the universe answers my plea

I’m in the midst of a very curious event, and I’m posting it, right now, as it’s unfolding.

I’ve been searching for answers, and something that seems to provide some insight involves me sleeping out under the stars. I’ve been going out into the mountains, alone, with the sole intent of asking the Universe for help. Yes, I know this sounds corny, but please keep reading.

Before I fall asleep, I’ll lay in my sleeping bag and I’ll ask out loud. I do this periodically, and I almost always get some sort of curious reply. It started in the form of VERY vivid dreams, and some are posted on this blog. Sometimes I’ll wake up, no dreams, nothing curious at all, but before noon I’ll find some other synchronistic event that seems to match my questioning. This post about the neuron-like nature of the internet is a good example, and it adds a deeper layer to this story.

Lately, I’ve been bringing a tiny hand held voice recorder. I’ll sit in my sleeping bag and record my appeal to the Universe. If I have a vivid dream in the night, I can record it as soon as I wake up.

Two days ago (Wed. July 29th) I hiked into the Tetons alone, I live close by, and I can get in quick. I just walk until it gets dark, and then I set up my sleeping bag. I know the weather around here, and I rarely set up a shelter.

Recently (and its an ongoing theme in this blog) I have been feeling lost and adrift. I’ve been trying to articulate my insecurities about what I’m dealing with, and it’s implications. It’s created a form of fatigue that is oppressive and confusing, and I’m tired of it. I want some answers.

As I hiked into the mountains on Wednesday afternoon, I rehearsed my speech, my appeal. I did this out loud. Is this prayer? I guess, maybe.

I feel comfortable hiking off-trail, and at about 10,000 feet this gets easy, you come out above tree-line and the terrain is open and lovely. I picked a direction (east) and just kept going, the sun was setting as I found an area just big enough to set my sleeping bag down. A little ledge of sorts, tucked in next to a little sub-alpine fir. There was a trickling spring nearby, and I was provided with a spectacular view of a canyon that sees visitors only rarely. I was perched above it, on a small platform of granite, watching the sun setting (in a blaze of orange) and the half moon rising. It was about 9:30 when I found my home for the night.

I ate a little something, I brushed my teeth, arranged my pad and climbed into my sleeping bag. Before zipping myself in, I spoke into my little digital audio recorder.

Yes, I recognize how perfectly mushy and New-Agey I sound. 

But this exactly reflects my deepest feeling, right then. 1 minute, 34 seconds.

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I woke up the next morning just a little before dawn. No dreams, nothing. I packed up my gear and kept going up in the calm blue-gray of the pre-dawn light. I hiked along a really pretty ridge system as the sun came up, climbed a nice peak, and then turned around, heading west, and made my way (off trail) back to my car. I got to the parking lot at about noon, and back to my house at about 1:PM.

 I open my email account and my heart literally stops. There, on my screen, was a Facebook friend request from Mike Lewis (a pseudonym for privacy). Okay - let me fill you in, Mike Lewis was with me in 1974 as we walked home on a friday night from a high school football game. If my memory is correct, at about 9:30 in the evening, we saw a strange orange flash in the sky, and I arrived home at about 11:30. Together, as best as I can figure, we experienced about 2 hours of missing time. (see this posting for more details).

I've been searching for Mike Lewis for the last three years. Unfortunately, I’ve found a large number of folks with this very common name, but I’ve been to scared to follow up and try to contact him. The last time we saw each other was probably high school graduation in 1980, that’s 29 years ago. The time of the incoming email from Mike Lewis was 9:38 PM, pretty close to the same time I spoke my emotional plea into that little recorder from my sleeping bag.

I ask the Universe for help and it answers me. This is a repeat of the single most important story on this blog. Please read the events surrounding Cindy Gail, and her reappearance in my life. The orange Flash and missing time took place in Cindy Gail front yard. The Facebook friend request. The exactness of the time. And both are an overt answer to a deep need in me. Okay - as I write this I am a little bit freaked-out.

Why can’t this feel peaceful and fun? Instead it’s welling up as a stifling quandary.

My next task as a human on planet earth is to “confirm this friend request.” But I’m frozen and scared. More soon.

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Added text on Sept. 3rd 2009

I have replied to the friend request from Mike Lewis. I even had a film crew in the room as I sent the note. Since that point, we've sent a few short notes back and forth. Just pleasantries. There will be a day when I ask him about that night in 1974, but it hasn't happened yet.

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Added text on Jan. 16th 2010

I've just posted a dream where Mike Lewis makes a very curious appearance.

orange flash and missing time

This is my old neighborhood as seen in a google-earth image. The yellow X marks the exact location of the event.

