I never understood how someone could put their life and reputation so far below telling some far fetched story, even if it was true. Unfortunately I can now say that I do understand. Every moment that I don’t tell someone about what I saw…what I felt...there’s this indescribable itching. Like I’m somehow betraying a part of my very nature in not telling.

I, Birdie Hyre, was abducted by aliens two weeks after my initial sighting of the disc.

I might have laughed, then, but now that feels entirely inappropriate given the events that followed. Like cracking a joke at a funeral, it might provide some comfort in the moment but once you’ve made it to the punchline it just hangs in the air like cigar smoke. It chokes out any laughter one might have had and only serves to emphasize the grief of it all.