chatting with David Huggins

I work for an outdoor school as an instructor, and I spend weeks (and sometime months) away from my desk.

I enjoy the time teaching in the mountains, and I’ve found that the weirdness factor in my life sort of evaporates when I’m out in the Wilderness.

When I returned from a winter ski expedition at the end of January (of this year, 2009) just a few minutes after arriving in my cabin, the phone rang and it was David Huggins.

David is a fellow I’ve never met, but we’ve had a bunch of delightful phone chats. He’s a lifelong experiencer, and he is also a passionate artist and many of his paintings are visual recreations of his strange encounters.

Oil painting by David Huggins attempting to describe his memories of strange encounters

I’ll add that he has been enormously supportive of my attempts to make sense of my experiences, and he has encouraged me to draw (or paint) my memories.

That phone call in late January was curious, coming just minutes after walking in my door. I'll add that the next two months were awash in ongoing weirdness and synchronicities. Actually, it was TOO much, and I was overwhelmed and sort of freaked-out.

Okay, lets fast forward to last night. I have been in Alaska for almost a month teaching for the same outdoor skills school. I had a wonderful time on a ski-mountaineering expedition in the Chugatch mountains with a great team. I arrived home, tired after almost 24 hours of traveling, and I lay down on the couch.

The thought occurred to me that the last time I came home from a big trip, David called, and maybe it would happen again. I drifted off to sleep, and after about an hour I woke from my nap and lay there feeling refreshed. Then the phone rang - and it was - as usual - David Huggins. It felt like he new I needed a nap before calling me.

And - as usual - we had a delightful chat, and he was supportive and encouraging.

[audio interview with David]

cloud circles

I've be doing these curious dueling posts with my sister blogger, Stace. This morning I saw that she had written a very strange personal experience. A story of asking the universe a question, and getting a reply.

Cloud Circles: Telegrams from a Conscious Cosmos

[excerpt]

Then our attention was drawn up to a scene that astonished us, despite our sensibility. There in the sky was, beyond any doubt, an intelligent manifestation of the extramundane reality we’d just been discussing. A definitive “cloud circle” stretched across the entire visible sky above us, painted in cotton ball clouds the warm hue of reflected city lights against the pitch black canvas of deep space ... Plainly depicted was an Elder of one of the Americas’ native tribes ... somehow also the embodiment of the Grandfather Sky archetype.

________________________________________________________

the shiny red balloon

The shiny red balloon, 14 months later. It lives safely in my sock drawer.

I met a woman at a Starbucks in the lobby of a tacky casino in Laughlin Nevada. We sat together and drank coffee on one of the first mornings of an eight day UFO conference. She is from Germany and her name is Natascha. We got along wonderfully and talked about the strange scene here at the conference. This happened a few mornings in a row, and soon we were sitting together during the presentations, and by the end of the conference, we were spending almost all of our time together.

Up until this conference, Natascha had almost no interest in the UFO phenomenon. How she ended up in Nevada is a curious story, she was told by an astrologer to travel from Germany all the way to Las Vegas to attend this eight day event, so she did. It proved to be the start of new chapter of her life. She realized that, somehow, this subject was important.

On the final day, after the conference had officially ended, she was planning to take a shuttle van to the Las Vegas airport for her flight home. I said I would drive her, it was no problem. We spent our final time in the casino at the same Starbucks, saying goodbye to friends we had met. It was late in the morning when morning we got in my little Subaru and started the drive North.

The highway out of Laughlin is though the desert, and it’s bleak and empty. This created a surreal mood after being cooped up in the casino for over a week. Natascha had her iPod, and she played me some music from two of her friends in Germany. It was a haunting series of tones created by a man rubbing crystal bowls and a woman singing. Less than a year later I had dinner with this same couple - but that’s another story.

We talked and tried to make sense of the of our time together at the conference. It was about an hour drive before we arrived in Las Vegas. It was actually a sad time in the car, because we had become quite close.

We were both hungry, and there was plenty of time before the flight and we were eager to find someplace to eat. We are both rather health conscious vegetarians, and the food at the casino was dreadful, and now we were heading into the outskirts of Las Vegas, and I was doubtful we would find anything that would fit our needs.

But, we passed a WHOLE FOODS grocery store, I made a U-turn and we doubled back, and within a few minutes we were pulling into the parking lot of the strip mall. I found a space for my car, and eased in. Natascha was on the passenger side, and she got out and stood up. I was on the drivers side, and I got out.

