She was always welcome in any group. Although she wouldn’t say much, she laughed a lot and her smile was magnetic. Everyone loved being around Emma. From the outside, Emma appeared to love her life which was filled with piles of friends, dance classes, photography and writing. And yet, when Shelley read Emma’s old journals, she discovered that her daughter had been unwell and unhappy from as young as eleven years old

 

But she made sure that nobody ever saw that side of her,” said Shelley. Shelley has since asked friends and parents of friends if they ever got sense of how much Emma was suffering. Nobody had any idea. 

 

In addition to being secretive, Shelley describes Emma as “non-confrontational.” While her siblings would debate and stand up to Shelley’s rules, Emma would simply retreat into her room.

“Emma wanted to grow up from the time she was about eight,” said Shelley. In objection to her curfew, Emma moved out on her sixteenth birthday. But she left a note telling her family she’d gone to her friend Ellen’s house.  She didn’t just disappear. 





Emma with Ellen's sister, Marie.
Both Ellen and Marie Flanagan did interviews for the Fifth Estate documentary, "Finding Emma."



After discovering that Ellen’s mom also enforced a curfew, Emma decided to rent an apartment with an older guy.  Although this roommate wasn’t her boyfriend, Emma had already begun to attract men far older than her. Physically stunning and quietly mature, by the time she was sixteen, she had a boyfriend who was 26. A bit of stretch, but not surprising given Emma’s beauty and grown-up persona.  To make rent, Emma, quit school and worked at KC’s video, a gem of a dive all us Perthites know well.

 



Emma, always so beautiful



It was at this time that Shelley realized that she couldn’t take a hard line with Emma like she could with her other children. At any sort of conflict, Emma would withdraw. In attempts to keep her daughter as close as possible, Shelley gave in to Emma’s request to see her younger brother. He was only eight and heartbroken that Emma was gone. The two adored each other. Emma has three siblings and Shelley claims she was close to all of them.

 

On Sundays, Shelley would drop her youngest son at KC’s video so that he and Emma could hang out and watch movies together.  At the same time, Shelley would drop off shampoo, treats and fresh fruit. Things she knew Emma would be struggling to afford.

 

Emma lived on her own for eight months. Finally, in September, she asked to come home. Like many teenagers, Emma detested high school. Instead of enduring the torture, she enrolled at the alternative school, where she could work independently. Her marks were excellent and she won a scholarship to Loyalist College in Belleville. She studied photojournalism, combining her talent for writing and taking pictures.

 

I wonder how Emma would frame her own story.

When I was in India, I watched the CBC Fifth Estate documentary on Emma’s disappearance. “Finding Emma,” it is called. Alone on my bed, I remember staring at the screen and feeling terrified and haunted. As an actress read words from Emma’s journals, I got the sense that I wasn’t supposed to be hearing them.

 

“What was in her journals was horrifying,” said Shelley. “So I don’t know if she was psychotic, or schizophrenic, or major depression issues. I don’t know.” The police don’t know either. Nobody knows.

Emma: "There is promise of flight.

And I lay in fear

In fear somehow

Somewhere

Sometime

Fear crept in.

She’s missing.

I am missing."

End of Part Two.

-Written by Erica J. Schmidt

 

Where is Emma Filllipoff

 
Read More:

 

One: The Grieving Mothers of Perth, Ontario

 

(NEXT SEGMENT) THREE: Wednesday, November 28, 2012

FOUR: Mental illness runs in the family
FIVE: A Mother's Instinct
SIX: Okay. So I'm dead.
SEVEN: She ran away because she fucking hates her parents.
EIGHT: Safe Until She Returns
NINE: A Perfect, Beautiful Family


HAVE YOU SEEN EMMA?
Please Share Your Stories and Tips
Help Find Emma Fillipoff Facebook Group
Email Erica: ericaschmidt85(at)gmail(dot)com
(contact form below)
Email Shelley: fillipoff(at)hotmail(dot)com
Call the police.

Finding Emma on the Fifth Estate

Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Erica on Twitter: @mypelvicfloor

 

Where is Emma Fillipoff (One)

Where is Emma Fillipoff
One: The Grieving Mothers of Perth Ontario
 

On November 23, 2012, Shelley Fillipoff heard her phone ring around midnight. Immediately, she got the feeling that something was very wrong with one of her children. It was Emma, her 26-year-old daughter calling from Victoria, British Columbia. Emma was in tears and highly distressed.

