February 25, 2022

I don't know for sure if I was born with it, or if I developed it deliberately during my many years as an active journalist, but I must confess to having been a skeptic about many subjects for much of my life.

However, as they say in closing that Canadian comedy show, Possum Lodge, "I'm a man, and I can change, If I have to."

On the subject of UFOs, I have most certainly had to change.

It was not because I have been abducted or anything like that, but because I have seen them on more than one occasion, and even though it was from a distance, it was nevertheless quite personal.

When I was researching whether or not to make a documentary with James Gilliland about his experience with UFOs and aliens, I experienced one of them fly over near Mt Adams.

James had said they would "power up" in response to a mental or thought request as they flew over.

I gave him my deadpan look and kept my skepticism to myself.

However, it was summer, so I (and producer John Savage) set up our cots and slept outside under the stars.

For some reason, I woke while it was still dark. And there was a satellite idling along from north to south.

"Hey John," I sort of whispered. "There's a UFO up there. Or a satellite."

John replied "I know. I'm looking at it."

That surprised me. I thought he was sound asleep.

"Let's make it power up," said John. "Then we'll know for sure it's a satellite, right?"

"How do we do that?" I asked.

"Just think it like James said."

"Okay," I said, then looked up and thought "Power Up - and prove me right. You're nothing but a satellite."

(See how skepticism works? It's right there to protect you from thinking too far out of the box).

Now imagine a light bulb on a dimmer switch, going from dim to maximum brightness, then dimming again - but all by itself.

That is exactly what that satellite did, except now my brain had to accept that it was not a telepathic satellite.

John has a great sense of mischief. He grabbed his little pocket camera, pointed it up, and said "let's flash back" - and pressed the shutter.

The camera flashed.

The UFO immediately did another "power up" and dimmed down.

John flashed again.

The UFO flashed yet again, gathered speed, and disappeared, leaving us laughing our butts off - and me far less skeptical than I had been.

We went ahead and made the documentary with James, and later returned to one of his conferences, where one of the speakers was a certain Dr. Michael Salla, an Australian Ph.D. whose special interest was extraterrestrials.

That was over a decade ago, since when I have been a subscriber to his newsletter and a frequent reader of his articles (and books) about what he calls "exopolitics."

All of which brings me to the point - that being that Dr Salla has got a lot deeper into the subject since then, to the point that he is asking whether one reason for Russia's incursion into Ukraine is because there may be an ancient space ark there - and it's reactivating after centuries of silence.

(Did I see any skeptics raise their hands when I wrote that?).