There has always been something about mankind that forces us to strive for the unknown. There have always been and will always be unanswered questions in the universe, and the fact that the answers to some of these questions have been found, encourages us to forge ahead in the pursuit of others. One such question for many lies still unanswered, that of whether there is life in the universe outside our planet. Many people agree that there is indisputable proof of alien life that has visited our planet. Others take a more skeptical approach. Among the former are varying testimonials, those who have seen "strange lights in the sky" to those who claim to have been abducted by "small grey beings." Among the later are government officials and average citizens who claim that some people are more prone to fanciful ideals and thus more likely to believe that they have been abducted etc. The myth and folklore surrounding UFOs and alien interventions is vast. There are stories, songs, pictures and every kind of art imaginable surrounding the phenomenon. However, personal narratives of alien encounters remain one of the most diverse and imaginative methods of transference for both fact and legend surrounding alien encounters. (See Items 12 & 13)
THE GOVERNMENT CONSPIRACY
For some time now, the majority of UFO sightings have been documented over North, South and Central America. (Jessup, 23) In the United States, there was the popular myth/legend surrounding Roswell, NM and the crash of a foreign object from the sky in 1947. The surrounding news attention and possible government cover up has gained worldwide attention. Inconsistencies between what the residents of Roswell saw, "A saucer shaped object falling from the sky," and what the government reported, "A weather balloon," have given fuel to those who believe the incident was actually a government cover-up of the first proof of extraterrestrial existence. (Jessup, 215) There have also been sightings of "brighter than life lights" in the sky over a US government military compound in Nevada entitled, "Area 51." (Pertman, 1) The repeated denial by the government that there is or has ever been any alien activity in either of these areas merely spurs on the speculation surrounding the locales. Certain investigative report television shows that have become popular in recent decades point to top-secret technology developed by the government. (See Items 2, 3 and 6) They claim that this technology is highly advanced and therefore must be kept secret. This would provide an answer for both the observation of unusual sights and sounds as well as government secrecy. Still, the truth has yet to be openly revealed.
In the United States, there aren't many UFOs sightings that are taken as legitimate, though the issue is looked at very differently in Russia and Mexico. When UFOs are captured on film and presented for the world to see, on the evening news or a broadcast of that sort, most people are almost eager to write them off as hoaxes. (See Item 1) Nevertheless, some persist in their belief because they know what they saw. In the cases where many people have seen the same thing, it becomes harder to discredit an incident, although it has been done. For many, it seems the government sways the view of the public in denying that any interaction with UFOs has ever occurred. For others, the mere fact that the government presumes to tell the public what to think about the phenomenon is more reason to believe. The government's persistent secrecy will continue to fuel the fires of curiosity in those who have seen and continue to see UFOs until the truth is uncovered.
The Fathers Of Humanity
There are many different areas of extraterrestrial research, and one of them that seems to bring about more questions than answers is the idea that aliens created humanity. (See Item 12) The main answers that this area of study seeks to find are those surrounding ancient archeological mysteries such as Stonehenge and Easter Island. Many authors of books in this area of study look at the technology that ancient civilizations had and compare it to our own. In many cases, there is clear evidence that ancient civilizations were fascinated with the heavens. Some designs such as the Nasca Stones are invisible from the surface yet constructed works of art when seen from the sky. (Bergier, 35) Many people in this genre of study argue that Earth's earliest civilizations were given technology by aliens to use in our advancement as a species. They point to maps of the "Sea Kings," ancient mariners, who saw the world, and documented it, as only space orbiting telescopes can do today. (Bergier, 55) The questions raised are how all of this was possible without the technology that we have today, or that of an advanced species. For some reason, the analysis always seems to lead to the fact that past civilizations could not possibly have been more advanced than we are today. We as human beings want to believe that we have advanced as a species, and any proof that would seem to dispute that is not widely acknowledged or accepted. The attempts at trying to understand them cross every exploratory field, from anthropology to geology and astronomy. Though the study of our planetary past seems to provide more questions than answers; the quest to understand ourselves remains. We want to know who we are, why we're here and what our future is. Some of the oldest religions in the world exist for the purpose of answering these questions, and though many have found answers in the religions of the world, for others, the questions still remain.
The Common Denominator
With the development of the technology age, many people have gained access to faster and more accurate sources of knowledge. Ideas spread instantaneously, and the Internet is one of the greatest tools we have for the spread of knowledge and information, good or evil. When the year 2000 approached, many people were consumed with a mass hysteria of sorts concerning the apocalypse, or end of the world. There were prophets popping up all over, revelations from ancient scripture posted in every newspaper, and even movies made about the cataclysmic end to life as we know it. In addition to all of this came the popularization of extraterrestrials as part of the mass pop culture that pervades much of American society. The aliens that began to be portrayed all over personal checks, store advertisements, car commercials etc. had some things in common. Most were green or silver in color and had some sort of space ship accompanying them to signify their other worldly origins. Sightings of UFOs and extraterrestrials skyrocketed. (Kolberg, 1) Along with this popularization of the image of extraterrestrials came television shows based on the theme of an alien presence covered up by the government and so on and so forth. Most Americans, when asked what an alien looks like, will describe a typical grey (See Item 7) because that is the image that has so often bombarded our experience with extraterrestrials.
Among the every-day experience with images of extraterrestrials, there arose an interesting occurrence. People began to talk about alien abductions. The personal stories of alien abductions ranged from descriptions of dreams (See Items 5 and 13) to the encounters with the unexplained (See Items 4 and 12) In each and every case, people involved in alien abduction situations experienced similar symptoms and remembered similar things happening. Many psychologists are quick to discredit people who claim to have been abducted by extraterrestrials (Kolberg, 1-2), still there is a common denominator among the stories and a recurring image of a being with familiar eyes and a familiar shape that would seem to lend credibility to their assertions rather than destroy it.
The Human Emotion
In reviewing the information of abductees, there are similarities among their stories that are uncanny. Nevertheless, they do exist and they should not be ignored. One informant revealed that the aliens are simply trying to get back something they've lost through the hybridization process that combines human and alien DNA in new life forms. (See Item 12) Humans have such a wide range of emotions and the ability to control, or loose control of them with varying results. This is perhaps best shown through our creative processes. We are able to communicate feelings and emotions in a way that no other species on Earth can. One way that people who have experienced alien abductions can share the experience with others is through capturing images on film, or creating their own artwork depicting events as they see and have felt them. (See Items 8 -11) Perhaps it is our ability to feel and understand so much that allows for such a gamut of personal experiences among the larger human experience. Human understanding is more limited than it is expansive, and our universe is filled with questions that remain unanswered. Still, through our emotions and our art, we can feel things that words cannot express. Our quest for understanding is recorded in our fears, our desires, our hopes and our dreams. The future of humanity as well as our past is also recorded in what we produce. Fortunately, it's not only the good things about humanity that make us beautiful, it is the good and the bad together that are equally incredible in scope.