“Mom, I want to come home,” she said. She wanted Shelley to fly out and get her.

 

“Of course,” Shelley said. She promised to book her flight as soon as they got off the phone.

 

“Are you booking your flight?” Emma asked. She seemed incredibly concerned. Once again, Shelley promised that she would as soon as she hung up.

“Right away, honey,” she promised. They hung up, and without wasting any time, Shelley booked her flight and packed to go get her daughter. Within a few hours, Emma called back.

“No, Mom, don’t come,” she said. “Not today.” She told Shelley that she wanted to figure things out for herself. Respecting her daughter’s request for privacy, Shelley cancelled her flight. This went on for four more days. An anguished Emma calling, begging her mom to come get her. Shelley booking her flight, packing her suitcase. And then Emma calls back, her mind changed. “No, Mom, don’t come. Not today.”

 

"Don't come. Not today, Mom, not today." These were the last words Shelley would ever hear her daughter speak. Emma called early on the morning of Wednesday, November 28.

 

At this point, Shelley could no longer ignore her instinct that something was terribly amiss. Her ex-husband and children urged her to heed Emma’s vacillating wishes, but Shelley got on a plane and flew across the country to bring her daughter home. She was still in the plane at 8 P.M. the last time Emma was seen. Shelley arrived at 11. By then, Emma had already vanished into the night. No one has any idea where she went.

“The days are unbearably long and yet it’s almost been three years.” Unbearably long, unimaginably horrible. This is how Shelley Fillipoff describes her life.

 

I met Shelley this July in her family home just outside of Lanark, a tiny village about ten kilometres from my hometown of Perth Ontario. Although Perth has been voted, “the prettiest town in Ontario,” I’ve always felt haunted by the community’s disturbing amount of tragedy. As I grew up, there seemed to be a disproportionate amount of pre-mature death and disturbing events. Fires, drugs, a double-murder suicide, a vice grip attack in a restaurant broom closet, a child pornography arrest, inordinate levels of cancer and countless young people who die suddenly of illness, accidents or suicide. Perhaps it’s just my morbid fixation on death, or maybe it’s because the community is so small. But whatever the reason, Perth has its share of grieving mothers.  The day Emma disappeared, Shelley became one of them.

 

End of Part One

-Written by Erica J. Schmidt

Where is Emma Fillipoff

Read More:

(NEXT SEGMENT) TWO: She's Missing

THREE: Wednesday, November 28, 2012
FOUR: Mental illness runs in the family
FIVE: A Mother's Instinct
SIX: Okay. So I'm dead.
SEVEN: She ran away because she fucking hates her parents.
EIGHT: Safe Until She Returns
NINE: A Perfect, Beautiful Family
 



HAVE YOU SEEN EMMA?
Please Share Your Stories and Tips
Help Find Emma Fillipoff Facebook Group
Email Erica: ericaschmidt85(at)gmail(dot)com
(contact form below)
Email Shelley: fillipoff(at)hotmail(dot)com
Call the police.

Finding Emma on the Fifth Estate

Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Erica on Twitter: @mypelvicfloor

Exalted

This morning I woke up at 3:30 A.M.

To menstrual cramps and menstrual blood and cravings for toast and peanut butter.

James Altucher loves waking up before 4 A.M.  So today, I get to be a little bit like James Altucher, but with menstrual cramps.  I don't know if James Altucher likes toast.  

At 3 A.M., I was dreaming.  In my dream, I was sending a free copy of  my exceedingly helpful self-help book to Tim Miller.

In real life, I don't have Tim Miller's email address.



Tim Miller. In my dream, he desperately wanted a copy of my self-help book, I Let Go.
In real life, he probably doesn't need it.



In real life, there is water in my ear.  Especially the left one.

It could also be curly-haired conditioner.

Or some cerebral spinal fluid.  Must be time for some brand name Q-tips, purchased with the Boatman during our Drugstore Date.

These brandname Q-tips come in a package of 54, which 108 divided by 2, which is a very auspicious box to come from when you are a brand-name Q-tip.

The Brandname Q-tips really hit home with folks from Perth Ontario.   Perth, Ontario is the prettiest town in Ontario.  What's more, in 2008, we had four Olympians.  3 of them were born in 1984.  Since I was a gifted child, I got to be in their classes, even though I was born in 1985.  Oh look!  Here's Mike Brown:

Mike Brown. What I think in my head when I look at this photo:
What a babe.

