The Quebec Encounter, part 4: Looking for Answers

Posted on April 5, 2012 by Trish and Rob

The field behind the house.

Here is part 4 of the encounter. As the story continues, it moves beyond being a record of an experience with something strange and unknown. It focuses on how the encounter affects those involved and how the encounter triggers more unusual events.

In the aftermath, Charles remains distraught. He begins an investigation to find out if others living nearby saw the cones of light. In doing so, he makes a surprising discovery.

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The next day… Tuesday March 29

I cannot say that I woke up, but rather stood up, since I did not sleep at all during the night. I was still afraid, acting like a coward. I walked upstairs with the baseball bat in my hand and took a quick look toward the patio door. The dog was not around. He stayed in the master bedroom, didn’t even move or ask to go out for his morning pee.

I got ready for work as usual and arrived on time. I was still very confused, depressed, and haunted by suicidal thoughts. I still felt the pressure in the head. I felt it constantly. I was crying and hiding in my office.  I had trouble focusing on my work.

Later that same day, I decided to leave the office early. I stopped at the college, picked up my daughter and drove home. As soon as we arrived home, I went behind the house and looked for clues or traces of what I had witnessed. I decided to jump across the ditch to the field where I searched for traces, anything disturbed or unusual. But there was nothing other than the frozen plowed ground. I looked toward the farm to the south, which was about a thousand feet away, not far, and wondered if the farmer had seen anything. Every morning after I get out of bed and let the dog out, the farmer is already in his barn. All the lights inside the barn are turned on and by then he’s probably already milking the cows.

I walked over to the farmhouse, greeted the farmer, and asked him if he had noticed lights or anything strange in the field yesterday morning around 5 a.m. By the look on his face, I quickly realized hat he had seen nothing. He asked, “What do you mean by lights and something strange?”

I didn’t want to tell him the truth and be pointed out as the village idiot. So I said: “I saw some people on ATVs riding on the field near the ditch and thought they could have been thieves at that time of day.” I left, disappointed that he hadn’t seen anything.

I then decided to visit another neighbor. After greeting the man, I asked what time he usually got up for work. He said between 5 and 5:30 a.m. I asked about yesterday morning and he said he’d gotten up at 5:30. “Did you see anything strange yesterday morning behind the house in the field?

He said he didn’t remember if he had looked behind the house. That was when his wife, Erica, called out from the basement. “What? Have you seen a UFO?” She wasn’t laughing. In fact, she sounded nervous.

Again, I decided against telling what I’d seen. I told them the same story about the ATV riders that I told the farmer. But Erica asked the same question again. “Have you seen a UFO? I know that’s it. Tell me, is that what you saw?”

I hesitated and she added: “This is weird because a couple weeks ago, one of my cousins who I haven’t seen for years, and he’s never come here, called us. He claims he is a medium, but we always thought that he was just a weirdo. He became that way after his mother passed away. He said that his Beings of Lights told him that it could be possible that we will witness strange lights appearing very soon. He said not to be afraid that they are good and harmless.

Finally, I said that I did not know exactly what I had seen and told them not to talk about this in the town. I left and went back to my house.

When I got back home, I started telling my wife about my quick investigation and even told her about the neighbor’s weirdo cousin. But honestly, I was still thinking at this time that it could not be possible. There had to be an explanation. I did not want to believe in aliens or Beings of Light—especially not in my backyard! Poor me, UFOs did not exist for me before March 28.

The cousin’s comments were strange, but they didn’t scare me at all. After all, he was supposed to be a weirdo!

Not more than 10 minutes later, the phone rang. It was Erica, the neighbor, and she told me that she had just called her cousin, Henri, and told him that we might have seen UFOs. He told her to tell us not to be afraid. His Beings of Lights knew they (the lights) were coming and he told her that I could call him, if I wanted, and she gave me his phone number.

I thought I had nothing to lose by contacting the medium, but Helene was against it. “You are still in shock. I don’t think it would be a good idea. Please be careful,” she added when she saw that I was still going to make the call. I wanted to understand what happened and I was willing to get information any way I could. So I picked the phone.

After I explained who I was, Henri greeted me and asked how I was doing. Instantly, I started crying. I told him that I was so afraid. I was desperate and exhausted. He told me not to be afraid, that there are good and bad ones. But those that came into my backyard were good. He seemed to go into a trance, and talked on and on, and I wondered how I could end the conversation.

