As I type this it’s an ordinary Sunday afternoon. My house is (semi) clean, and while there are the usual creaks and settling (and rampaging of three new cats!) it’s otherwise quiet. Out the window the sun is shining for the first time in days. I can see clear back into the woods behind my house. Tonight I imagine I’ll even be able to see the stars.
What I won’t see are UFOs or strange animals (cats notwithstanding), and I sure won’t hear or see any ghosts. Nor will I pick up a psychic message, or get any valuable intel on the future.
Sure, I’ve had the odd lucid dream or hypnopompic hallucination but I’ve never mistaken these for anything more than unusual-but-not-unheard-of brain misfirings. Even in the most auspicious places and circumstances I’ve not seen or heard a thing.
See, much as I’m interested in unusual experiences, I’ve never had any. And after 45 years I don’t suspect I will. I don’t think my brain has the “weird chip”.
Though some argue that I ought to. I’m all on board with the co-creation hypothesis because I think a lot of what makes weird encounters weird is our own brains, but I’m not sure I agree that creative sorts are more prone to extraordinary experiences than others.
Admittedly, vanity and insecurity fuel this hesitation: I’d like to think that with all the writing and costuming that I’m at least a little creative. And yet, nada.
But this might not be a bad thing. In the past I’ve wanted to see something but having talked to a few witnesses of the weird I’m not so sure anymore. Such experiences can turn lives upside down. In addition to dealing with a harsh blow to what they thought they knew of the world, experiencers have to contend both with ridicule and others insisting they know what they really saw or did.
Besides, my interest in all this stuff would make me the least reliable witness ever.
Or, perhaps if these phenomena have minds of their own, I’m just not cool enough to get invited to that party. Which works out–I’m not that cool in this plane so it’s not a surprise if I’m not in others.
But I’m gonna keep looking.