This study of alien encounters contains just a few pieces of a puzzle that is huge in scope. The answers to whether extraterrestrials exist may or may not be found, depending on how one perceives the information given. Perhaps more questions will be presented than answered. Each one of us at some point or another will be forced to accept the fact that we don't know everything there is to know, and that's perfectly acceptable. It takes time to understand concepts that are of universal scope, and perhaps we are not meant to understand some things at this point in our evolution. Though there is a lot about humanity that makes us immensely beautiful, there are aspects of us that can equally frightening. Our quest for knowledge has been destructive at times and has lead to great scientific and technological advances at other times. However, we must be careful to understand and respect the balance that we are a part of. If we destroy the Earth, our home, we may not have a home any longer, and we may be forced to become extraterrestrials of a type ourselves. If we destroy each other, there won't be much left of all that is beautiful. The beauty of the human condition lies in the emotions that we experience and the different ways that we express these emotions. We must be careful to preserve them and ourselves and to foster the imagination that lies within our children so that we will never loose it. The only limitations we have are those we place upon ourselves and only time will tell if we manage to grasp that important lesson in time. Many men have died for the freedom to express what they feel in an uninhibited manner, others even today who still don't have that freedom and they are kept captive by those who hold the keys of government and power. When we finally learn to trust one another and to be trustworthy, there will be no more need to discredit the incredible because all things will be possible when we believe.
Works Cited
Bergier, Jacques. Extraterrestrial Intervention. Chicago, Henry Regnery Co. 1974.
Bergier, Jacques. Extraterrestrial Visitations from Prehistoric Times to Present. Chicago Henry Regnery Co. 1973.
Free, Cathy. "Way Far-out Drop-ins Welcome" 6 June 2002, all ed: B01.
Jessup, M.K. The Case for the UFO. London, Arco Publishers Ltd. 1955
Kolberg, Rebecca. "Are People Abducted by Space Aliens? Or Are They Victims of Their Own Fantasies?" Deseret News 18 June 1988, Metro: A5.
Pertman, Adam. "UFO Buffs Follow the 'E.T. Highway' for Close Encounter with Tiny Town" 27 August 1996, Metro: D10.
I was born into a single parent family. My mother loved Sci-Fi and I hated it until I became a teenager. For some reason I developed an intense fascination with all things having to do with extraterrestrials and I became interested in the stories of Betty and Barney Hill, abductees from a time when alien encounters were very uncommon, and Whitely Schreiber. I read Schreiber's novel, Communion and developed a greater interest in all things having to do with UFOs and anything paranormal. As an adult, my fascination has turned more to the role that the government plays in much of the paranormal activity that occurs every day. Investigative shows have the government involved in everything from Amelia Airheart's disappearance to the recent cattle mutilations that have plagued the agricultural community. For many people, the answer to many of these mysteries lies in discovering the secrets behind UFOs. Just like many others, I feel the answer can be found.
Through this project, I have learned so much. I have come to understand the community of "Ufologists" and what they believe in. I, along with the rest of the human race, still have an insatiable need to discover that truth. I've learned that I can be happy with not knowing the whole truth, if I can just grasp the different possibilities. This is the case with a lot of man kind. We are happy with a piece of the truth if it will lead us to greater understanding eventually. More than anything, this project has offered some pretty plausible explanations for a lot that has gone previously unexplained. I look forward to continuing my investigative quest to understand extraterrestrials and what constitutes our relationship with them. I find I'm not alone in this quest, and that serves to intensify my interest.
Other: Mark was very ready to tell me that he had seen a UFO when I mentioned the project that I was doing for this class. He added after the interview that many people had seen the object, and that it even made the news. I suspect that he said this to add validity to his story, even though I wasn't there to judge whether he'd seen a UFO or not. It seemed like he thought the story was pretty incredible. The description is definitely congruent with the normalform that describes UFOs.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: Mark's UFO sighting was actually was witnessed by many other people. School children saw it and commented on it and they weren't believed because the news stated that it was a low-flying aircraft with several others in formation. He doesn't buy that explanation and I think it's interesting that everyone that saw the same thing was, for the most part, in agreement that it was a UFO.
Cultural Context: The item concerns a possible UFO sighting. There were lights in the sky, and the description of their motion is definitely unique. Mark also felt that the news didn't tell the truth with the story that they gave to the public. This is the case with many UFO sightings that are seen by masses of people. The government and the news usually portray them as low-flying aircraft so as to disperse people's suspicions about the existence of UFOs. The attempt to conceal suspicion does raise the question of whether there would be mass hysteria if actual indisputable proof of a UFO were ever to rise to the surface. Perhaps this would explain the supposed government/media cover-up of such events.
ITEM I tape recorded Mark while at work this afternoon.
Text: "Okay our next door neighbor came over to our house and said, "You guys have to come out and see this. We come outside and just above the tree lineum we see a really slow moving object, it had lights that were slowly moving around it, it was kind of roundish like, that I recall, and after staring at it for about 5 minutes, it just took off. It just quickly left. (What color was it?) Well, it was night time, and basically all you saw was the lights. You could see, it was dusk, and you could kinda see it but you couldn't really make out what color it was. It was dark. (Hmmm, interesting, did you hear any kind of sound accompanied with the lights?) I don't remember any sound. (Wow, that's interesting, and it was close? Or would you say, like a few miles away?) A few miles away, I mean it was large. (Like as big as a plane? Or like a helicopter?) Much bigger than a helicopter. (Wow!) Um, it could have been a plane, but there's no way that a plane could have just loitered like that. (Or taken off that fast right?) Yeah."
Other: Justin has known me and my husband for years. He and my husband have gone on many camping trips throughout the years and he is one of our most trusted friends. He was the best man at our wedding and he's generally like a big brother to my husband.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: Justin and some buddies of his were camping at Eagle Point close to Salt Lake City, UT. They saw something they couldn't explain and were fascinated by it, so they took a picture and that's where the mystery arises. I should perhaps add here that my husband was teasing Justin all the while he was telling his story, so that may have had something to do with his hesitancy to tell the story in elaborate detail.
Cultural Context: Pictures of UFOs are generally not taken seriously. People tend to write them off as fakes because there have been so many fakes produced in the recent UFO craze that enveloped the 20th century. The funny thing about this item is that Justin didn't seem to really believe that what he took a picture of was a UFO. He made remarks such as, "Look, see, the UFO disappeared out of the photo!" He was half joking, because I think he really did think he took a picture of some UFOs, but there's a stigma attached to believing in the unexplained. He wouldn't even elaborate on the story, and I tried not to force him to. It was almost as if he believed the story, but he wouldn't admit that to anyone else and risk the chance of looking like a fool.
ITEM I went over to Justin's house and talked to him about his story as I asked him to find his picture of the UFOs.
Text: "One day me and a bunch of my buddies were up shooting at Eagle Point. We looked up and saw these strange silver disks flying around in the air. They had sort of a strange pattern because they'd go back and forth really quick and then come together and separate. It was weird. I took a picture of ithere it is, Oh no! The UFO disappeared out of the picture! It's the government, they switched my film so that I wouldn't have proof. I'm ruined! Hahaha."