Finally, I interrupted and said, “Henri, why me?” After a silence, he replied, “Because you are down to earth.”

“What happened when I blacked out? Where is that lost time?”

“They did not want you to see some things.”

“What do they want from me?”

“Give yourself time. It will all come up to you. Give yourself time and be receptive.”

When I asked if his Beings of Light were the ones in my backyard, he said, no. I was becoming confused. I didn’t understand who these Beings of Light were. He wanted to talk to me in person, and we agree to meet at the house on April 4.

After I hung up, I thought Helene might have been right. Maybe I shouldn’t have called him. Was he really a medium? I didn’t know. I started regretting the plans to meet him. In spite of everything he said, I didn’t feel any better. I was still afraid.

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Coming next: Spot’s story.

 

Posted in Canada encounter, synchronicity | 15 Comments

I Am Because We Are

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Trish and Rob

A friend sent me this. It expresses everything, I think, about the emerging paradigm.

It also seems a fitting image and story to celebrate the fact that the trickster planet, Mercury, retrograde since March 12, turned direct today at 6:11 AM EDT!

Today i read a story about an anthropologist who proposed a game to the kids in an African tribe. He put a basket full of fruit near a tree and told the kids that who ever got there first won the sweet fruits. When he told them to run they all took each others hands and ran together, then sat together enjoying their treats. When he asked them why they had run like that as one could have had all the fruits for himself they said: UBUNTU, how can one of us be happy if all the other ones are sad?

UBUNTU in the Xhosa culture means: “I am because we are”

Posted in connections, synchronicity | 17 Comments

2:26,2-26: Spirit Contact Through Clusters

Posted on April 3, 2012 by Trish and Rob

This sequence of synchronicities – date and number clusters – comes from Ann. It certainly has the signature of spirit communication – from a beloved dog who passed away recently and from Ann’s mother and husband, who are also on the other side.

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The other night, on 3/12/12, I woke at 2:26 in the morning and felt I wasn’t alone in my bedroom. I sat up and noticed that my closed bathroom door looked as if it was glowing or that some sort of light was shining on it. Also the entry door to the bedroom was black, and I could no longer see the light coming up through it from a nearby nightlight.

I put my glasses on and just sat there looking toward the window opposite the door. The blinds were completely closed,  and I couldn’t see any light that could be shining on the door. As my head turned from the window to the door…the light that seemed to be shining on the door turned off, as it were a lamp. And then once again I could see the nightlight shining at the bedroom door entry.  I laid back in bed…and moments later my TV turned on…the controller was setting on the pillow next to me….no here near the TV.  I figured there was something I needed to see on theTVand turned up the volume.

It was Dr. Wayne Dyer’s new lecture on PBS….and he was giving Neville Goddard’s quotes. These quotes not only comforted me in my own life situations at this time, but have taken me back to the openness that I have closed myself off from recently.  It was exhilarating to say the least.

On 2/26, my dog Maggie passed away.  For a few weeks previous I was seeing 12:26 on the clock often and even though my family thinks it’s a stretch, that date holds a very significant meaning to me. 12 was the month my husband died, and my mother died on the 26th of a month. I think of it as them being here for me and letting me know it.  Well, Maggie’s day of departure backwards is 12-26-2…..I figure the two of them (mom and hubby) were here, knowing how difficult losing my dog companion was for me.

On another note…

On March second and the third I was sitting on the sofa that my dog Maggie and I always sat together on and next to her spot a lamp on the table went off and on three times at around 7-7:30 in the evening. This happened both nights. I checked the bulb and the cord….all okay. I think my little white furry friend was saying hello and letting me know she’s still around in spirit. Once again a wonderful comfort to me.

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The 2:26 AM and 2/26 date of Maggie’s passing are particularly striking.

 

Posted in clusters, number clusters, spirit communication, synchronicity | 13 Comments

The Quebec encounter – Helene’s story

Posted on April 2, 2012 by Trish and Rob

 

The weeping willow tree near where one of the cones of light appeared.

Here is part 3 of the encounter story from Quebec that began here. On the same day of the extraordinary experience described in the last post, Charles went to a see a colon surgeon, as scheduled. That, in itself, could be considered a synchronicity. Numerous abductees have described painful invasive procedures on their bodies, including rectal probes. Often these memories are obtained through hypnotic regression.