I looked across the roof of the car and saw that Natascha was standing there, with a curious expression on her face, and she was holding a shiny red balloon. I walked around to her side of the car and she seemed a little perplexed. She handed me the balloon, it was heart shaped with the words I LOVE YOU on it. I was confused, she definitely did not have the balloon in the car during the drive, so I didn't understand where it came from.

I gently set it in the car, closed the door, and we went into the grocery store together.

We never mentioned the balloon.

Our lunch together was very nice, we ate salad and fruit in the deli. She also got some food for the flight home (mostly chocolate) and I got some food for my long drive back to Idaho (mostly chocolate).

We went to the airport, and I walked her up to the security gate and we said good-bye. It was an emotional farewell and there were some tears. I walked out of the airport feeling sad and confused.

And then I spent the next 16 hours driving, with a shiny red balloon on the passenger seat, with the words I LOVE YOU staring up at me.

I got home and with in the first day or so I called her on Skype. Early in the conversation I asked: “Natascha, where did that balloon come from?”

She paused and then said, “I don’t know.”

We were both perplexed, and I pressed her on it.

She finally said, “I’m not sure, but I think it was just there when I opened the door of the car and I picked it up.”

I met Natascha over a year ago, in February of 2008. Since she has been back in Germany, we have talked almost weekly (and sometimes daily) either on the phone or thru Skype. These conversations have a way of getting very deep, in a way that seems to help me - a lot. I don’t quite know what to make of our intense relationship.

I feel like I’ve met a true soul mate.

fireball

view out my south window

In February of this year, I was in my cabin getting ready for bed. I was walking around the house shutting the lights off, and I passed by a big window facing south. As I looked outside, I saw a very bright orange ball of flame streak downward to the horizon. It only lasted a second, and it was very distinct in the night sky. I'll add that it looked sort of cartoony, like a perfect fireball with a long tail of flames.

I didn't think much of it. I was in my house, so I have no idea if it made any sound. It looked like it was way off in the distance, over the mountains to the south. It looked like a completely natural event.

I'll add that I had a curious feeling that I had seen this same thing before. I calmly thought, "Oh, this again."

I turned off the lights and went to bed.

_________________________________________________________

Text added on Feb 9th 2012:

I just realized that looking out this window to the south would line up right around the star Sirius. Whatever that might mean.

the view to the south from my cabin in Mid-February 2009

Text added on Oct 28th 2014:
This post has had more hits than any othe post on this site—ever! I am not exactly sure why, except that there has been an increase of fireball sightings (similar to what I saw in Feb. of 2009) and perhaps people are searching out the word fireball. If anyone around the world googles that word, this post (with it's one word headline) would probably show up. So, it might be nothing more that that.

The image above is from a cool site called Planetarium.

Also, this post has been VERY popular...

_________________________________________________________

streetlights

Last week I was in Bozeman Montana. I was on my bike riding through the cute streets of the downtown neighborhoods. It was nighttime and snowing, and it was really pretty. As I rode, I calmly thought to myself, “Nothing strange has happened in a little while, has this weird part of my life ended?”

And, at that exact instant, the streetlight directly above me shut off.

Ha! I laughed out loud. It was funnier than it was weird. I tried to ride past some other streetlights to see if it would happen again (it didn't).

I’ve experienced this occasionally over the years, where street lights will turn off as I approach them, but it’s been inconsistent, so I don’t really consider it strange. But that night, riding my bike in the wet snow, it felt different. It felt like I asked a question - and I got an instantaneous reply.

The question was just a playful nice thought, nothing needy or pleading, and this seems to be a pattern for me. Simple questions that just pop into my head are somehow more relevant.

ALSO: I have another nice thought event with the same street-light response.

[Text added: May 1st, 2009]

A mutual blogger named Stace (one of my sister blogs) just posted an insightful essay on her streetlight experiences.

Singing the Body Electric

- Human Force Fields and The Streetlight Effect

{an excerpt}

I’ve thought about “the streetlight effect” quite a lot, because the phenomenon of knocking out streetlights happens around me quite a bit. These events are also episodic to a degree, typically clustered around times when I perceive my quantum vibration to be intensely high, whether I’m relaxed or excited.