Other: Mark's dad is an avid volleyball player. He grew up in Southern California, has 4 younger brothers, and has practiced law for 25 years. He doesn't believe in UFO's, ghosts, or any other supernatural phenomenon. For him to bring up and believe in this story gives validity to it. He's not one to make up a story like this and stick to it for 25 years.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: Mark's dad had just graduated from Pepperdine Law School and got a job in Northern California (San Jose). He loved to hunt and frequently went up into the mountains around Anderson Dam to hunt birds. He would often go with his friend Phil Robertsona former LDS mission companion. Both Phil and Mark's dad share the same story whenever they get together to reminisce about the past. No others were present when the event took place.
Cultural Context: The item concerns a UFO sighting. These have become part of popular folklore traditions all over the world. They usually consist of some sort of strange sighting or noise that appears to be out of place. In other words, they are sounds or sightings that shouldn't be in the places they are seen. Interestingly enough, California has had lots of UFO sightings and it's possible that the men's explanations for what they heard were influenced by the news report.
ITEM Mark interviewed his dad on the telephone. His dad lives in California and Mark lives in Provo, so he typed while they talked. He offered this collection to me because it coincided with my project, and he verified that his dad is alright with me adding it to my project.
Text: "Well, I guess this story happened in 1975. I had just graduated from law school and had moved to San Jose, California. A friend of mine, Phil Robertson, was living in the area at the time. We both enjoyed hunting and decided to go up to Anderson Dam. It's a large reservoir about 30 miles south of San Jose. The area is scarcely populated and we were "visibly" alone during our trip. Both of us had recently purchased .22 caliber rifles. We weren't into the "big guns," like shotguns. A friend of ours told us there were several good areas at Anderson to hunt birds. It was a sunny, clear Saturday morning when we arrived at the dam. There wasn't a soul in site. We walked along the edge of the reservoir for a few hours, but didn't see any birds. We decided to head to higher ground. About the time we decided to go higher, we heard a strange souldactually it wasn't that strange, it sounded like a helicopterbut we couldn't see anything. We didn't pay much attention to the sound at first. We started hiking. As we hiked, the sound got louder and louder. (One thing I didn't mention before hand is that the reservoir area was a guarded land preservewhich means we weren't supposed to be there. We were young and we wanted to have some funI guess we were stupid.) Anyways, we figured that if it was a helicopter, it must be the police coming down to tell us to leave, or possibly arrest us. We got really scared because we had guns in our hands and we were well into the reservoir area. We started running for the trees. At one point I tripped and dropped my gun. It slid down the side of an embankment. I was too scared of getting caught to go after it. We continued to run up the side of the mountain. While we were running, the sound continued to get louder. I remember looking at Phil; he looked scared out of his mind. We took a second to look around for the helicopter. Judging from the sound it seemed like it should have been right on usliterally. After about 20 minutes we reached the summit of the mountain. There was a small clearing in the trees and all of the surroundings were opened up to us. We could see for a good 20, possibly 30 miles. What really freaked us out is the fact that the sound was still getting louder! It was almost deafening. I was sweating bullets and Phil had turned a pale color. A good five minutes passed on the summit. The sound slowly started to fade and eventually disappeared. We just looked at each other in disbelief. Needless to say we didn't spend anymore time at Anderson Dam. We went straight home. My friend Phil called me up a few days after the event took place. He told me that he was reading a local newspaper that revealed some shocking news. According to the paper, several UFO sightings were reported in the Anderson Dam area. I guess it was a common occurrence. To this day I'm not sure what it was that we heard. All I know is my best friend was with me and we heard a deafening sound that seemed to follow us and get louder over the course of roughly a half an hour."
Other: Mara has known my husband since they were both in Jr. High School. She is a very good friend of mine and I trust her completely. She told me this story one evening when we were talking about strange and unusual things that we've seen in our lives. She's a great conversationalist and story teller. I haven't talked to her brother (who was with her when she witnessed this event) but I know him as well and he's a very serious, logical person who would not exaggerate in a story like this.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: Marah and her brother Josh are very close. They used to go out late at night to parties and not come home until the wee hours of the morning. There were times when drinking and other things were involved in these late night jaunts, but she assured me that this was not one of those times. She also assured me that several other people saw what she saw, adding validity to her story.
Cultural Context: The item concerns a possible UFO sighting. There were lights in the sky, but the description of "tangible air" etc adds another dimension to the narrative. Mara felt something she couldn't explain in addition to seeing something she couldn't explain. These two sensations could have been intermingled as a result of a confusion of the senses in the presence of the unexplained. They could have magnified each other, but the possibility that this would have occurred in several people at the same time is slim. The fact that this occurred in an area of continuous mining/construction may be an explanation for the light seen, but it's a stretch to assume this could explain the quality of air.
ITEM I had heard this story in person before, so I just called Mara up to refresh my memory about some details.
Text: "One night Josh and I were driving down from Salt Lake at about 2 o'clock in the morning. We usually partied when we went up to Salt Lake, but this was not one of those times. We were driving at a normal speed on I-15 when we started to see all these cars up ahead that were slowing down at the point of the mountain. We thought maybe there was some sort of accident or something, but then we saw this strange green light going straight up into the sky. It was so weird, Julia, I mean there were people stopping their cars in the middle of the freeway as they approached it. It went up really high into the sky, like there was no end. When we finally got up to it, we drove inside it and I rolled down the window and looked up and Josh was driving, so he was trying to look, but he didn't have as good a view as I did. I reached my hand out of the window and felt the air and it was almost thick, like some kind of Jell-o or something. I looked across the lane and another lady was doing the same thing, both of our cars were slowed down to a crawl. She asked me, "Do you see that?" I told her I did, but it was so strange. People had stopped their cars on the side of the road and were just walking around looking up. There weren't that many cars, because it was 2 o'clock in the morning, but still, the ones that were there were fixated on this ray of light. It was really weird. Josh is, well you know my brother, he's a totally logical and straight-laced kind of guy, but even HE got freaked out! I wanted to stop, but he wouldn't, so we just got out of there as fast as we could."
Other: I usually have some pretty wild dreams. However, I don't usually remember them. This dream was so vivid and stuck in my head from the night I had it, I was 9 years old, until today.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: Dreams are usually interpreted as signals from our subconscious that show us our unachieved desires etc. I have dreamt less and less as I've gotten older, and I think this is a result of the fact that I had a really active imagination as a child. I never really knew much about extraterrestrials as a kid, but my mother did talk to me and have books about Betty and Barney Hill, the abductees that came back to tell their tale. She had quite a few books lying around that I'd look at that talked of people's personal abduction experiences. If there is a correlation between the events of our daily lives and the dreams we have, then this item would definitely agree with what I saw and heard around my home as a child.
Cultural Context: Abductions stories seem to be the most sensational items within the folklore materials pertaining to UFOs and extraterrestrials. People with abduction stories often recieve media attention whether they want to or not, and sometimes, their stories get made into motion pictures. There are many people in the world who strongly believe, even know without a doubt that they have been abducted, yet there are still many who don't accept the credibility of such situations. The event itself is something of a psychological phenomenon, because details are normally brought out most fully through hypnosis of a subject. Nevertheless, many narratives of extraterrestrials and what they are like exist in the world today and it's hard to separate the credible from the incredible.
ITEM I tape-recorded myself telling my story to some friends, because I thought it would be more natural than talking to a tape recorder, then transcribed what I said, which was strange, I sound much different than I thought!