For Charles, there would be many more synchronicities, but also terrible anxiety and profound strangeness. We also hear from Helene and her surprising story as she recalls a previous experience with the mysterious cones.

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I arrived at the clinic that morning on time and while I awaited my appointment with the specialist, I kept thinking it was all only a dream, a bad dream, that it was impossible.  It could not be real. I moved away from everyone else, looked down at the floor and cried. Finally, I met the doctor, filled out a questionnaire, and was given a prescription to take the day before the colonoscopy that was scheduled for April 26.

I returned to work and remained behind a closed door where again I cried. I did the minimum amount of work required. I was so tired. I had no energy. I left the office at 4 p.m. I couldn’t continue any longer. I picked up my daughter at college and drove home.

My daughter was not aware of what happened earlier in the day. I hadn’t told her, because I didn’t want to scare her.  On the way home, she was talking to me about her day at school but I wasn’t listening. I couldn’t concentrate. I felt a constant pressure in my head and all I wanted to do was cry. Finally, Bridgette turned to me and frowned. “What is  wrong with you, Dad? Aren’t you crying?”

As soon as we arrived home, I walked over to the patio door and looked through the window. I tried to evaluate the distance that thing that I call ‘the machine’ had been from the house before I blacked out. It had been blinking off and moving closer and closer and I figured it was about 150 feet away.

I moved to the kitchen where Helene was preparing dinner. As she met my gaze, I said: “And so?”

She looked confused, at a loss as to what I was referring to, as if she already had forgotten what happened, or couldn’t quite remember. “And so what?”

At that point, I was afraid her memory had been wiped clean and I was the only one who remembered, and that made it all even more frightening. “So this morning,” I responded. “You know, I woke you at 5 a.m.”

The look on her face changed instantly. “That was very special,” she said in a quiet voice.

“What was special?”

“The beam of light. The energy rising inside the cones. All the colors. All this energy at the bottom of the cones.  It was all so special. It was getting brighter and brighter and was being pulled upward toward the top of the cones.”

“Do you remember hearing me ask you to look on the right side. I said: ‘Do you see the tube…can you see it?’”

She said that she remembered hearing me, but was too fascinated by the beams of light out in the field and said she could only count five of them. She remembered feeling  hypnotized or paralyzed, then nothing. She did not remember how long she stayed there or how she got to the bedroom. But she felt as if she had floated through the air and was gently placed on the mattress. Instantly, she felt like she weighed a ton. Felt like the mattress was completely wrapping her. She fell asleep and woke up as usual at 7 a.m.

She felt very rested, which she found odd. She thought, How could I be so rested when I had a short night of sleep after all the interruptions? She had no problem getting to work on time.

Then a cloud seemed to clear from her mind. “Wait, don’t you remember, I told you that I had seen this same thing once before.”

She recalled standing beside her car watching them. She remembered thinking that she wished Charles and Bridgette were with her to see the spectacle. I asked where she was when it happened.

“I don’t know exactly, but don’t you remember? It was about two weeks ago on a Thursday evening. I got home around 8:30 and I told you that something scared me while I was driving. But you weren’t paying any attention to what I was saying.”

I told her that I remembered, but I thought it was about a deer crossing the road in front of her. “You are always afraid of deer, so I didn’t bother listening.”

Then she seemed to recall more about the incident. “I was alone on this country road that I take every day… and you know me, I always drive safely, keeping a watch out for deer that might jump out in front of my car. Suddenly, this strange reflection appeared on my windshield, a reflection of something strange, shaped like a muffin mold inverted with three inlaid red dials.”

She realized that the reflection wasn’t from something within the car, but from an object outside of it. Then she sensed a huge bright light moving very fast toward the side of her car. “I instantly closed my eyes and my whole body tensed. I was afraid and expecting to be hit by something coming toward me. For a moment, I thought that was it. I was going to get hurt.

“Then I opened my eyes and looked to my left, the side that the light was coming from. For a moment, I clearly glimpsed about 30 deer lying in a field. I thought it might be related to something going on at the army base a couple of miles away. Or maybe a lightening strike.”

The next thing she remembered was standing somewhere on a road, but she had no idea where. “I was alone, outside of my car watching those cones of light, exactly the same thing as we both saw this morning.”

Finally, I asked, “What if I didn’t ask you about this morning?” She replied, “Then I probably would’ve forgotten everything.”