  This story requires reading this other story first.  

It was a pleasant and clear autumn night in Michigan, I was a boy living in a quiet suburb of Detroit. I was 12 years old and in 7th grade, it was 1974. It was Friday night after the local high school football game, and I was walking home after the game ended. It was normal for me to walk the half-mile back to my house. I was with my friend (also named Mike), who was walking the same way. We were close to my home in a neighborhood of small suburban houses on a well lit but quiet street. The scene was completely normal and calm. We were in front of a house where an elementary school pal named Cindy Gail's used to live.

A recent photo with the spot marked with a yellow "X"

I know exactly the spot on the sidewalk where we were when suddenly there was a bold and jarring flash that took up most of the sky. It was a giant blur, and everything up above us was lit bright orange. It felt like someone just flipped a switch and the sky lit up, and then went back to normal. As soon as it happened, it was gone. It was completely silent. We were surprised and both responded with, "What just happened?"

There was nothing to see, since the event was over instantly, but something unsettling had happened. Was it a meteor? Was it lightning? Why was it silent? I know that I saw something, but there's an odd skip in my memory.

The color seemed utterly bizarre, it was a very bright and very saturated orange. To this day, whenever I see a campfire, and look at that the way the coals can glow as a warm radiant orange, I say to myself, "That's how the sky looked above Cindy Gail's house."

We continued to my house, I said goodbye and Mike walked home. I was excited to get home and watch a television show I really loved (KOLCHAK, The Night Stalker) that started at ten o'clock. I remember leaving the football game in order to get home in plenty of time so I could watch this show. But when I walked in the door, my parents were angry that I was out so late. I was surprised because I had made certain to be home at about 9:30, but instead it was well after 11 o'clock. It seemed odd, but I was genuinely disappointed because I missed that cool TV show.

The next Monday a group of friends were all in the cafeteria at my junior high school, along with Mike, and I told everyone that we had seen a bizarre light on Friday night. Mike added, "Yeah, a UFO with lights and everything!" What? I hadn't seen anything with lights. Did he see something I didn't? Mike and I never mentioned that night again.

That was over 34 years ago, and I have no idea what has happened to him.

I've always had a memory of this event, but the pieces were disjointed. I clearly remember the orange light in the night sky. And, I’ve always had a definite memory of missing that TV show, and my parents being angry about me being out so late. I had no explanation for that missing time. It wasn't until the mid-1990's that I remembered both of these events together. It happened while watching an interview with Chris Carter, creator of the X-Files, he talked excitedly about how he loved the same TV show (KOLCHAK, The Night Stalker) when he was a kid. Instantly the memories resurfaced with an almost electric jolt, like somebody just flipped a switch in my head. These two events slammed together in my head.

I suddenly realized that this all happened on the same night, I jumped off the couch and paced around my cabin in anxious circles. I’ve read a lot of UFO books, and the implications of this story unnerved me to my core.

Note: I easily googled the TV show KOLCHAK and it was only on for one season. So, I can pinpoint this event to the fall of 1974. The show was on Friday nights at 10 o’clock, exactly as I remembered.
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A little more about the orange flash.

Now remember, this is over 35 years ago, so I can only say so much. I remember that it was a very pleasant night in autumn, there was nothing stormy about weather.

The actual color was a hot orange. Exactly the color of glowing coals when they "illuminate" as that deep rich orange. Quite a vivid color. Radiant.

The flash was abrupt. Normal night sky - ORANGE - normal night sky. Lasting maybe 1 second. Extremely jarring. Perfectly silent.

Imagine you took movie footage of a night-time street, a normal suburban street on a clear night. The film runs thru the projector at 24 frames per second. You take this film, and using some sort of post production computer effect you change the sky to a hot radiant orange, all of it, one uniform color. But only for 24 frames, meaning just one second. No fading up and no fading out. Just ON - and then OFF.

If I was to watch this film on a projector, with the effect inserted for one abrupt second, this would match (as much as I can remember) what I saw in Michigan in 1974.

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I've added this on Aug. 6th 2009.
If you've read this far, you simply must read about the curious reemergence (again, at an intensely synchronistic moment via facefook) of my friend from that night, Mike.

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And - I've added this on Sept 2nd 2009.

I just got off the phone with Cindy Gail. She still visits her old next door neighbors (the couple are now in their mid-80's). She said they told her a story that they saw a glowing green UFO over her house! This would have been before 1977 (when they moved).

I begged Cindy to play the role of investigative reporter and dig up more on this very curious puzzle piece.

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