Text: "One night, when I was about 9 years old, I had a dream. It was a really detailed dream, so much so that as soon as I woke up, I wrote down and drew pictures of what I saw. The images just wouldn't go away until I drew them. In my dream I was taken to an alien planet. Hey! Don't laugh! I made friends with these beings that had triangular shaped heads and large black eyes. They were smaller than me, and they seemed really fascinated by the fact that I was not a grown-up yet, because they asked me all sorts of questions that only a child would know the answer to. They took me into their spaceship, and we went on a journey to their planet. We traveled through the solar system and their planet was orange and maybe had some sort of rings around it. I remember thinking that their planet wasn't very beautiful in comparison to Earth, it was all sorts of orange and red colors. It didn't have the variety of colors that I'm used to seeing. I remember it was kind of hot. I was in some sort of a chamber with bubbles floating all around me. We looked at their plants, they had different types of flowers and stuff. They sort of tapped my brain for every piece of information that I could give them on what I liked about my planet. I think they wanted me to be happy. I felt like I was very special and liked by them. The next thing I knew, I was in my house sleeping in my bed with all sorts of weird images ingrained in my brain. I drew them and showed them to my mother and she told me I had a great imagination and that was the end of that."
Other: Nate went on many camping trips with his father and the Boy Scout organization. He believes that in this particular instance, he saw something out of the ordinary. For a lot of years, he thought it was a UFO, but recently he's seen a lot of documentaries on the Discovery Channel and such that have lead him to believe that it may have been a "top-secret stealth airplane" or something of that nature. He doesn't really know what to think, but he knows there was something out there and he supports these feelings by adding that many other people saw and heard the exact same things that he did.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context Nate was willing enough to assist me in gathering the data. However, when I first asked him if there were any narratives he could give me about anything that he had experienced, he sort of chuckled as if to make fun of the process. He started to tell me a story about Big Foot and then decided to tell this story as the details were clearer in his mind. I have an ongoing fascination with UFOs and aliens, so I think he chose this story because he knew that I would like to hear it, and he was right.
Cultural Context The idea that the government has secrets from its citizens is an old one. For decades, there have been books and articles written about government conspiracies etc. However, many of these articles cannot be substantiated with actual proof because they claim that when a person comes out with a personal testimony of witnessing or participating in these secrets, they are often encouraged to be silent or threatened in some way. In this narrative, the informant substantiates his data with the comment that there were many others who could support his narrative as well as the mention of certain documentaries that describe similar occurrences.
ITEM
How Collected: Tape recorded and transcribed with a few follow up questions for clarification purposes.
Text: "Basically, we were at Joe's Valley Reservoir. That night, we were at the campfire telling ghost stories and stuff. We all got pretty scared, but we went back to our tents and fell asleep. A few hours later, in the middle of the night, we heard a 'whooomp, whoomp, whooomp' noise that woke us up, so me and three other guys got out of our tents and decided to find where it was coming from. From a distance, like 20 or 30 feet, we saw green and yellow lights going up and down. Then we went closer and right before we got to the meadow there was a bright flash and then the lights were gone, so we got scared and ran back to our tents and got in and shut the door. The next day we walked back to the meadow and saw no signs of anything strange. I don't really know what to think, but I know something was out there."
Answer to Follow-Up Questions: "I don't know, for a lot of years I thought it was a UFO, but recently, I've seen a lot of things on the Discovery Channel talking about the government's top-secret stealth machines."
Other: Don gave me these terms after our interview to help me understand some of what was said. Though most are familiar with the terms on some level, the way they are used was slightly different than I'd ever heard before.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: The words used are common among UFO and Discovery Science participants. As with any folk speech, to an outsider such as myself, they took a little getting used to. However, I now know exactly what they are used for and would feel comfortable using them myself. Lots of acronyms are used and it's a bit like a cross between science and anthropology in that many of the names are used to describe commonplace, sights or life forms.
Cultural Context: This terminology isn't really found in a dictionary, it's picked up by those who use it most. It seems that some of the words are combinations of other words, and others are just descriptive words. Acronyms are common as is evidenced by the most common acronym of all, UFO.
ITEM Don gave me these words orally and I wrote them down along with their descriptions.
Text:
NIDS National Institute of Discovery Science. UFO related work, possibly monitoring Utah activity.
UFO Unidentified Flying Object, this one is very common.
Gray An alien species, normally 4 feet tall, mechanical and precise. They are biological computers.
Reptilians Earth based aliens that like war and discord. They feed off of it. There are also other non earth-based reptilians that are loving and peaceful.
Nordics Benevolent, straight forward aliens. They show lots of love toward humans. They are usually blonde with blue eyes. They are also called Pleidians because their planet is somewhere within the Pleides consellation.
Cigar Ship Looks like a long tube, a common UFO seen in Utah.
Triangular Ship Looks just like it sounds, belongs to the aliens that are large Praying Mantises.
Flying Saucer Typical flying saucer belonging to the Pleidians.
Other: Alien Dave took this photograph in Nov 2000. He is renowned for his UFO photography as well as his astrophotography.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: I had the opportunity to ask Dave a few questions about his experience, and he provided me with the following information. The photograph was taken when Dave received a message to go for a ride. It was taken in an area where he's had multiple experiences and on an evening when he was set up to do some astrophotography. He has been instructed not to reveal where the place that he took this photo is. He calls the craft a "cigar ship" because of it's tube-like shape. He's got the following quote on his website in relation to this photograph, "This area is of great importance, not only to the ones that know of it, but to the ones that control and use it. This is one of many places on Earth that is a Natural Doorway or Portal, for THEM, and is a place that is reserved for the Prepared, the Awake, and the called upon." He explained to me that he may be more tuned in to seeing UFOs because he's seen so many of them, but that everyone's got a different take on what the see in the sky.
Cultural Context: The Photograph is of interest to those in the field of Discovery Science which is predominantly concerned with things that cannot be explained with Natural Science. The craft is one of many of its type that have been seen in Utah by the Utah UFO Hunters.
ITEM Dave sent me the image and I printed it out so I could add it to this project. It can also be found at www.aliendave.com
Other: This is a piece of graphic art done by Alien Dave.
CONTEXTUAL DATA
Social Context: This piece portrays an ominous scary feeling. He told me that it's a dream, a clear picture of something, leading me to believe he's seen this with his own eyes. He wanted the picture to give off a message of being under their control. It's a fear based piece of art based on a feeling, an emotion that he's felt. However, it seemed like fear was just one of many emotions he felt/does feel in relation to this image. When asked about the color scheme, he said he felt that the colors would produce emotions, and that he wanted it to look like the alien was coming out of the dark.
Cultural Context: When I asked him why he didn't make the alien grey or green (the only aliens I've seen depicted often), he answered that he'd, "never seen a green alien." The colors definitely produce certain emotions, and the shadow effect accomplishes what it's meant to, so the piece is effective. Dave's art is about expression of emotions as much as it is about concepts that may seem abstract to the majority of the population.
ITEM Dave sent me the image and I printed it out so I could add it to this project. It can also be found at www.aliendave.com
Image: Below can also be found randomly at the www.aliendave.com website
Other: This photograph was taken by Alien Dave in Salt Lake City, UT in the Rose Park Area in 1999. He used a 35mm camera.
