I don’t know what it was, but it was strange.

One spring night in the early 1960’s we were returning home from an evening of dance roller skating in Suffield, CT.  (Remember when they still used to dance on skates?)

We lived out in the sticks on a dirt road in the corner of Northampton, Easthampton, and Westhampton, MA.  It had been a warm evening and the moon was full.  The sky was clear and full of stars.

Halfway down the road, my mother, who was driving, said, “Oh my goodness!  What is that?”  and pointed to the sky.

There above the tree-line was a huge round something that was glowing in a swirl of white, grey, and purple.  I know the thing was much closer, but in relation to the full moon it looked to be three or four times its size.  It didn’t make any noise and it didn’t move.  It just stayed there and hung in the sky.

All of a sudden the wind came up and the trees were bending in the gusts that were blowing around us.  Even the dirt on the road was spiraling like small dust devils. Then some small trees that lined the lane blew down in front of the car.

We sat there looking first at each other then at the sky.  The thing was still there.  We wanted to leave and make it the next quarter of a mile to our house.  But, neither one of us wanted to get out of the car to move the downed trees out of the way.

Next I knew my mom opened the door and said, “I’ve got to go do it.” and went to the front of the car to start dragging the trees out of the way.  I couldn’t let her do it alone so got out too.

I don’t remember moving trees and  brush from in front of the car.  And I don’t remember getting back into the vehicle.  There is no memory for anything that may have happened during that time.

The last thing that I recall was being seated inside the car still looking at the sky and watching the thing take off – straight up and disappearing in seconds.

When we arrived home it was three hours later than we should have gotten there.