Based on how I feel energetically, I can generally predict whether or not I’ll be knocking out streetlights on a given night. If I’m driving home from an intriguing lecture or have just been involved in a fractalising conversation, or if I’m just thinking, thinking, thinking and making new connections - that’s when I’m more likely to affect streetlights.

_____________________________________________________

seeing a white Lion in rural Idaho

During the spring of 2005 myself and my friend Ned were spending part of the afternoon at an outcropping of small boulders near my home in rural Idaho. We were practicing and traversing on theses rocks as a way to get in shape for the upcoming summer climbing season. The spot is quite lovely. The long row of boulders were on a small hill above a dirt road, with sweeping views of the snow covered peaks of Wyoming in the distance. The long winter had ended, the sunshine was warm and everything smelled of sage.

The act of traversing on these steep rock formations proved to be quite a wake up call, both of us were surprised at how weak and sore we were after only about a half hour of bouldering.

We sat on a big flat rock above the road and lamented our exhausted forearms.

I remember quite clearly saying, “I need to get strong. This is the summer for it.” And Ned agreed.

Then - I saw what I thought was a dog on the dirt road below us. It was a ways off, and there was something odd about it.

I said, “There’s somebody’s dog.”

It took only a moment to realize that it’s slow lanky stride looked more like the way my cat walked. Within seconds, both of us knew this was no dog, this was a Mountain Lion.

We watched silently as the Lion walked along the road below us. It never saw us. We were transfixed as the cat calmly plodded past us. We watched it for about 10 minutes. It was rather small, no bigger than an adult golden retriever. It was almost completely white, except for a black spot on the tip of it’s long tail, and the distinctive dark “tear stains” under it’s eyes.

We sat in silent amazement, as it past us maybe less than 30 feet away.

It continued unhurried along the road for a few more minutes, and eventually it calmly stepped off the road, and walked leisurely into the tall grass and trees, and we lost sight of it.

This was quite a sighting.

People live out west their whole lives and never catch a glimpse of a Lion, and we were fortunate to have an astounding sighting, close up on a beautiful day.

The feeling was sort of magical, and I felt enormously fortunate. When I got home I wrote up a short email about the experience and sent it off to hand full of friends.

I got a reply from an email pal in New Zealand named Ivan. He scanned a page from a book on spirit animals and sent it to me. I’ll add that Ivan is an amazing fellow, he’s written two books that he claims are channeled directly from God. The text of the scanned page explained that, “seeing a Lion is an important sign that it is time to get strong.”

My first impression was that this meant some kind of spiritual strength, and it was a few days later that I realized that both myself and Ned were telling each other that: “We need to get strong” at the EXACT moment we saw the Lion.

[added text, april 21/09]

I was recently asked a question in a comment :

"Looking in retrospect, did something happen during that year or these last 4 years that proved this announce to 'get strong' to be a sage warning?"

That was a good question.

I hadn't ever thought about it, but the events of my life seemed to change direction sometime around 2005. This would have been exactly four years ago, and it was about that time that I began to focus more on paranormal stuff, as far as reading and studying for myself. These years have been an evolution of sorts, with some bold jumps forward. The last two years have been really hard for me, with a lot of personal challenges.

Perhaps this was a "sage warning" for me.

image from the original STAR TREK

This creepy image was at the end of every STAR TREK episode as the credits rolled. As a little kid, it always scared me.

comrades

The blogisphere confounds and impresses me, and here's another example.

As a follow up to my previous post about my two sister blogs, I’ve found my brother blog, PARANORMAL MUSINGS, created by Canadian film maker Michael MacDonald. Both our blogs are focused on weird paranormal stuff, much of it personal.

We’ve commented on each others posts, e-mailed, and even spoken on the phone since meeting through our blogs, with the initial conjoint link being Mac Tonnies and his blog POSTHUMAN BLUES. Michael found my blog (and made a comment) on March 10th, one week after my first posting.

There are a bunch of curious similarities between Michael and myself. And I don’t know what else to do but list 'em, so here goes:

* We are both named Michael.

* We both have (beautiful) Scottish last names.

* I am 46 and he is 47.

* My list of labels on this blog have both "paranormal" and "musings" as a quick link to the posts.

* Both of us are involved with a documentary project on the subject of UFO abduction phenomenon. His film INTRUDERS, is completed but mine (alas) is on hold. We were working on them at the same time. We’ve each interviewed Budd Hopkins, Dave Jacobs and Leo Sprinkle. When he described his film during our phone conversation, I started laughing.

