404 Not Found: Faces, Hearts & Souls Lost Without a Trace

Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell. 

~Edna St Vincent Millay, American Poet, Playwright and Feminist

Hmmm, how is it that I did not, until just now, see the prophetic irony in that annoying "404 Page Not Found" error that leaps onto our computer screens from time to time?

I must confess that I have allowed the enormity of the Japan earthquake and tsunami to fade from my mind. So many things to do. Places to go. Obligations to meet. It is all too easy to become preoccupied again by these small necessities as I go about my daily business

But on this dreary, rainy April day, I slowed down enough to take a look back at that catastrophe. I did the obligatory Google search for "Japan Earthquake Missing People". The results made me pause once again to take it all in.

More than 26,000 people are presumed dead. But bodies have been found for only 13,500 of them. Authorities believe up to 1,000 bodies are in the muddy debris inside a six-mile radius around the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant that had been off-limits until now.

Then it happened. I clicked on one heading and the "404" error screen popped up. How oddly and tragically appropriate it seemed to me.

Many of those who perished in the Japan catastrophe will never be found. For their loved ones they will always be "404 Not Found". No closure for the grief. No final chance to say goodbye. No gravesite to visit to commune with their spirit.

I wondered how many people go missing, from causes known or unknown, and are never found. More Google searches. The numbers are staggering.

… The U.S. Department of Justice had 109,531 active missing person records as of the end of 2005.

… During 2005, 834,536 entries were made into the FBI's National Crime Information Center's missing person file – an increase of 0.51% from the 830,325 entered in 2004.

I couldn't locate a comparable statistic for Canada. Somehow that seems even worse. Don't we care enough to even keep that statistic?

In any event, statistics are just nameless numbers and don't tell the real story. The Edna St Vincent Millay quotation at the top of this post puts an emotional stamp on the issue. Losing someone we love leaves a hole that is never filled. Losing them without a trace – presumed dead but never quite certain – must be hell indeed.

"404 Page Not Found" is a sterile metaphor for this heart wrenching experience. But in some ways it is apt. The connection is still there and always will be. A door we can never quite close.

Let us cherish those we hold dear and not let the business of life come between us. For if, God forbid, the 404 message appears – we'll be left grasping at air.

~ Michael Robert Dyet is the author of "Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel" – double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael's website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com or the novel online companion at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog. Visit www.smashwords.com to download a free preview of the e-book version. 

~ Subscribe to "Michael's Metaphors of Life Journal aka Things That Make Me Go Hmmm" at its' internet home www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog2. Instructions for subscribing are provided in the "Subscribe to this Blog: How To" instructions page in the right sidebar. If you're reading this post on another social networking site, come back regularly to my page for postings once a week.

~ Send comments or questions to michael@mdyetmetaphor.com.