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Social Context: The photograph is interesting because the central feature of the picture showed up only after it was developed. Dave didn't see it while he was taking the picture. He knows it wasn't camera movement that caused the streak, but he doesn't know what it is. He says it has to have been moving pretty fast, whatever it was because he didn't see it with his own eyes.
Cultural Context: There's been a lot of speculation as to what the photograph is, but no answers have come up. The picture was featured on www.cosmiverse.com and many others have taken an interest in it. He mentioned that sometimes photographs taken with a 35 mm camera, such as this one, are more credible because they actually have a negative with them. Digital photography is a lot easier to manipulate and potentially corrupt.
ITEM Dave sent me the image and I printed it out so I could add it to this project. It can also be found at www.aliendave.com
Other: This sketch was done by Alien Dave in 2001 in pencil.
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Social Context: This piece is a representation of one of many government restricted areas. The picture shows what Dave explained to me to be a "precognitive event." He said it is meant to be a dream of the future.
Cultural Context: The picture seems to present and a possible answer to a lot of government secrecy. Secret government bases are a common denominator among those who've experienced contact with extraterrestrials or seen UFOs. Lots of incidents seem to point to the fact that the government is hiding something, but try as they might, the average person cannot or perhaps doesn't really want to find out what it is. The aliens depicted seem to be coming out of the dark. There's a secret being revealed.
ITEM Dave sent me the image and I printed it out so I could add it to this project. It can also be found at www.aliendave.com
Other: I found a great article in the Deseret News while doing my research on UFO's and extraterrestrials. In the article, the reporter talked about a guy named Alien Dave whom she'd interviewed as he was (and still is) the director of the Utah UFO Hunters. I decided to look him up since he lives in Utah and so do I, I figured it wouldn't be so hard, so I contacted Cathy and she told me how to find him.
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Social Context: Dave was completely open and willing to give me an interview about his personal experiences and thoughts pertaining to UFO sightings and extraterrestrials. We e-mailed for a week and then I interviewed him in person. He was a lovely and informative contact and person. I found him to be very approachable and knowledgeable about what we discussed. My small amount of research barely skimmed the surface of his knowledge which was great for me because he taught me a lot. He's one of many people in today's society, who are independent entrepreneurs and he's very dedicated to what he does. He's got a fantastic website at www.aliendave.com that proved to be an invaluable resource for me as well. Dave is a very respected individual among his peers, as much for his openness as for his willingness to help others. After interviewing him, it wasn't difficult to see why. I was awed both by the amount of study and research he's invested in understanding the events of his life and the apparent number of other people who share his opinions and knowledge. He stated that is religion is Ufology/Science and there are thousands, if not millions who practice/believe as he does.
Cultural Context: The item concerns many different topics of discussion, primarily Dave's personal experience with extraterrestrials and how his life has changed as a result of that experience. There are many others who've undergone similar experiences and their narratives are easy enough to find in books and on the Internet. Dave's experience isn't published because he considers it very personal. I'm fortunate he was willing to share it with me. He's aware that many people in the world think he's crazy, and explains this with some very interesting observations about our society and people's possible motives for disbelief.
ITEM I tape recorded Dave this afternoon at the Village Inn in Salt Lake City on 4th S.
Text: "I mean in my eyes, some people, could have an alien knock on their door and they still wouldn't believe it. Because of their religious beliefs and what have you. In most people's eyes it's easier not to believe, because it alters their reality. People are happy with their easy access, 9-5 pre-programmed lives. You know, their happy with that, but there are others who are not. And it's like me, you know I was forced to believe. I had no choice. Things were happening and I thought they were dreams, and then, when I turned 25 is when I was conscious. I had a conscious experience with them and I realized that all the dreams I was having since childhood weren't dreams at all, they were real. I was more forced to believe. (In answer to the question about whether he had had any interest in UFO's previous to his experience he states the following.) I had some interest I guess, just like little kids do. You know, like Sci-Fi, stuff like that. I guess it was about when I was 21 or so that I started looking into the UFO sorta stuff and I found out that my MOM was also interested which I didn't know. She used to hide all her books and she had a huge library of stuff. So, I got ahold of that and you know started getting into it. But then it seemed like it was about when I was 23 that I started having really disturbing dreams and experiences that were frightening and I was having a hard time with them. It was kind of a dark area in my life where I didn't feel like everything is normal in my life. I mean not like, you know everybody feels at one time or another, but this was different. This was like, something's going on and I don't know what it is. I felt like I was being watched by something. I'd get a feeling that like something was in the house. I started seeing lights, what I call "breathing lights." Like, just a part of the wall would light up, start glowing, like it was breathing. I thought I was seeing things, hearing things. Then, when I turned 25, I was up camping and I heard this voice in my head, which I was hearing quite a bit of at the time, and it asked me, 'Are you ready?' and I thought to myself, "Am I ready for what?" And then it was almost instantly it says, 'You're ready' and that's when I seen the craft come down and I had a fully awake conscious experience with them. That's when I realized, hey this is what it was all about in the past and this is why I'm feeling this way. They kind of answered a lot. I think they were, were wanting that, and they were waiting for me to get to a certain level before they presented it to me. (In answer to a question about whether there's something about him that makes him desirable to them he says the following.) Genetics. That's why a lot of us are taken, is genetic material. It's part of the hybridization . . . (I asked how they gather this information about us and he said the following.) I think they just look at someone and saythey eventually take them, and then take a little bit and analyze that and say 'yeah, this is a good one,' so then they come back. And so I know I was marked. It's not there now. I had an implant in my ear but it's not there anymore. So, either they upgraded, hid it somewhere else or something, smaller? Or they took it out, because it used to bug me. I used to play with it a lot. I just had this feeling that it was something that shouldn't be there, type thing? Then I woke up one day and it was gone. The only marks I've ever had, I've woke up with scratches and stuff like that, nothing that would stand out, I mean just small things. But I remember, um in one of my experiences, having my arm completely opened up. I mean I remember that. And see here (shows arm) and but there's nothing there, you know, there's no scars, you know there's nothing. A lot of it is traumatizing. At first, I found it quite frightening and it wasn't until I started getting over the fear of the ones in front of ya and I started seeing the ones in back, more of the higher up, the people in control and I had to lose the fear of the ones that were, you know in your face type thing and then I started noticing ones in the background and that's when I started realizing hey, this isn't all bad. There's something, a higher purpose here. There not just you know here to frighten me or take what they want, they actually have a purpose that's a higher purpose that includes me and I should feel special. (When asked to describe the difference between the ones that are in the background and the ones that are in the front, he said the following) Yeah, the ones that I meet first, are a typical grey. And it, always puts itself off as female, as probably as a comfort thing. You know, like a motherly, everything's okay(I asked if they communicate telepathically because that's what I'd read in my research and he continued by answering) Yeah, well that's how they all do it, they don't speak verbally, but the feeling that you get like it's female, but it's