* We both are big fans of Mac Tonnies.

* We are both cat people.

* We are both creative types (and we’ve both worked on a lot of TV commercials).

* We both have curious memories, and we are blogging and sharing our odd personal stories in a very public way.

* And - His blog was started on March 2nd of this year, and I started my blog March 3rd, the very next day.

Am I reading too much into this? I can’t help it, these similarities fascinate me.

Michael MacDonald actually commented on my posting

The Neuron-like Nature of the Internet, as I was adding his picture to this post.

He wrote: Interesting, as I was reading along it made me think of my Ackerman 000 experience, and you actually posted an excerpt. I think the internet in its vast and complex interconnectedness becomes the equivalent of a web-based-style of quantum slit test. In a similar fashion I have often wondered whether systems on the edge of stability, such as an electric light bulb about to burn out, are primed for influence by entities such as ghosts, spirits, and even aliens, if they do exist in the paranormal realm as we suspect.

two sister blogs

I’ve been utterly intrigued by two other blogs, both curiously similar to this one. The first is called Postreason and the postings are by a woman going by the name Kartott.

The second is Inter-Intelligence Communications (IIC), with postings by a woman named Stace.

Postreason started in February of ‘09 (25 days before I stated this blog). IIC started in November of ‘08. Mine was the most recent, with the first post in early March. I found their blogs only after starting mine.

Why did these writers (myself included) create these very public websites?

In a recent blog posting on Postreason, Kartott wrote:

About 1- 2 years ago ... I found I had the time and space to revisit old personal history, events and experiences that I had wondered about for years, but had put on the back burner in order to carry out my ordinary daily life. I began my exploration by joining Dreamland last year, participating in the chat sessions on that site. ... I joined the Paracast board last year, but did not post much until recently. Mike Clelland's recent posts there frankly gave me the courage to come forward more publicly (thanks Mike!), though I still have this weird feeling of wanting to run an hide every time I talk about this. Yet I feel a strong compulsion that its time to do this. I feel I must get my stories out whether written or visual. This is largely a selfish act, something I need to do for me.

And in a follow up comment Kartott added:

... More recently I have been feeling a sense of urgency regarding some visual imagery that I want to get out of my system. The stories are almost secondary at this point. ... However, in posting recent imagery (specifically, the cigarette lady) I felt it necessary to describe the particulars (i.e., the words). And in doing so, it seems I got even more questions about other events (oy)...

And there is a curiously similar tone from the author of the other blog. Stace wrote about her inspiration to begin blogging in a personal email:

As for IIC (Inter-Intelligence Communications blog), for ages I've felt a need to share my experiences that indicate a deeper level of reality than most people realize is interwoven with the mundane stuff. I've been more or less driven to tell my stories... and I also feel that by writing and posting my experiences, those that are "ready for" or "needing" or just "interested in" what I have to say will find it and get something out of it.

My need to develop IIC became more urgent in the past year, so when ... [I] set it up in November, it was like "WOW!" - a whole new world of possibility opened up, and I jumped right in!

When I review the words of these two bloggers, I am struck by the similar emotions. There’s a pattern in their explanations, there’s a repeating of words and phrases like: need, urgent, strong compulsion, I've felt a need to share my experiences, I've been more or less driven to tell my stories, sense of urgency, I want to get it out of my system.

Kartott stated is perfectly in six words, "I must get my stories out."

I feel the exact same way, and I don't quite understand why.

A few weeks ago I had a long talk with Stace on the phone. She made a real-deal effort to try and describe what she was feeling. She wanted to find the perfect word, and she actually got the dictionary out and looked up COMPELLED and IMPELLED in the hopes of better defining this feeling. We agreed that both words seemed accurate.

She said that what she was feeling was coming from outside of her. She was COMPELLED to come forward and share her story.

This matched what I am feeling - exactly. Especially right now.

I look at my blog, with all it’s strange (and very personal) stories, and the logical side of my brain says: “I must be crazy, I should delete all of this.” But I don’t. Some other part of me wins out, and instead, I add to it.

Recently, I had a psychic reading (and I wrote about it) from a woman and the first thing she tells me is, “You need to be journaling.”

