Little Green Men

Do you believe in UFOs? Alien life on another planet other than ours?

I do. And even though I do, quite strongly in fact, it's never been anything I've talked about. I like reading books written for lay people like me, such as "How the Universe Started For Dummies." I like reading about string theory, even though I will never, ever get it. Even when brilliant scientists try and write a book for regular people, they usually miss the boat.

Now, just imagine the time space continuum as a slice of bread. Got it? Good. Now you can understand the flaws in relativity and move on to the next chapter.

When I'm just pooped out, I love nothing more than to beach myself on the couch and turn on the History Channel and watch UFO Hunters or UFO Files. But really, that has been the extent of my interest. I haven't even really talked about it to anyone.

Until my oldest daughter told me she saw a UFO one night.

She's a kid, and I brushed her off when she told me. I didn't believe her - I still don't know what to think. But one night I was watching a show on "The Phoenix Lights" that recapped the famous sighting in Phoenix eleven years ago. It was caught on film by dozens of people, aired on CNN, and even the governor of Arizona at the time claimed to have witnessed the enormous, silent, formation of brilliant, mulitcolored lights on several things flying slowly overhead Phoenix - until they just disappeared. We live close to Phoenix. And sort of close to Roswell. You could say we're an alien hotbed where I live.

So my daughter came out into the living room while I was watching History Channel, casually glanced at the screen, and announced, "That looks just like what I saw out of my bedroom window that one time."

Okay, I'm a dork. I got goosebumps. I quizzed her. It was an airplane. It was a helicopter. She was dreaming. First, We rarely see airplanes overhead up here in our mountain town, especially way out where we live, and she reminded me that she did grow up on an Air Force Base. Okay, then, helicopter. Mom, helicopters move slower, straighter, and have a blinking light on the tail. This thing was long and round and had lights all around the edge. And it zig zagged. And then it was just gone; I couldn't see it anymore. Oh, okay, you were dreaming. No I wasn't, mom. It was the night you bought me my daybed. I couldn't get to sleep, so I just stared out the window at the stars for a while. That's when I saw it. Why didn't you come get me? I almost did, but I knew you wouldn't believe me.

So even though in theory I really can't accept that earth is it - the only place that harbors life, I don't know what to believe here. I believe that she really thinks she saw something. So I told a neighbor and good friend of mine. She proceeded to shock the pants off of me.

"Everyone around here has seen something. One of my employees said his entire street was out one night because the power just shut off, and everyone went out to see if the neighbor's had lost power, too. When they were all out on the street, every one of them saw these strange lights in the sky. He actually called 911 - and they kept waiting to read about it in the paper, or the radio, or something the next day, and they never did."

Ooookay....

"The guy with the horses behind me says he sees stuff once a month or so. But he would never report it because he's this conservative horseman. They'd laugh him out of town."

Even weirder.

So when the weather warms up, I am going to the deck upstairs and I'm going to look for little green men.

Would you? What do you believe?