A bit later, we all sat down at the table for dinner. I wasn’t hungry at all and I started complaining about this constant pressure in my head. I felt very depressed. The dog didn’t feel well, either. He didn’t come to me as he usually does when I come home from work. He stayed in the bedroom on the bed looking all the time toward the patio door in the other room. My wife said that he had not gone outside for pee since morning.

My daughter thought we were acting strange and asked  what was wrong with us. We blamed it on the dog not feeling well and waking us up early in the morning. After dinner, I wanted to go behind the house to the field and take a look around. But it was already getting dark, and I was afraid.

My wife and I stayed up late talking about this experience. She comforted me. I was crying again, feeling frightened. But she was not scared or shocked by this event like I was. She even told me: “You know, what happened to us is exactly like if we had won the lottery. We were lucky enough to see something that others will probably never see in their entire lives. But the difference between winning the lottery and what we saw is that you can prove to people that you won the lottery by showing them the winning ticket. But with our experience, we have no proof and have no choice but to shut up.

I think I was more frightened than Helene, because she did not see what I saw. She focused on the energy beams in the cones of light. But I had seen the tube hanging in the air with the 0-rings, which was something different. I knew it was a machine, a vehicle, from outside this world– a UFO in my own backyard.

As the evening grew late, I became more and more depressed. I was linked with something that did not even exist in my mind or in my life the day before. I wanted to scream to people to be aware that such things exist.

I hardly slept at all that night. I woke up every hour. I was in the basement again on the couch with a baseball bat within my reach. I would wake up and cry over and over through the night. My life had become a nightmare.

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Remember, when leaving a comment, be sure to click the I AM HUMAN button – even if you’re not!

 

 

 

Posted in quebec ufo encounter, synchronicity | 18 Comments

A little Jovian-Plutonian levity…

Posted on April 1, 2012 by Trish and Rob

The day we thought – at least for awhile – that we could moonwalk – 4/1/1976.

 

Posted in synchronicity | 3 Comments

Orbs

Posted on April 1, 2012 by Trish and Rob

Orbs, like crop circles, are a mysterious phenomenon that so far have defied explanations – except for the usual argument – dust or moisture  on the lens! The video below is striking. It is followed by a couple of orb photos that are on Threads of the Spiderwoman, which are some of the best orb photos I’ve ever seen.

The photos:

A violet orb!

And a blue orb!

Posted in orbs, synchronicity | 14 Comments

The Quebec UFO encounter – part 2

Posted on March 31, 2012 by Trish and Rob

Photo/illustration copyright by Jean Lavergne

This is part 2 of the Quebec encounter.  We received comments, e-mails and Facebook messages telling us not to wait with the story, so we decided to put it up today. Now we get right into the encounter. Here’s what happened, as Charles describes it.

(The photo above of the backyard where the encounter occurred is combined with a drawing of what he saw. The drawing was made by  More about photos at the end of the post.)

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Sunday evening March 27, 2011. It was still very cold outside and I decided to stay down in the basement where I added logs to the wood-burning stove. I laid  on the couch and watched TV while my wife Helene and our daughter Bridgette remained on the first floor watching television. My dog, Spot, a fox terrier, was laying in front of the stove on his pet bed, a favorite resting place. I expected him to remain there the whole night. Later my daughter came downstairs to her bedroom. That’s when I turned off the lights, put some more logs into the stove, and fell asleep on the couch.

At 3 a.m., I was awakened by the sounds of Helene yelling and making noises. I stood up to see what was going on, and noticed that Spot was no longer on his bed. I went upstairs and headed to the master bedroom. The lights were on and my wife was standing beside the bed asking the dog to get down.  Spot was acting very aggressive, showing his teeth, and refused to obey. We’d never seen him acting this way  before. It was clear that something was going wrong with him… but what? Finally, with the help of a dog treat I was able to get his attention. As he came out of the bedroom for the treat, my wife asked me to take him down the basement and close the door. I did as she asked and laid back down on the couch.

I was awakened again at 4:50 a.m. by cries from my dog. He was standing in front of the wood stove trembling and shaking as he looked toward a window on the southeast side of the house. I usually wake up at 5 a.m. and let the dog outside, then feed him. By 5:30, I wake up my daughter and we drive together to the city where I work and she goes to college.