To make all this even more mixed up, Stace plays an important role in one of my postings about visiting a crop circle, dated March 5th. She respond to me and says she just posted a story about her experiences in that same formation on March 3rd, two days before.

And just a little while ago, I was the focus of a bunch of internet forum postings questioning my honesty, and some of it was pretty negative. Kartott sent me a supportive personal message saying: “Hang in there.”

When I checked her site, I saw - to my surprise - that she had thanked me, she said I gave her courage. Right at that moment, I was in a very low mood, I felt really discouraged. And when she thanked me, I instantly felt SO good. I got kinda sappy and emotional.

And, Kartott writes about owls, and Stace writes about synchronicities. There's more, and I'll post it soon.

Why do the words of these two women resonate so deeply with me? They both articulate a sense of urgency, and I feel it too.

Should I try and describe what I’m feeling? I don’t know if I can. Both these women are saying it for me, better than I could. But what is it?

* * *

QUESTION: Is there anyone else out there feeling the same thing? Are there any other folks blogging for similar mysterious reasons?

(PLEASE NOTE: any editing by me of other postings and emails is indicated by using ... in the text)

neuron-like nature of the internet

I experienced a tiny little dose of the divine in a coffee shop in Moab Utah.

The other night I slept out in the desert under the stars. I was a few miles outside of Moab along a lovely stretch of high-way that runs parallel to the Colorado River.

Sometimes when I sleep outside I'll experience the most vivid dreams, and recently I've tried to encourage some extra message from the great beyond as I sleep. So, as I zipped up my sleeping bag below the sandstone cliffs, I asked the universe to give me an insight, I was receptive. Alas, I woke up without any dreams.

Later that morning, I drove back into town for coffee, and I pull out my laptop. I wanted to look up MOAB for any mythic significance, so I go to Wikipedia, a resource I rarely use. I log on and the featured article of the day on was about high-way 128 in Utah, where I slept the night before.

That was odd...

Now, this coincidence is curious, true enough. It obviously made me take note. In the previous days I had been composing a blog-post in my head about on the neuron-like nature of the internet and the possibility that it might be developing it’s own self awareness. And then I get a very curious cyber-synchronicity linked to where I slept, and where I asked for an insight.

Are we witnessing the internet form a new kind of collective consciousness? There is now a global expanse of electronic brain neurons running everywhere, in the air, into space and into the psyche of individuals. It's all emerging from an unfamiliar digital zeitgeist.

Is there an evolving giant life form of synaptic fibers emerging within cyberspace? Is it a new set of neurotransmitters, allowing and encouraging an alternative web of synchronistic happenings?

I recently tried (and succeeded) to poach a wireless signal at a friends apartment in Brooklyn. I was amazed to see a ridiculously long list of available internet connections, it was bizarre.

This is a new chapter of human history, nothing like this has EVER happened before. We are surrounded by a swirling electo-magnetic soup, with wi-fi portals, cell-phone towers and satellites in space. I am somehow forced to imagine billions of devout monks all chanting together, resonating collectively.

What is unfolding?

There is a perceivable significance in a shuffled deck of Tarot cards. And the I Ching is regarded as a system of divination within a random set of set of 64 abstract line arrangements.

Why is the internet any different?

Here’s a little bit more:

Below is an excerpt from PARANORMAL MUSINGS:
This is no joke. Today Ian and I went to Forrest Lawn Cemetery to pay our respects to Forry Ackerman, who died Dec. 4.

Next we ... arrived at our hotel. When I sat down and logged into the computer, Facebook required the typical security typographical entry before letting me see my mail. To my total astonishment, the words I was prompted to type were, "Ackerman 000" I kid you not.

____________________________________________________________

Text added Sept.  2nd 2012

Just so y'know, highway 128 shows up again in a very curious set of events, described in this post HERE. The experiences described by 'Artimesia' happened just a few miles from where I slept in the post above.

____________________________________________________________

deep feelings and blogging

This blog has been a very curious thing for me. It’s a nervy way to share some extremely personal stuff.

I recently had a psychic reading from a women named Marisa Ryan who claims to communicate with dead relatives, spirit guides and aliens. Yes, I know how goofy this sounds. The fact that I did this, and actually took it seriously, says a lot about my state of mind these days. This is exactly the kind of flighty thing I would have dismissed with contempt just a few years ago.

Am I really that needy, where I’ll seek out something as silly as a psychic, and an expensive one at that? Maybe I am, because I eagerly pursued this reading.

