Odd Observation #18

Odd Observation #18
Though Heaven Falls...
by Alfred Lehmberg

I'd had some exciting observations since a previous report. Some real puzzlers in the Southeast United States (converging and then diverging multiples, rate and direction changers, and super-slow movers creeping furtively along about one degree every ten seconds...), but nothing at was my location close to the west coast (I'd traveled out to CA to get my mom; she would go back to Alabama to live with me until she passed) save one wispy 'indistinct' a few days ago. It's been nearly a week of clear moonless mornings, so far, virtually bereft of even the prosaic non-prosaic... 

I'd previously wondered where they go... Where DO they go?

There WERE the usual good skies found in northern California to marvel at, despite some fires in the area, but the distinct absence of wandering stars was noted and they are auspiciously obvious with their absence. I've ALWAYS seen copious amounts of them out in Nor Cal. Where did they go? Another question, of many questions, with no answers readily forthcoming, at all.

This iteration of my observation series, fortuitously then [g], can concern itself with observations on another matter entirely: my tumultuous dismissal and change of venue as it pertained to an "ongoing theme" and a "continuing saga" of the hard but honorable road of elusive truth, harsh consequences for actions taken, and righteous good faith whistleblowing. Though my eyes were drawn to the sky, still (every morning), for a glimpse of the presumed larger reality I would convey back to an appreciated reader, I must confide that I found myself remarkably affected by the aforementioned *change*, disappointingly inexplicable at the time, as it was.

I felt a little like I'd been cast from heaven, eh? Reality can be uncomfortably mercurial.

Briefly (?): valued individuals I'd thought respected peers (if not rare friends) made what I had to take as a pointed indication from seeming ambush, that the perceived fellowship just described... Was.  Not.  So.

I was ejected from their offended presence in what I took for unqualified irritation with extreme prejudice. It was harsh.

The charges as leveled included getting "in too deep" where it was desired that I not go.  That I was "rewriting history," ...and a tersely undefined "indecency" was accused. These came to be not so laughable charges as it turned out. I didn't  know it at the time.They'd be true enough.

I, through my own filters, would have more properly described my unflaggingly consistent behavior as the continued support of a once valued friend and comrade, telling it like (I perceived) it WAS, and turning over restless rocks in PUBLIC that were being perceived as busily undermined in PRIVATE.  We'll forget for a moment that that "undermining" was abundantly deserved.

...But that's the theme; it's what I do, I've discovered to my horror and chagrin over the decades. When I put two and two together sometimes I get five... hey, it's served me well in a literary sense.  Sometimes, where only half the truth is being told, you have to tell the truth and a half!

That, and coming clean when I can see my arrears myself and not hang on to them beyond their expiration date... That's the key.

I am and have always been, pretty much, a whistle-blower. I've tried to keep it real, and I know what the value of loyalty is (the first whistle blown is to the individual concerned, always, no ambushing), but I can't help bumping my gums if I feel something untoward is going down, be it individual or institutional. I'm at the end of a long line of scientists, teachers, and Protestant ministers and when stuff ain't right, somebody ought'a SAY something about it! I regret it when, my little *character flaw* gets me knocked away from YOUR attention, reader, even if that WAS a good thing. [g].

I bring it on myself, undeniably, and perhaps I sometimes (too many times) elect myself to sound an alarm, but I require an occasional glimpse of myself in a mirror (Gotta trim those nose hairs!), so keeping silent about perceived non-equity I can at least say something about is not a comfortable option for me... Moreover, on those occasions when I failed to blow the whistle, folks around me got needlessly hurt (on one level or another) or a substantive chunk would come out of my own rear... The wage of inaction is oftentimes more arduous than the painful wage of the whistle blown or the flag thrown down.

My whistle-blowing outlook served me well in military aviation (though it kept me at company level as I've pointed out before), where what one does pretty much has to *work*.  Lives are in the balance.

Nothing has to *work* in civilian life... I've come to find; it just has to FIT, and that *fit* is trending back to one of rigid inflexibility, more and more, over time, for horrendous times ahead if we let it... ...Some irony there.

My alien view of the entire tedious situation forecasted only an aggregate appreciation for my efficacious behavioral consistency, as a matter of definition. In other words, one might think that behavior that had achieved some celebration mere days before... becoming, suddenly, almost overnight, "indecent and disappointing", would strain garden variety credulity a little bit. It strained mine. I was wounded and pissed off.  I dug in.

Moreover, I was stunned personally. There was no appeal, no discussion, and no debate. After six years of smooth sailing, there was no explanation, no expression, and no introspection. My WEB site, previously hosted by the dismissing venue, was also ejected into null space for ten days of needless inactivity, and I, with no warning of any kind (in fact counter to other more seemingly reliable indications!) suddenly had the deadest of dead microphones. My idiosyncratic stock had bottomed.  Ouch!

Well—Ok. I'm not Martha Stewart, I don't have to be "on," but I kind of got the immediate impression that it wasn't so much ME that was getting bumped from a ufological round table as you, good reader. All of a sudden, for the most seemingly arbitrary of seemingly arbitrary reasons... I wasn't getting "out" to a readership the way I was before... The way that had seemed to me to be as natural as breathing. It didn't feel like a good thing. It didn't feel like the right thing.