This morning, though, March 28, was different. Spot didn’t want to go outside. Instead, he was trying to alert me to something unusual going on outside the house. I opened the door to the stairs. Usually, he races ahead of me, anxious to get outside. This morning, though, he wouldn’t follow me, even after I called him. He continued to tremble and look toward the same window. I walked toward him and touched his right side gently to comfort him. That’s when a strange feeling came to mind that he was going to die soon. After awhile, he calmed down and followed me up the stairs. I walked to the patio door, which faces east, and reached down for his leash.

That’s when I noticed beams of light, very low in intensity, in the expansive field behind the house. I opened the patio door but the dog refused to come out. I grabbed him, forced him out and closed the door. As Spot passed our motion detector sensor, the patio spotlights came on automatically, illuminating the backyard. I couldn’t see the light rays any longer so I hit the switch, turning off the lights. After a few seconds, my eyes adjusted and I saw the beams of light again. Now they were closer and much more intense. They seemed to get brighter and brighter, closer and closer, so close to my backyard. I counted nine of them, their beams reaching the ground.

The shapes of the beams were like ice cream cones, but inverted. They were brighter near the ground and lost intensity toward the top. If there was anything above the cone, I couldn’t see it. I didn’t have any idea what I was looking at. At first, I thought they might be solid acrylic tubes of light. They were all displayed asymmetrically in the large field. I could even see energy rising inside the beams. But the energy was not the same in each one, and they were not glowing identically. I had no idea what I was looking at, but it was beautiful. I actually felt paralyzed by the spectacle. I watched for a couple minutes then went back inside the house and called out to Helene. “Are you awake?”

When she answered that she was, I asked her to come out to the patio. I said, “Spot is outside and acting kind of strange. I think he could die, and I want to know if you see the same thing that I do.”

We walked out to the patio door and looked out the window. “Wow, what is it, pyrotechnics?” Helene asked. “This is exactly what I told you about the other day. This is what I saw!”

My attention shifted to a vertical tube hanging just above our weeping willow tree to the right side of the yard. It glowed as brightly as lightning for a few seconds, then vanished, and reappeared again. Over and over. “Do you see that one to the right?” I asked. But Helene didn’t respond.

I was amazed, almost paralyzed by the sight, but not fearful. Gradually, I was  able to barely perceive a grey, steel-like structure on one side of the tube. I kept staring and on the last two illuminations of the tube, I saw something that seemed out of this world. I clearly saw beads of very bright white lights, shaped like O-rings or Cheerios that floated in the tube, but didn’t touch each other. The tube itself now appeared a blue hue, but the O rings were bright white.

I opened the patio door, called out for the dog. Then I blacked out. That’s the only way I can describe it. The next thing I knew, I was in the shower shampooing my hair. I was confused,  acting like a zombie. I felt like I had a hang over. The pressure in my head was painful, a headache like never before. I wasn’t scared, just confused. As I showered, I remembered what I’d seen in the backyard, but I wondered what I was doing in the shower and why I wasn’t standing by the patio door.

I shaved, dried my hair, brushed my teeth, all as if on automatic pilot. Then I went back to the patio. It was still dark out, but the tubes of light were gone. I didn’t even bother to look in the bedroom for Helene. I left with my daughter on time and drove to the city and got to work by 7 AM, right on time.

I sat in my office all alone, the door closed. I was looking at the floor, still feeling  this huge pressure in my head. My eyes hurt. And then I started realizing what happened to us. No words could explain just how I felt.

These things were not supposed to exist. They were only supposed to be a product of Hollywood, American fiction.  I was 49 years old and I started to cry and would do so repeatedly for month to come. I was stuck with a reality that does not exist for the majority of people.

I was now in mourning for my life and I started to become very frightened. As I sat in my office, I actually wished I had never been born. During the day, I even thought seriously about committing suicide. I felt as if I had been used, abused and controlled against my will.

They made the rules…they let me wake up my wife and then they controlled the game. Deep inside of me, I wanted to scream to let people know they exist. But I was scared that no one would believe me.

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The question skeptics often ask is why didn’t you take photos of the lights. So I asked Charles that question.

“As I’ve told other people who have asked that question, I did not think at all about my camera, which was in the basement. I was 49 years old and I was not born with a cellphone in my hand, either, like the new generation. Also, it was 5 a.m. Plus, if you you see the Airbus A380 passing over your house at very low altitude, you do not run for the camera because it might not be there no more as you get back. Besides, after a point, I was no longer in control of my actions.”