She told me a bunch of stuff, and a lot of it seemed to resonate with me as true.

Below is a (slightly edited) excerpt of her reading.


Marisa:

I’m being told that you are supposed to be journaling all the experiences . . .

(Mike laughs out loud)

. . . and if that means going back to the very first memory you have, you need to be journaling. It’s almost like, I feel like, it’s important for you to re-experience them . . . What was your mood that you can remember? And then what was your experience, and just completely describe every bit of it. And how did you feel at that time, meaning was there any communication, did you have anxiety, did you have fear, did you love it, did you feel at peace. Every little thing that you can sense, use all your senses. Did you smell anything? Did you see anything, did you hear anything? Write it all down. And then write down how do you feel about that now. And you are supposed to go through each experience.

I’m being told that you are going to write a book, if you haven’t started already.

(Mike laughs)

It’s not necessarily for education purposed, it’s just because there are more and more people waking up that have had these experiences, like you, and they feel like they are crazy, or like they are nuts, and even though there are millions of cases out there, there are still new people waking up that are saying I don’t believe in this, or why is this happening to me - and you will bring peace to them.

One of the first thing she said to me, and she repeated it over and over was: “you are supposed to be journaling.”

Right at that time, I was compulsivly writing, and posting things on this blog. She didn’t know anything about my weird commitment to journaling. There is a lot of stuff backlogged, and if I’m brave enough, those stories will make there way out into this very public forum.

A few days later I spoke with a close friend in Germany, and she had been reading my blog. She has shown herself to be quite a skilled intuitive and I trust her insights. I was proud of my boldness at posting my stories. I expected some praise, but she was very quick to point out that I was being too superficial. She told me my text was void of sentiment, that I wasn’t sharing enough about what I was feeling, about the deeper emotions. She told me, in essence, exactly what Marisa had told me (above).

I feel like I’ve taken a bold plunge into the deep end of the pool, and now the psychics are telling me to go deeper.

___________________________________________________

trying to capture a memory with a pen

This image was drawn as a quick little sketch in about 1994. I added the grey tones, using a computer, in 2008. Click on the drawing for a hi-res view.


This drawing represents the same 1993 memory in the posting below.

Here's the story of this drawing. For obvious reasons, that faint memory out my window bugged me. And, maybe about a year after the 1993 night-time event (maybe more) I doodled this little drawing on a page with some other scribbles. I didn’t dwell on it, I just quickly sketched it, and I remember thinking, "Ewww, that's kinda creepy."

And, I promptly put the drawing away in a drawer and forgot about it.

About a year ago, I found it again. It had been well over ten years since I had drawn it. It was just a little sketch, merely black ink lines on a piece of white paper. The memory was of a dark room, and the drawing didn't capture that. So I scanned it onto my computer and added some B&W tones. Using photoshop to create the darker image, with the bight light outside, seemed to accurately capture my dim recollection. The memory was of five spindly entities, I am sure of that, but the drawing only shows only two.

The much more precise follow-up drawing (in the post below) was created last summer in a sort of compulsive flurry.

After coloring in the little sketch, I realized I simply had to finally draw up another more detailed picture. It had been bugging me, and I've avoided doing it. But I needed to do this drawing. So, I forced myself to sit at my desk and I finally drew this more detailed image. Please understand, this was not an easy process to draw, I felt anxious and obsessive as I put the ink on the paper.

The final illustration feels pretty close. I clearly remember five entities, and they were lined up in the snow. But this drawing seems a little TOO tidy, I don't think it was so orderly, they weren’t standing in such perfect sync. And, I feel like I saw them walking, but I can't be sure.

The back lighting is pretty much the way I remember it. It seemed to flood into the room.

* * *

I’ll add that there have been a series of comments from people who have read the post below. They (quite correctly) point out that this could be some sort of dream state that I am confusing with reality. Sleep apnea or a hypnogogic hallucination are appropriate terms. Please know, that I recognize that potential, and my logical mind would agree completely. But, the “metaphysical” side of my mind is quite conflicted. I simply can’t allow myself to declare this memory as real or imagined. It seems weirder than either.

I’ll also add that I never looked in the yard for any evidence. It would have been very easy to just walk outside and look at the snow. I didn’t do that, at the time I forthrightly dismissed it as a dream, so why would I?