not either. They're like biological robot. They do jobs that are too dirty, too dangerous or too boring for THEM. She, or it is always the first and last one that I see, but they're the worker bees more or less. So, when I got over the fear of them, is when I started seeing the ones in the background, and there's a lot of others that I've seen, human looking (just like us), insect looking (that was pretty frightening) cause I mean you see a large insect, it's quite disturbing. But, um you don't get any bad feelings from the others. It's always a good feeling, like a feeling of love and you know, that they're not there to hurt you, but they're interested in what you have. I've even explained to them, I says, 'You have no right to do this.' They says, 'We have every right in the world to do this. You've given us permission at one point.' I think maybe that's another reason, maybe why some people are taking this so hard, because in their own minds they're open to it, and you know kind of saying in their own minds, 'Well hey, you know, I wouldn't mind experiencing this,' and you know, more or less giving permission. (When asked what was the earliest that he remembered experiencing things of this nature, he replied with the following) Six, around five or six yeah, and I remember playing with naked children and laughing at them. Because, when I was six, I just thought that these were other kids, but they weren't, they were aliens and they didn't have any clothes on so I thought that was funny. (When asked how many times he's been contacted, he responded with the following.) Probably too many to count, probably so many that I can't remember in all. The last contact, I can remember was two years ago. It's not something you can plan on, it's always kind of random. Sometimes I'll get a feeling or a message or something come through like, 'go take a ride.' So I'll pack up the cooler and just drive, I don't know where I'm goin' and then I'll have an experience. It's almost like they call ya. I mean and even in the place I'm living now, I was told or asked or hinted about living there, so that's why I live up there now. I guess it's to be closer to them. I don't know the reason, I like it up there but I don't know why I moved up there. I mean it was just kind of a feeling or a ya know something up here, because I've been downloaded, is the only word I can use to explain it, is downloaded information. There's information in me that I know, but if I was to try to talk about it, it wouldn't come out. It's like it's not time yet. I can't even write it down. I can sit there and think about, 'aw yeah yeah and I see these eyes . . ." nothing, it's almost like there's a block. (After discussing whether he feels he's been given a special task by them he responded with the following) I don't feel like it's a calling in life, I was asked by them to write a book, which I haven't done yet. Um, I started up the website a couple years back, and had no prior experience with computers or anything. It just seemed to flow, come right outta me. You know and I don't know how I became so good at it. It's probably something you know they put in me or whatever. I think that um, that a lot of us are compelled to make it public to make more people realize this kinda thing does go on, you know. That it is a reality for a lot of people, and that artwork and stuff like that inspires not only everybody but mostly children, you know? Because if you get on a level where children will understand it and they're interested in it, then that's the new generation and that's what's going to be important. Because, if you get 'em while they're young, they're not going to be filtered or programmed, let's say by the mass media and what have you, to not believe, I mean because children and animals are the most psychic things on earth. Children, a child will loose that psychic ability between 5 and 8 because they start developing filters. When a child says, 'Oh I seen grandma.' Well, they seen grandma, but the parent says, 'Oh no, you didn't see grandma, she's long gone.' So, it's with that kind of you know programming, saying that, 'That's not real, that's not possible.' They start building filters as their reality. So, that's why humans are not able to do what we would normally be able to do and that's use more of our mind and our abilities. We are only now starting to re-learn some of these abilities, like remote viewing, you know, stuff like that where they find out anybody can do this. It's just been lost. I mean if you look at, um you know the ancients, people from way back, they knew a lot more about space, about you know the earth, than we do today. It's because they were more in tune, they're psychically in tune with what's going on around them. Today we're so busy, everything's going so fast, we have so much clutter up here, we don't have time to listen to a rock. (When asked about whether extra-terrestrials may have brought knowledge to earth a long time ago, he responded with the following.) I believe real information isn't learned, it's passed on. So for real information to be here on earth, to begin with, it had to have been brought. (When asked about the possible existence of other dimensions and the possibility that extra terrestrials are really inter-dimensional beings, he stated the following.) I believe in that fully. There are other dimensions, there's dimensional beings. You could put it this way, they're all around us right now, but you can't see them because they're on a different time level. So they're actually maybe a second ahead in the future, but they're living on the same plane, just different time. That's one take on it. Now, another take is that yes, there's another dimension, scientists now are saying that there's 12 that they know of, we can only see in three. If we was to see in four, we'd be able to see things moving around that we can't see, like the orb phenomenon, it's only picked up with digital cameras. Probably because the digital is so sensitive, that it's picking up the phenomenon, but you can't see it with your naked eye, you see what I'm saying? So, it's just on a different frequency that you can't see, and you can't feel. You know what I'm saying? And, in space time, more people are become atuned to these abilities or more sensitive to certain energies that we have here. So today, there's more psychics, there's more people who can actually kinda put their hand in that other dimension, that other frequency let's say, and start experiencing things like that. Because people are seeing orbs with their naked eye, they're having more experiences now then let's say 10 years ago."
Additional Quotes from Dave:
"A lot of people who experience abductions may be seeing themselves coming back through time, because our physiology will change a lot in the future, we are them."
"Religion makes belief complicated."
"Time as we know it exists on Earth only. If you're on Mars, time is completely different."
"Earth is like a rest stop for them, it's got a great view. They can see in us, something that they've lost."
"Earth is a great place for experimentation, because everything on Earth lives and dies very quickly in comparison."
"The pyramids were there when the Egyptians got there."
Other: I found Don through my contact with Alien Dave. He was extremely helpful and willing to share lots of information with me. Don runs an abductee support group, the only one that I know of in Utah. He's a wonderful human being with a lot to say.
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Social Context: Don's story is partially so extraordinary because he's lead his live very similarly to most people out there. He was a single father and his experience with his son has joined them together rather than torn them apart. He studies Shamanism which is the study of the earth's energies and the energy in life. As I understand it, it is working with things and people on a spiritual level, rather than an earth based level. He practices healing in this way as well and has learned what he knows from his contact experience.
Cultural Context: The item concerns a personal encounter with extraterrestrials. Don prefers to discuss it as a contact experience rather than an abduction. As narratives go, he seemed perfectly at ease telling his. There were no accounts of fear or shock or horror as are present in so many tales of this kind. When answering some of my questions, he commented on the following. Some abductees experience fear because they're put in fearful situations by the extraterrestrials so that they can learn to work through it. He says that through his experience, he was able to retrieve a part of his soul, he now knows what to do with his life. Hollywood sensationalizes the ET experience, and they play on our fears because emotions sell. Sometimes the experience can be quite spiritual. He says the aliens told him that we need to take care of our planet better and ourselves so that we can return to the creator. Creativity is essential to be open to the ET experience. He said that for some, abduction or contact is a spiritual path chosen before birth. Also, the only limits we put on things are our own.
ITEM I tape recorded Don at his home in Provo.