Posted in quebec ufo encounter, synchronicity, UFOs | 31 Comments

The Quebec UFO encounter

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Trish and Rob

This is the first of several posts related to a dramatic UFO encounter that occurred one year ago. It was experienced by a French-Canadian couple who live in a rural area of Quebec. The incident has had psychic reverberations, including astonishing synchronicities as well as disturbing events.

The story is deeply emotional and came to us directly from the man, who we will call Charles. He and his wife do not want their names used. Neither had any interest or belief in aliens or UFOs before this experience. Charles approached us with his story after finding the French edition of our book, The 7 Secrets of Synchronicity, in a Montreal bookstore.

The story is long and quite involved, but fascinating. At times it reads like a modern-day gothic horror tale. We’ll post the entries intermittently over the next two or three weeks. English is a second language for Charles, so we have edited the writing, but hopefully maintained the essence of the story as well as Charles’ voice in the telling.

It begins in a graveyard nine days before the UFO encounter. We usually think of hauntings and aliens as two separate scenarios. But Charles is convinced that what happened in the graveyard was related to what followed.

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I guess it all started on Saturday afternoon March 19, 2011. The day was sunny, cold with very strong wind and still had a bit of snow covering the ground. A couple of days before, I started a project to create a family tree. I decided to call my father and ask him for help identifying family tombstones in our hometown cemetery.

When we arrived, I took out three sheets of paper with a list of family names.  While my father located specific tombstones, I made note of the dates of birth and death. But a strong wind came up making it difficult to write. So I went back to my car for my digital camera and began taking photos of gravestones.

One of my father’s brothers was buried in the cemetery Feb. 19, 2011, exactly a month earlier. My father and I did not attend my uncle’s funeral because of a long-standing family dispute dating back to 1984. It involved a family business and was serious enough that it had to be settled in court.  It was very difficult for my father not to go, but it would’ve been uncomfortable with other unfriendly family members there.

Something happened that day in the cemetery. My father started feeling very strange and frightened. Something frightened him, but he didn’t know what. Later, he asked me if I heard him screaming into the wind, calling for me. He said he heard a voice in his head that seemed to be coming from outside of him. It said: Tell your son not to stay there. Get him away quickly. I did remember hearing my father calling to me. At the time I was taking pictures of the family tombstone where my recently deceased uncle was buried. I walked away from the grave, and looked for my father. Oddly, even though I’d heard his voice, I had trouble finding him.

That evening, I took my 17-year-old daughter to a nearby city for her part-time job working at a restaurant. On the way there, I started feeling a pain in my stomach and began sweating profusely. I felt wetness in my pants and pulled into a gas station. I hurried to the restroom, embarrassed, thinking that I peed on myself. It was worse. My pants were filled with blood.

My first thought was that I was going to die. My father had colon cancer 20 years earlier, but was saved by surgery. Now it was my turn. I went to a clinic and was examined by an emergency physician. At his recommendation, I made an appointment with a doctor who specialized in colon surgery. I would see him at 8:30 a.m. March 28.

Little did I know how important that date would become for me. Not because of the appointment, but because of the astonishing and frightening event that would take place in the early morning hours of that day.

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The next entry describes the event that has changed Charles’ life.

(The complete story can be found in liens in the Backyard: UFO Encounters, Abductions & Synchronicity, by Rob & Trish MacGregor (Crossroad Press, 2013).

Posted in quebec ufo encounter, synchronicity, UFOs | 13 Comments

Flight 191

Posted on March 29, 2012 by Trish and Rob

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=RvqvXhXwMbw

As you see in the You Tube video, this is the chaotic scene on March 27, 2012, on Jet Blue’s Flight 191, New York to Las Vegas,  when the captain who was co-piloting the flight tried to storm the cockpit.  He was wrestled to the floor by men en route to the 2012 International Security Conference. An off duty pilot helped to land the plane in Amarillo at 10 AM central time, 11 am Eastern time, and passengers were safely deplaned.

But here’s where the story slides into that strange area of synchronicity clusters involving numbers.  Flight 191, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal,  “is one of the most tragic of all flight numbers.”  Here’s why:

1985:  Delta Air Lines Flight 191, an L-1011 wide-body, crashed shortly before landing at Dallas-Fort Worth, apparently due to wind shear, and killed 137 people.

