Admitting one has an unexplainable experience in a generation that lives on social media is essentially social suicide; however, what my best friend and I experienced our sophomore and junior years will forever be left in the realm of the unexplained. Yet, due to the idea that every answer can and will be found on the internet if one searches long enough has led most who have heard our stories to scoff at experiences and discount our perception of what we experienced. Admittedly, I would love to be able to explain the experience; instead, I have been left scratching my head as to what we experienced and perhaps it was my dull perception of the unknown that led me to be struck with fear when my friend and I had our first encounter with an unidentified flying object (UFO).

First, allow me to preface my memoir by saying prior to my sophomore year, I had no experience UFOs and I quite frankly laughed at the idea that aliens flew around in flying saucers in the sky to spy on us. Portraying this level of disbelief in UFOs came from around 4th or 5th grade when I saw a picture of a sky with a saucer-like object in the frame. Inquiring about this picture, I asked my teacher if UFOs did in fact exist; however, much to my disappointment, the teacher informed me that the picture was taken using a unique photography trick where a cardboard cutout of a saucer was made to appear to be flying in the sky. Since that moment, believing in alien UFOs seemed childish and because of all the ridiculous rumors I would hear about Area 51 it seemed more and more like a science fiction story than actual events occurring on earth. Furthermore, Giorgio A. Tsoukalos from Ancient Aliens is well known for his crazy hair and ridiculous claims to extraterrestrial beings that watching that show seemed more like comic relief opposed to scientific proof that aliens do exist. Needless to say, I felt confident UFOs were an invention of man.

Halloween night is well known for a night of costumes and candy; additionally, Halloween night is also a night known for evil pranks and cruel mischief. Yet, for two high school males who were in line to get their drivers license in the coming months, Halloween had become more about hanging out and having fun opposed to dressing up and pulling pranks. Besides, when we began our walk home it was already around 10 pm, we were in a safe neighborhood only 7 minutes from home, and most people were beginning to turn off their porch lights and get ready for bed and go to school the next day. From our perspective, we had enjoyed the night at our friends handing out some candy, we were not up to any mischief, and we were too old to be fooled by a juvenile prank by the local middle schoolers. Perhaps it was our arrogance that made the next sequence of events make us stop dead in our tracks, perhaps it was the fact we thought it was the beginning of the next world war, or perhaps what made us stop that night was the fact that was we heard shook us to our core.

Walking down the street, neither of us expected to hear a sound that literally vibrated our bones as in penetrated the silent night sky. Living in Sumter would lead one to argue a military aircraft simply broke the sound barrier; however, rarely does the sound barrier feel like it is breaking right next to you. A sound so loud that had cars been parked on the street I am convinced alarms would have sounded as the noise swooped down towards us that froze our bodies as the road shook beneath us and the sound swirled around us. Then, like the sound of one zipping up their coat, it shot off. Frozen, we gazed at one another unable to describe what we had just heard; consequently, we stood alone on the road just minutes from home frozen, puzzled, and without words. Trying to find words, we expressed our utter shock in a series of sounds as puzzling as the one we had just heard; however, the sounds we made failed to frighten us because in this case, we could identify the source. Remaining in disbelief, we continued our journey home, frightened, excited, and in awe of our experience. Once we came to the fork in the road that separated our two homes, we said goodbye and ran, still afraid of what we just heard. Less than 20 seconds from home, we took off out of fear of being alone that night. Perhaps it was mischief or one of the most incredible pranks we will ever experience; but, to this day, that sound still remains a mystery.

After almost a year had passed since that incredible sound shook us to our core, our lives had not ended abruptly, nor did either of us experience any sort of post-horror episodes as often seen in horror fiction; yet, our experience with UFOs had been singular until we drove home from our first home football game during our junior year. Having not mentioned our incredible encounter with UFOs in quite some time, neither my friend nor I believed we would experience anything quite as weird and inexplicable as we had our sophomore year; however, when we made a left turn into our neighborhood on our return home I looked into the night sky and saw something very odd. Turning to my friend, I interrupted our conversation to point out what appeared to be a blue orb moving in the night sky; likewise, he too saw the odd object and encouraged me to follow the object to the best of my ability. Continuing down the main street of our neighborhood, we began to eliminate the possibilities of the type of aircraft it could be. An airplane would have blinking lights as would a helicopter, a star or planet seemed improbable because the object was dancing across the night sky and was illuminated at too high of a degree to be a planet or star, and a military aircraft seemed unlikely because the object would remain stagnant at certain points then quickly move in sporadic directions. Opening the sunroof, my friend stood in the seat with his head poking out of the sunroof as we attempted to follow the oddball of light; however, the road was beginning to hinder our ability to follow the object as it veered away from where the object was located. As I slowed the car down to keep the orb in our sights, the ball of light began to dance in an almost small elliptical motion and then, from almost a dead stop, the orb shot off behind a treeline in a swirling motion. Disappointed we could no longer follow the object, we began our turn around to head back home, on the very same road that just a year earlier was vibrating at the sound of an unidentified flying object. Heading home, we turned to one another, once again in disbelief, neither of us having an answer as we took the same path home we had less than a year ago.

Three years have passed since our last encounter with the unknown and to this day we have no understanding of what we experienced. Each of us holds our own perspective as to the possibility of what we saw and heard those two nights. Being more of a believer in the idea that aliens are real, my friend holds hope to the idea that what we experienced that night may very well be aliens; consequently, I am not as optimistic that we had a true encounter with aliens, but can firmly argue that unidentified flying objects are not a myth. However, from my perspective, I am more of a conspiracy theorist in that my idea of what we experienced was likely military experiments or aircrafts that are kept top secret from the public; therefore, if the public is unable to identify what the object is, it becomes unidentified and since it is an aircraft it becomes an unidentified flying object. Likewise, my friend would agree with this argument, but also finds the existence of aliens fascinating and a plausible explanation for many unexplainable stories and events. Whatever the explanation may be, both my friend and I fully agree on what we heard and saw those two unexplainable nights, and will forever hold those stories as our weirdest memories.