_________________________________________________________

looking out my window at night

Drawn from memory. Click on the picture for a high resolution image.

I am attempting to recount a very short memory. The incident described in this post lasted, maybe, less than 20 seconds. The implications of this event has been difficult for me to integrate into my life. I’ve been terribly conflicted about the truth of this foggy incident. It could have been a dream, true enough. I cannot allow myself to discount that.

In January or February of 1993, I was living alone in a small house in rural Maine. I had been dealing with a hard break up, and I was in an fragile emotional state, and this is an important factor in this story.

The driveway of the house had one of those motion sensitive lights, and it was pretty common for the light to come on when a car drove by or a deer walked through the front yard at night. The bedroom window faced the driveway, and my bed was up against that window.

I was depressed during that chapter of my life, and sleeping poorly. But I woke up that night because a very bright light was shining in through the window above the bed. I sat up, propping myself up on my elbow, and looked out the window. I saw five spindly entities with skinny bodies and big black eyes. They were on the lawn walking toward the house. They were back-lit by a singular round bright shape. This light seemed oddly small.

My first drawing, done as a way to get my thoughts down on paper, and then hidden away in a drawer.

My response to this frightening image was to nonchalantly lay my head down on the pillow and promptly fall back asleep.

Shouldn't I have jumped out of bed screaming in terror? But instead I felt absolutely empty of emotion. It was almost as if I was somehow controlled. I calmly thought to myself, "Oh yes, they're here, let's just shut down and black out."

The illustration (above) seems to capture the memory as close as I possible.

Now, it’s important that I add this extra information. This memory is strangely vivid in a way that seems entirely different form a normal state of mind.

I saw something, but at the same time I truly do NOT think it happened in “this” reality. That may sound hard to grasp, but it is the only way I can honestly depict the experience.

It’s important to me that I try to describe this feeling.

Hmmm - how to use words - weirdly quiet - sort of a pressurized fish bowl - the deepest part of my psyche is displaced, and moved to the forefront - maybe the normal thought chatter in my head is turned off - maybe - kinda - sorta...

A distinct warping of my psyche, whatever that means.

This strange warped feeling shows up again a few years later as a key element in a funny dream involving a UFO.

Did it happen while sleeping, and I simply imagined everything? Was it just some sort of dream state? Maybe. That would be an easy way to sum it all up. I’ll add that, because of this strangely vivid state of mind was so weird, I do not fully trust this memory.

The next morning I had the image seared into my mind, and I could NOT imagine something so weird could be true. I simply dismissed it as some sort of dream. I will add that I don’t recall ever dreaming I was in my own bed. My dream imagery will always be somewhere else, never in surroundings that are exactly like my bedroom.

Could my fragile emotional state been a factor in this vivid image out my window? Was I simply so depressed that I created this scary delusion in my weakened mental condition? That night, was I somehow more susceptible to such a weird hallucination? Maybe.

This memory has a series of follow up stories. And each one is, for me, quite perplexing. I will continue to post more about this very curious event.

*     *    *

I try and articulate the process of doing two drawings of this event in this follow up post.

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Text added Oct 31, 2009

The night of this event I was reading Budd Hopkin's book INTRUDERS. It was right there on the bed, probably just inches from my pillow. This might subtract from the potential reality of the experience. I mean, this book is filled with scary descriptions of skinny gray aliens, and my fragile mind was obviously filled with that imagery as I fell asleep. Did these vivid images well up as some hypnogogic dream? I have no idea.

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Text added March 25th 2010

This is something that feels funny to try and articulate, and I didn’t add it when I posted this thing a little over a year ago.

I remember looking out my window, and looking past the five skinny beings, and being drawn to look at that light out in the small open field surrounded by tall trees along side my driveway.

I thought the light was unusually small, maybe the size of refrigerator. The bright light in the yard looked, to me, just like a movie light mounted on a very short stand, pointed right at me, and into my window.

I've drawn it (above) to match my memory. 

Now, here's where it gets weird. This matches a scene from the feature film COMMUNION, based on Whitley Streiber's book. There was a lot movie that bothered me, BUT, there was a scene where the actor Christopher Walken (playing Whitley) walks toward a bright light in a forest setting.

approx. 1:30:20 time count in the movie COMMUNION

In the film, it is supposed to be an alien craft, but if you look carefully, you can see it's just a big movie light pointed at the camera. When I saw this during the movie, I thought to myself: "Oh, that's a simple way to create this special effect."