1979: American Airlines Flight 191, a DC-10, had an engine ripped off from under a wing, which severed hydraulic lines. The jumbo jet plowed into a field near the end of the runway, killed the 271 people on board,  and grounded all DC-10s until the technicalities of what went wrong had been solved.

These tragedies and the near tragedy with Jet Blue all involved 1 or 11 in the flight number, the type of plane, the time the Jet Blue flight landed safely, and of course, the death of 137 people in the Delta tragedy.

This story first came to my attention through a link on the Daily Grail to author Loren Coleman’s fascinating blog, Twilight Language.  As he points out, 191 can be rearranged as 911. But as I started Googling and ran across the Wall Street Journal article and another on Huffington Post, I was struck by the clusters of 1s and 11s and, of course, by that other number, 137, which we’ve written a number of posts about. How is it that in all three of these flight 191s, everything reduces to 1 or 11?

Then of course, there’s the  famous Flight 19, (another 1). It consisted of   five TBM Avenger torpedo bombers that disappeared on December 5, 1945, during a U.S. Navy training flight from a Fort Lauderdale, Florida  and birthed the modern lore about planes and boats that vanish in the Bermuda Triangle.

The higher ups at Delta and American are either superstitious – or understand synchronicity; after their respective crashes, they retired the number 191 for flights.  When Jet Blue was contacted by The Huffington Post about whether it would also retire the number, they said they had no intention of doing so.

So, in the future, I won’t be taking any flight 191 anywhere, and I’ll definitely avoid a Jet Blue Flight 191.

 

 

Posted in clusters, number clusters, synchronicity | 14 Comments

Dark Trickster and the Health Insurance Mandate

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Trish and Rob

U.S. Supreme Court justices are now in day 2 (March 27) of  arguments in the landmark Affordable Health Care Act case, which mandates that by 2014, every American must have health insurance or pay a penalty.  The constitutionality of the mandate is what’s being challenged: how can the government force you to buy a product?

The lawsuit was filed two years ago by the National Federal of Independent Businesses and 26 states – led by Florida – in an attempt to overturn the law. The core of the legal question is whether the U.S. Constitution’s interstate commerce clause allows the federal government to force people to purchase a product they don’t want.  The government attorneys argue that since everyone will enter the health care market at some point, it makes sense for people to obtain insurance while they’re still healthy and costs can be controlled.

Two years ago, Mary Brown was one of the original plaintiffs in the lawsuit, didn’t have health insurance, and owned a small auto repair shop in Panama City, in the Florida Panhandle.  Today, Brown’s auto repair shop is closed, she has declared bankruptcy and is unemployed, partly because of unpaid medical bills. According to the Palm Beach Post,  of the $63,000 Brown owes, $4,500 of it is for unpaid bills for her husband’s medical care. More than half of it is owed to a medical center in Panama City and the rest is owed to doctors in Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi.

Jane Perkins, legal director of the National Health Law Program said, “Had she been eligible or had this law been in effect, she would have had access to affordable health insurance policies that would have covered these health care costs and in all likelihood avoided bankruptcy. It’s ironic that this plaintiff against the law is someone who makes the case for the rationality of what Congress did.”

Ironic? We have a better term for it. Dark trickster.

More than 62 percent of Americans who file for bankruptcy do so partly because of medical costs. Perkins notes that Brown and people like her are one reason health insurance and medical care are so expensive.  When people don’t pay their medical bills, those costs are passed on to consumers.

But another factor of this dark trickster is that both sides of the arguments are specious. When President Obama signed the Affordable Health Care Act into law, with the mandate, he essentially handed the insurance companies nearly 50 million new customers – the number of people in this country who don’t have/can’t afford health insurance.  You could hear the insurance companies’ collective  cheers all the way to the moon. In return, insurance companies can’t deny coverage for pre-existing conditions and must remove all caps for coverage.  Until profit is removed from health care – i.e., take insurance companies out of the picture and extend Medicare to all –  then health care in the U.S. continues to be  just  another business run by corporate interests.

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We were going to post this tomorrow, but it appears the individual mandate is in trouble and if it’s overturned, then the entire law unravels. Robert Reich, labor secretary under President Clinton, believes that overturning the mandate could result in Medicare for all, IF the  administration plays their cards right. You can follow this at Huffington Post.

 

 

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