Text: "I was laying in bed one night, well it was early in the morning, probably about 7 or 8 o'clock, and I was thinking to myself, 'do I wanna get up, or do I wanna you know go back to sleep?' And you know how it is, you're sorta half-way, in between and I was just sitting there thinking and then all of a sudden my body sorta froze, and I saw this little grey hand come up to my forehead, and it had this little cylindrical device. It was maybe about 3 or 4 inches long, and it if you looked at it on the end it was egg shaped, oval shaped on the end, and it was like a light blue stick, a plasma stick or something. You know? And he stuck it up to my forehead, and then when he did that he held it to my forehead and then, he just started pounding it with his other hand into my head. And I could watch it and I felt it, my head was bouncing in my pillow as he was doing this, and I could just watch it and he did that probably about 8 times, and I was sitting there watching it, I felt my head bouncing back into my pillow and you could just hear this SMACK, SMACK and my head would go OH! It didn't hurt, but there was a physical force there, and it was just like, you know BOOM, BOOM, and that happened about 8 times until it finally just went all the way into my head, and uh then I got my, you now I was unfrozen. So I said, I just said telepathically to whatever did this, I said, 'what the hell was that?' You know, and uh, it was saying, it's a psychic implant. I said, 'what for?' And it said, 'It's to help you see psychically and to help us monitor your spiritual growth, so we can see what you're seeing on a psychic level. Okay, so they're putting it in like a movie camera for my psychic abilities. So if I see something with my third eye, they see it, so it's like a psychic camera you know? And I thought, woah, that's sorta weird, and they said, 'Tomorrow we'll come in and we'll show you how to operate it, how to turn it on.' I said, 'Woah, okay.' So I didn't think anything more about it and then that night, um, the next night as I was getting ready for bed, they said, 'Don, we're gonna show you how to operate, how to turn this thing on.' I said, 'okay, well show me.' He says, 'This is how you do it, you draw energy all the way up from the base of your spine.' And so I said, 'Okay.' So I drew up energy all the way up from the base of my spine and they said, 'Concentrate it on your forehead.' And so I did, and I could feel a rush coming up the spine up through the back of my head and it just sorta like POOF, exploded in my forehead. Well, for about a week, I had a really red splotch right there, and my skin dried out in the middle of my forehead, that's what they call the third eye of course. And it was just really red and it itched for about a month. And you know it was just like the whole top of my head was just tingling and it was just really, you know? It was really weird. And for about a month, I could feel it, my head just tingling and it was like somebody was sticking needles in my head all over the place, like a thousand needles. And um, and then I think I finally just got used to it, because I don't think it's ever gone away totally. And since then it's been changed probably about three times. They call it the plasma implant kind of thing, they took it out and they put a yellow one in once. It was smaller, it was only maybe about two inches long, it was a lot smaller, it was a lot more powerful. And now it's like there's a little white dot in there and it's just really powerful. I can see really good psychically, okay? So if I go into a meditation, I can see what's going on and if there are any spirits in the house or any bad entities. What most people want to call demons, you know? Um, or any ETs and when I do my meditations or bring people through my meditations, I can see who's in the room with us actually doing the work on people, you know? And that may sound sorta bizarre. Some people have really been scared by that, they've kicked me out of their house basically. The thing about it is, there's a mind set with a lot of people that, and it's a religious mindset which, you know if they need that, that's fine, you may be LDS too, I was once upon a time. And there's that fear factor that's built in that this is bad, you know because they feel different and they don't know how to deal with it. That was one of these weird experiences that I've had and it just keeps on going. My awakening experience happened when I was 25, that seems to be a time, right there. You know, 5 years old is one big time in a contactee's life, 25 is another one, and then you get up to, probably about 30-38 and another one will happen. And again, these are major events that just seem to BOOM. Uh, I can remember when I was a kid, up to the age of 25, I can remember when I was a kid, that we lived in Spanish Fork and it was for a period of about a month, I was scared to death to go to bed. You know, it was just like I was petrified. And every night I'd wake up screaming because there was a 9 foot man out in the back yard with a flashlight, and he was shining it through the windows. And so the police would come over and they'd scour the area. They wouldn't find anything and finally they got tired of coming over and the doctor would come over because of the nightmares and the gorillas that would come and visit me in my sleep. You know? And I would pull the covers over me real tight and, you know, scared to death because the gorillas would come. And that's what I thought at the time it was. Until I was 25 years old that's what I thought, you know, these gorillas would come and get me at night, you know, and that's what I thought. Well when I was 25, um, I went to bed, I had my son lying down to the side of me on a mattress on the floor because we were sharing some space at my Mom's house, and he was sleeping on the mattress down there and I was sleeping on, that bed right there as a matter of fact, that fold away bed. And and uh, up to that point in time, I'd had this fascination with UFOs, with the Bermuda Triangle, things of that nature, I just saw these mysteries that I was like . . .I was sort of obsessed with but I didn't realize it. I thought no, you knowthisI didn't pay an awful lot of attention to it, but there was a fascination, obsession with it. I'd be driving down the road and if a UFO show, speaker or something, I mean he was talking about UFOs, I'd pull over and I'd listen to the UFO thing, I'd give my attention to it. And I'd been to the library a couple of times you know, sort of browsing through, looking to see what kind of UFO stuff they'd have and you know the Provo library didn't have an awful lot. You know, but they had a couple of things, so I'd go there every once in a while, just check it out, and I never really got serious about reading them, but you know I knew where they were at and I knew they were there. And, um, just these obsession type things. I mean it's like the Richard Dryfus thing, okay? You don't realize you're obsessed, but there's something going on and you can't figure out what it is. Well, I went to sleep, I turned the TV off and I went to sleep, and my son was asleep on the bed by the side of me. And, uh, I went to sleep and I guess it was probably about 1 o'clock in the morning. All of a sudden I just raised right up out of bed and I was sitting up in bed and he was lying off to the side, and I looked down at him and he had this little toy truck he was playing with. And it was, actually had been sitting in a book case for about a year and I don't dust, I'm a terrible duster, you know? And so it had a layer of dust on it and he was pushing this truck back and forth, because you know he hadn't played with it for about a year, it had just been sitting there, and he was pushing this truck back and forth, you know? Just sitting on the edge of his mattress pushing it back and forth, and I looked up and there was a grey that was floating in the room. And it was just floating right there, and I looked up and I thought, 'Oh, okay you're coming for him, I said okay well let me go with ya and if I go with ya then he won't be scared.' You know, everything will be okay, well um, we both of us went together and we went up through the light, and we went into the ship. And there was a ship that was floating there, lemme back up first, we didn't do that, firstyeah that's what we did, we went through the light into a ship that was hovering right there on the, it was just hovering and it's like 30 feet across, it was metallic and you could see across the top of it it had the red and the blue lights flashing. And it was like strobing off off the houses, there's a house that was sitting right next to it and it was sitting up above, there's a house there now but at the time there wasn't, it was just an open field, it was sitting above the field, maybe about 40 feet in the air, and we were just traveled up this light, both of us. And there was a grey that was moving up and I thought, 'God this is so weird, I mean look at this, why isn't anybody waking up, you know somebody should be waking up, I mean there's this thing that's floating there, I mean this is huge!' It's like 30 or 40 feet across and maybe 20 feet tall and it's just floating there and nobody's waking up. It was big as a house, and the lights were just strobing, ya know they'd go blue and then red and blue and then red and you would just have a strobe light effect among the lights. It was a saucer, one of your typical flying saucers that you would see. And um, we floated up into the light, we went actually through the wall of the