A real champ.  I used to swim in the lane beside him.  Then I was his lifeguard.   Once I helped him with his English Essay.  Now Mike Brown has huge pipes.  Mike Brown is preparing for the Olympic Trials at the end of the month. Wish him luck.  Good luck, Mike Brown.

Mike Brown and all the other people from Perth Ontario know that you shouldn't stick Q-tips up your ears, not even brand name q-tips.  I used to know this but some conditioner or cerebral spinal fluid got stuck in my ears, especially the left one, and it has been so long since I lived in Perth, Ontario that I forgot.  So this morning I stuck some brand name q-tips up my ears.  Especially in the left one.  What I found there:  It wasn't conditioner.  I do not think that I will do that again.  Not with the brandname Q-tips.

There are 20 more days left of Lent.  Lent is 46 days this year.  Last year at this time, I started a post entitled "Lent."  It seems I didn't have that much to say about it.

Yesterday the doorbell rang and the Big Black Dog barked so loudly that the man with the pamphlet couldn't come in.  He slipped his pamphlet into my hand through the crack in the door.  On the pamphlet Jesus was standing on a cloud.  He had white hair and a crown.



Jesus says, "Where is my crown?"



The pamphlet said:  "Jesus is an exalted King.  But what does that mean to you?"  I don't know what it means to me.  Neither does the Boatman.  We can go find out at the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's witness on Holy Thursday after the Boatman washes my feet.  I am not allowed to talk about my toenail fungus ever again.

26 days ago, more or less, the Boatman and I were sitting on the couch.

 "What do you want to give up for Lent?" I asked

"What's Lent?"  asked the Boatman.  

Last year for Lent, I tried to give up an hour of my time to meditation.  I wanted to be Zen, like the Buddha.  And exalted, like Jesus.  I made it eight days.

This year, the Boatman resolved to give up eating all meat except for seafood.  Since I already never eat anything with a mother or a face, I decided I would try to give up 20 minutes of my time to meditate.   I thought that it would help me become Zen and Exalted.  As the Boatman and I observed, I became increasingly neurotic as the days and the 20 minute chunks of exalted time passed.  I worried about the gunk in my ear.  And all sorts of other things.  And I had terrible dreams that weren't about Tim Miller.

While I was meditating, the Boatman ate a lot of fish and chips.

fish and chips and peas.

Sometimes with green peas, sometimes without.  Last weekend, the Boatman and I flew to Montreal.  On the airplane we decided that while in Montreal, I would not meditate and the Boatman would eat chicken.  We had a wonderful visit.  I did not worry about the gunk in my ears at all.  Which was a good thing because I'd forgotten my brandname Q-tips.

When we got back to Halifax, our housesitter had clogged our kitchen sink with Honey Nut Cheerios, and our bathtub with Johnny Walker puke.  I cleaned up the Cheerios and have not started to meditate again.  I Let Go, like in my self-help book.  The Boatman let go too.

You too can let go, for $2.99.

Jesus is an exalted king.  But what does that mean to you?

Jesus might say:  Chicken is not the end of the world.  But watch out for the pepperoni and the French Fries.  

Dix frites ont 110 calories.  (Ten French Fries have 110 calories)  This sentence was on my grade six French Grammar class.  I have never forgotten it, and have cringed at the thought of French Fries ever since.

ONT stands for Ontario and it is also French for have, if you are more than one person, or more than one French Fry.

I was always very good at conjugation.  Mike Brown was in my class.

Seventeen Magazine.  I read it in grade six, when I was ten.  Recall that I was a gifted child and thus the youngest person in grade six.  Seventeen Magazine had a column called Ask Anything.  The question I never forgot was:  Why do I always get the runs when I'm on the rag?  I can't remember the answer, but I never forgot the question.  There are so many reasons to ask it.  Especially at this time of month. 

Runs on the rag.  My friend Fern calls it "Peanut Butter and Jam."  Gross.  I hope I sleep better tonight.  Tomorrow I will be Zen and Exalted.  Today is brown and bloody and very high in calories.  But my team spirit and conjugation are impeccable.  My memory is also rather impressive.

James Altucher says that you must always bleed in the first line.  Today, I don't have to try at all.  I have been bleeding since 3:30 A.M.  I bled in my first line, I am bleeding in my last.  I will bleed all day.

The End.

Peanut Butter and Jam, Vice Versa

Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor
I Let Go, self-help book by Erica J. Schmidt

The Earth Will Shake Us Off Like Fleas
Holy Thursday
Spiritual Beard, Secular Vagina