I don't know why I felt that way, really (though I have my suspicions), but I did. I felt I had a valid connection with a listening readership all too easily severed as if by the petty and arbitrary pique of a wounded teenager. I was wrong, even if I didn't know it.

There are a few of you out there, reading, for all the admonitions accusing my alleged pretentiousness, insults about unusual words I may use, or the pointed questioning and potential shredding of your untested faith! It's all paint from the paint box, good reader. True enough, you've read this far... There will be more to read, lord willin' and the creek don't rise...

Had the reader noticed, for instance, that for all the strident acknowledgment of the UFO phenomenon (multiple daily reminders in all media from a suspect mainstream), ZERO progression has been made regarding that key concern in over seventy years! I have!

That's part of the problem. The ufological principals (from opponent CSIcopian to proponent "Two Percenter") don't like to discuss their part in the general cover-up and mainstream obfuscation as it pertains to that nondisclosure.

Well, I DO like to discuss it. I suspect that most do. Was that a good reason to lose our connection? I didn't think so at the time.

Additionally, treat UFOs as anything more than an entertainment or a moment's fanciful digression and one risks (as a result of the 'Mothman Futility Syndrome'?) one's livelihood, social control, even family and sanity—plus the concern, consideration, and respect of those who proclaimed that they were your fellow travelers in the struggle. Is that rational? Look at the all but forgotten John Ford. Be a "truth seeker" only at your peril.

The reader can only imagine the quandary that put THIS writer in at the end of that aforementioned line of truth seeking scientists, teachers, and ministers. What ABOUT those nose hairs?  I'm sixty-eight!  They grow like weeds! I can't trim the "edge" if the "lawn" revolts me...

Step away from an "accepted party-line" and incur the wrath of the hard-liners. Suggest the existence of a hidden agenda they entertain and be summarily banished and whisper campaigned. Become the hated enemy as a result of rational disagreement and endure the irrational. Think outside the accepted box to be perhaps shoved outside that box. Think on your own and mayhap be socially disowned.  All that's risked right or wrong.  I was wrong.  Still, no one tried to "show" me.  All just tried to "tell" me.

That I would do it all again with a blind second chance? Of course.  Remember that consistency I talked about back at the start.

See, somethin' didn't seem right? The stress of NOT banging my literary gums about it was too much to bear. I had to report on it! Like any person aspiring to journalist/artist, I'm driven. ...Sounds a little pretentious? ...Not a whole lot I can do, or want to do, about that.  At my age, little pretentiousness can remain.

The personal satisfactions found in producing this critical prose and poetic commentary are huge, with the reader or without the reader, forgetting for a moment that any joy that is shared is always increased. That's the nature of a conscientious expression. It also may be an indication that I might be on the level...

The much appreciated constant reader understands that my behavior is constant and has remained constant over the past twenty years (anyway!) and would gleefully remain so, despite the discomfort of a few that find me cutting a little too close to their rational bone (?), but prosecuting rational convictions, generally "soaring" and "cleaving" to the maximum extent possible, and reporting it all back in as optimistic and respectful manner as I can... Would the reader have me do anything less?

All this, AND I would admit error when it's presented to me and I can recognize it. Why? It's a step up.

Every opportunity to have more information should always be busily explored. ...Ever moving forward to where the data appears to lead... ...Though heaven falls.

Still—I haven't had to back off a single major position I've taken, save the one, in that same twenty years. Show me new evidence.  I'd been right on Frank Feschino, "Emma Woods," and John Ford.  I LIVE to change. The future, as it has always been. Anything else is death. Death, reader!

What do I observe as a result of my (my/your) expulsion from a conflicted corner of Internet ufology?

1. That a new idea is not easily tolerated anywhere, even in a bastion of the newest of new ideas (that idea being that we are not alone in even this little sector of backwater space), and we ought to stamp out a reflexive, untenable, and unreasoning intolerance wherever it raises its pointy little head.  I'd thought such was so... heavy sigh...

2. That officious authoritarianism is everywhere in a serious ufology and it is used as it always is anywhere else: to avoid rethinking positions, redoing work thought done, and upsetting a status quo comfortable only for its too comfortable facilitator and administrator.

3. That no good deed shall go unpunished, and that the good a man may do is usually interred with his bones where his evil is almost guaranteed to live on and on? Plenty of evidence exists in our community for both of those.

4. That as important as being correct must be that it's more important to admit error, immediately, as it occurs and as it is recognized.

5. ...That I'm not dead, so I must be stronger?

6. Finally—that I am on to something important and consciousness changing (with some significant like-minded others), that I'd be able to bring back *alive* somewhat, perhaps, contribute some "beginning explanation" for same, or even materialize it in the so-called real world? The will is there and it's affordable to watch.  Aspiration inspires even as it fails!

Closing frankly? The only persons I have left in this world to impress are myself, family, anyone with an Alien View, or any general entity visiting from off planet, so... check in with the AlienView once in a while and see what's been explored, see observations made, or see stuff "impressive." My aspiration's there and it's sure to curl the short hair, gratify a few, and astonish the rest! The AlienView aspires to be real even if derivative.  That shouldn't be a concern or a surprise where we live in a fractal reality.  It is, and we do.

That's enough, read on.

ÆL