"In the summer of 1989, Karen Palmer bought a used car for cash, filled it with belongings some clothes, toys, one pot, one pan and a shoebox of photos and disappeared with her new husband and two young daughters. She didn't tell her mother, her friends or her neighbours where she was going. She gave no notice to her employers and landlord, leaving items out on her apartment balcony as a sign she still lived there."
"They headed east, and eventually stopped at Boulder, Colorado, in the foothills of the Rocky mountains, partly because Gil would never think to look for them there. I've always lived on the coast as I liked to be near the ocean, she says. He would not expect me to go inland. They had no ID, no references, no papers linking them to who they were. In the weeks that followed, they changed their names, faked documents, found jobs, a home and a school for the girls."
"It worked. Gil never found them. She stayed in touch with friends and family by phone so they knew they were safe but didn't tell them (even her mother) where she was, so that they wouldn't know if Gil came and demanded information. The family thrived under their new names. The girls grew up. Yet those ordinary, uneventful decades that followed gave Palmer space and time to doubt all that had gone before."
In summer 1989 Karen Palmer bought a used car, packed belongings and left Los Angeles with her new husband and two daughters without telling anyone. She left items on her apartment balcony to create the impression she still lived there. The family traveled east and settled in Boulder, Colorado, chosen because Palmer believed an inland location would hide them from her ex-husband. With no legal papers they adopted new names, fabricated documents, and secured jobs, housing and school enrollment. The family remained undiscovered and prospered, but over decades Palmer wrestled with guilt and doubt about removing the girls from their father.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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