house, I think we actually even went through the dirt that was on the outside, and there's some telephone lines that were between the saucer and that the light we was going through and we went right through the telephone lines and into the saucer. And um, once we got in, I sorta lost track of where my son went, I don't know what happened to him for a while, but I can remember sitting there, standing there, and it was like on the outside of the ship, and I think what had happened was we probably went to a bigger ship, someplace you know when we took off we went to a bigger ship, but I was walking along the outside of this ship and it was like a curved pathway. It was like we were inside the ship but it was like on the outer edge of the ship, and there's a catwalk we were walking on but it was covered with like a rubber type of mat, and I was walking with this really, really attractive looking lady. Who had uh, I believe she had like brown hair and blue eyes or maybe it was blonde hair and blue eyes and she was wearing a jump suit that was um brown and orange, you know? Sort of like a camouflage thing that fit her really tight and she was just a really, I can remember walking along the outside of the ship talking to her and I can't remember everything real well but I'll tell you what I can, I know I've got it written down in the book (the CD book he gave me of his experience) and I remember saying, um, we were just talking and walking along and she brought us to this hallway that came into the corridor that we were walking in and we stopped and I looked through the corridor and there was my son and he was like 5 years old. And there was this other kid that was with him. He was a black haired kid and he was with him, and they were standing by this really shiny metal column that ran, you know vertically up through the length of the ship, and on it was like a shower massage. So it was attached to this column. And they would pull this shower, it's like they were fighting over this thing, the shower massage thing you know? And they would stick it over their head, and I could watch my son as he did this, and he stuck it over his head and you could see these blue volts of electricity just shoot down over his body, and he just, it musta tickled because he just laughed. He said, 'This is like it was so funny man.' And so the other kid would take it while he was laughing and he would do the same thing and you'd see these just WHOOOSH you know, these blue volts of electricity just shooting all over their bodies. And they just sat and fought over that, and I believe the reason why she took me there was so that he would know I was around and so he wouldn't be frightened. And it was for me, for me to say, 'Hey, your son's over here, don't worry about him,' you know. And so we continued walking around the ship, and I can remember asking her, I says, Ok, I had a really bad stomach problem, it was really painful, I mean it really hurt, and I looked at her, I said 'Can you do anything about this?' I says, 'This really hurts." And she started laughing at me, and you know we were talking telepathically, it wasn't like we were if I was talking to you. We were talking telepathically and I could hear her laughing at me. It was like this laughter echoing through my head, and she said, 'You'll be alright.' And I looked at her and I said, 'Well hey, you know I've got a problem here come on lady!' But she just put her hand on my shoulder and said, 'You'll be okay.' And it was like oh, yeah, of course, duh. I mean why am I bothered with this you know? And we just automatically changed the conversation and she introduced me to some lady and she said, this lady will change your life. And she had some really thin features and she had dark brown hair that floated down over her shoulders, and brown eyes, these really remarkable brown eyes, and uh, at the time I didn't know she was introducing me, I thought she was showing me a picture of something. I mean I didn't know that I was being introduced, it's like 'This lady's going to change your life.' I thought 'Cool!' That's sorta neat, and then the next thing I can remember, we were sitting in a garage. It looked like a garage cause there were boxes and there was one of those doors on the other side. And um, I was sitting with a grey, and the grey was pointing at this figure, he was pointing across the other end of the garage, it was a black figure, just like a shadow being. He was walking across, it was sorta like one of those things at the carnival that you shoot at, it was going back and forth and he says, 'It is forbidden to walk through those.' It was like this Volvo echoing through my head and he says, 'It is forbidden to walk through those.' And I said, 'Oh, okay.' You know I understood what he was saying, a lot of people talk to me and say, 'Oh what was he saying?' I says well, you don't share space with him, okay, because, that's possession, okay? Don't share space with a shadow creature. And then, uh the next thing I can remember is, we were standing in the front room of my Mom's house. And the screen door was open, it was upstairs in the front room and you can look right through the front door right across the road and you could see the just ship hovering there, it was whirring. It was going WHIRR WHIRR WHIRR, WHIRR, you know? Making some sounds, and you could see, and I looked around the room and my son was sitting on this love seat with his little buddy there and they were talking and just you know laughing and having a good time. And I was looking around the room and there's like about 10 other people in the front room. Just strangers, I'd never seen them and the two that really stick out were an old man and an old lady. And they were really old, they were probably around 70-75, somewhere around there. And there were just standing over there, and they weren't like doing anything, they were just like motionless in a coma or something. And they were just standing there and everybody was naked. It was so erie because as I was sitting there watching the lights just flash around the room off their faces it was just like a science fiction thing, it was like, 'Wow, this is so weird look at this.' And we were all sitting there watching it and listening to the sound of this flying saucer across the street. Well the next thing I knew I just sprang up out of bed, it was like 6 o'clock in the morning and I was like 'Woah!' I was like, 'Oh my god!' It was like, I can't believe this, because I was very, very religious. Okay, I mean I was teaching the Elder's quorum, I was you know Sunday School President for a young adult ward. I was just a go getter and this was like, 'How could God let this happen to me?' I was just like, 'Holy crap!' I was stunned, you know I mean it was like, but the minute I sprung up, there's like about a dozen other times where they just like instantaneously popped into my head. It's like you have a near death experience? I had a near UFO experience where all the sudden BOOM all these experiences popped into my head and I thought, now I know what all this was about. You know when I was a kid, the 9 foot man in the back yard, it was one of those beings coming down to get me through the ray of light through the window. These little troll guys that I called them the gorillas, they would send these little troll guys like about three feet tall in to get me, they were like the precursor guys, like Whitley Strieber's book. It was those same guys, those little black, troll looking guys, and I called them my gorillas. And now that I think back on it, it makes sense because I had a little black stuffed animal that was a gorilla. I thought, well yeah, that makes sense, the little gorillas come in to get me. And that's what I was associating with. And it was like, I was just stunned, it was like huh, no way, no way, this just cannot happen. Well, I looked over at my son, and he was sleeping, he was lying in his bed and there's that toy truck that was sitting on top of the, you know it was off the shelf, and you could see his handprints where he had been pushing it across the carpet through the dust. I thought, oh my god. The very first thing I did, was get him off to school and then I was going to go to school and I thought, no, I'm not going to school. I can't go to school, this is just too bizarre, so I went to the Provo Library and I took all the books off the shelf, which was like, you know, Betty and Barney Hill and there was a whole bunch of just, the earliest ones that were written down. And I took and I read them all. I stayed until they closed and I missed a whole day of school and I thought to myself, if this is real, you guys gotta help me, Have my son come to me with this wild dream he had. I says, my son, you know he's got to prove to me that this really happened. And I was talking to the ET guys in my head because you still have that connection. And so I was talking to them and, I mean I didn't know he had a dream, and well, I got home and I met my son and he followed me downstairs and he said, Dad, lemme tell you about this wild dream I had. He said, 'I dreamt that I was being attacked by a bunch of wild bears and they were in the house and I couldn't get rid of them.' I just got through reading that they mask themselves as animals, because you're comfortable with that. He says, 'It was really, really weird because it felt so real. Also, he said, 'I reached down to scratch my leg and it's all bloody.' So I wiped some of the blood away and there was a little crescent mark on his leg, which is what they do too, they go through and do DNA samples."