I saw the movie sometime in the summer of 1992, and “seeing” the light out my window would have been early in 1993.

When I saw the bright light from my bed out the window, I literally saw that same kind of movie light, just like in the film, and I remember thinking, in those few seconds: "Oh, that's a simple way to create this special effect." I had a similar reaction when I saw the movie. I simply dismissed this as perfectly normal. There was nothing at all unusual about a movie light in my yard in the middle of the night, but at the same time - it was very odd.

Where do I go with this?

Is this just proof that it was nothing more than a dream? Or, did "they" somehow create a screen memory? It seems like “they”quickly scanned my brain, picked a screen image from the files in my memory banks, and implanted the image of the movie light. Okay, just typing that previous sentence was hard, what I wrote is a big leap, but it feels accurate.

Am I using this "movie light" image to reinforce my own belief that nothing happened, and it was just a dream. Or, is the overt sense of a screen memory telling me that something very strange actually happened?

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Here’s an email excerpt from Mac Tonnies:

“Sure, your recollections aren't as inexplicable or dramatic as some, but you've never claimed that they were. (I think I mentioned this in a comment on my blog, but I tend to think the episode with the five Grays really *was* a sort of waking dream, as I've experienced similar phenomena myself). But the point is that you're not making unsubstantiated claims and that your take on the UFO counterculture is articulate and worth hearing, even if one happens to disagree with it.”

I agree with Mac on some level, I think this didn’t literally happen, but I simply don’t know. That said, 18 years later, the memory still haunts me.

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Text added Oct. 2nd 2013
Presently, I feel that this event truly happened. I came to this conclusion because of that sensation I tried to describe in the essay above. I say this after some serious self examination of my own memories. That altered reality feeling has happened tome several more times, and each time it was very much part of a UFO memory. I wrote about these other experiences and how I reluctantly came to this conclusion, liked in a post titled Hyper-vivid Distorted Consciousness.

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slow news day

                       Mellow voiced newscaster Robert Siegel.

I have a soft spot for pithy little palindromes, like this: Do geese see god?

I even ended up on the radio because of it. For three minutes and thirty seconds, I got interviewed by Robert Siegel on NPR's Morning Edition. He got some non-actors to play roles in a very short excerpt of my one-act theatrical work, THE PALINDROME DRAMA. This was a novelty play, with all dialog in palindromes. Below is a little bit of the interview that got edited out.

Robert Siegel:   Now mike, what is it that you find so fascinating about palindromes?

            (long awkward pause)

Mike Clelland:   Uhhhhm - I think they're funny?

This comes in at a tidy 3:33 time count

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reassuring dreams

My weird journey has brought me face to face with a lot of people who declare themselves to be psychic, intuitive or at a higher spiritual vibration. I’m deeply skeptical of these claims, but if it’s true, I might as well chat with them. They will all ask me what I do. Do I meditate, do I pray, do I use a Ouija board?

I don’t do any of that. I sleep under the stars.

Here’s what seems to work for me. I walk into the mountains alone with a dinky backpack holding just the bare essentials. I live in a beautiful place, so this is convenient. I check the weather before I go (this means looking to see if there are any clouds in the south) because I don’t want to be bothered with a tent.

I hike until it’s dark, set out a little pad and then lay myself down to sleep. The proper term is "open bivouac" but the accepted slang is astro-bivy.

If I'm inspired, I'll go thru a simple request. I'll ask, out-loud, "Okay universe, if you want to tell me anything that could help our troubled world. Or, if there is a lesson I need, please let me know. I'm receptive."

And then I fall asleep.

The results have positively bizarre. I will have the most weirdly vivid dreams. Some of them are richly mythic, with heavy-handed metaphors. But most of the time, they are curiously reassuring. So much so, that I call these my reassuring dreams.

I don’t know what it is about me, but my sychronicities have (for the most part) been playful and - well - sometimes downright silly. Why it’s unfolding for me like this, I have no idea. Maybe because I’m a cartoonist, it’s manifesting - well - sort of cartoony.

I've met a lot of people who claim the the UFO abduction phenomenon, and when I tell them I sleep outside alone they say, "I could NEVER do that." For me, it's just the opposite, I am deeply content alone in the mountains. I love sleeping under the stars.

(more vivid and reassuring dreams to come)