I had a strange experience when I was about 12 or 13 years old. I was sleeping over my cousin Scott’s house in the summer of ’83 or ’84. It was a warm summer night and our plan was to sleep outside in my cousin’s tent in his backyard. About 11 at night, we went outside and were hanging out with two of his friends. They were smoking “ciggies” as they called them and we were talking about whatever it is that adolescent boys talk about when they get together. Knowing my cousin, the conversation probably focused on the current state of the Soviet military or something – but I can’t really recall. <\/p>\n
So, after a while, we decide to go for a little walk down the road to the the reservoir that was located about a mile from my cousin’s house. Now, Scott lived in Charlton, Massachusetts. I have talked about how my hometown was rural – Charlton was considered hicksville even by residents of Oxford! Scott’s street was not exactly unpopulated, you could consider it the “urban” Charlton, I guess. There was even one streetlight!<\/p>\n
Anyway, we are walking down the deserted road towards the lone streetlight which is about a half mile away, but we can see it’s glow down the road. Suddenly, we see the lights of a car turn onto the street. “Into the ditch!” someone says and we scatter into the empty drainage ditch on one side of the road. It was deep enough to duck down and not be seen by the passing car. There was no reason to be hiding, but it seemed like a fun thing to do at the time. As the car passed, we climbed out of the gulley and continued walking towards the reservoir. <\/p>\n
A few minutes later, the group of us were illuminated by another set of headlights and we automatically moved to jump into the ditch again. As I leapt into the ditch, the first thing I noticed was that this one was not empty. There was about 4 inches of muddy water at the bottom! I was soaked, but I huddled against the wall of the gully to hide myself from the approaching car. Scott was a few yards behind me in the ditch and I heard him swear when he hit the water.<\/p>\n
Crouching there, we waited for the car to pass us so we could climb out of the ditch and dry off. Instead of seeing the lights pass us by, I noticed that the area around me was completely lit. I looked down and I could plainly see my sneakers covered by the water in the gulley. I looked around and noticed that the whole area was bathed in a bright white light! I looked up towards where the light must have been coming from and saw something that should have startled me. There, above me, I am not sure how high, was a brilliant, unmoving circle of light! I stood and stared at the source of the light for several seconds. Then the circle moved slightly down the street and vanished! <\/p>\n
I turned and searched for Scott in the darkness. My eyes seemed to quickly adjust to the lack of light and I saw Scott and his friends emerging from the ditch. As we noticed each other, we suddenly broke into a run back towards Scott’s house. There were no taillights trailing off into the distance as we ran in the direction the light had moved, so this was no car!<\/p>\n
When we got back there, we were out of breath and tired. Oddly, I don’t remember being afraid or schocked by what I had just seen. Without any further discussion, Scott and I said bye to his friends and we walked into the house to go to sleep. <\/p>\n
There were several strange things about this experience that I can’t quite reconcile:
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\n[*]Scott and I never, ever spoke about this experience. Even the next day, it just seemed like it never happened. I clearly remember eating breakfast the next morning and thinking about what had happened, but I did not utter a word about this to him or anyone else for a long time.<\/p>\n
[*]There was absolutely no sound from the source of the light! After the light moved down the street and then disappeared, I do not recall hearing anything except maybe the normal noise from the woods on either side of the street. I do remember hearing the sound of a helicopter flying overhead a couple minutes after the light disappeared, though.<\/p>\n
[*]The street we were walking on was tree-lined. When I looked up at the source of the light, I didn’t see the silhouette of any trees or anything which would lead me to believe that the light was below the level of the trees on the street!
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\nI am not sure what happened that night. It was a long time ago now and I have probably forgotten some of the details. But what I wrote here are all things that really stand out in my mind. I can see these things like it was yesterday. Since that day, I have told a few people about this, but I have mostly stayed quiet on the issue.<\/p>\n
You can draw your own conclusions….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I had a strange experience when I was about 12 or 13 years old. I was sleeping over my cousin Scott’s house in the summer of ’83 or ’84. It was a warm summer night and our plan was to … Continue reading