From the Edge of Experience: Suspended in the Mist
by Program for Extraordinary Experience Research (PEER)

In addition to conducting long-term interviews with approximately 200 "experiencers" of so-called alien contact, the Center's Program for Extraordinary Experience founded by John E. Mack, M.D. also received over ten thousand letters from the public, many of whom wrote to share their anomalous experiences. In this From the Edge of Experience entry, we present a letter from a woman whose description of certain sounds and other perceptions is remarkably similar to a report shared in another Edge entry ("A Pearl", also available on this website). Both of these entries are of interest because the nature of the interactions, as described, suggest a need to carefully examine both the external and subjective dimensions of these encounters.


I have had a strange experience. What I couldn't figure out is why I forgot it almost immediately.

One morning the radio in my truck went wacky, and I heard some beeping noises. I got to work, went out on assignment, and heard the beeping noises again. They were very strong and consistent. I thought I was losing my mind, but I remembered hearing these sounds before, years ago. Asking a co-worker if he heard them too, he said no. I thought he must be joking, so I laughed it off.

My job that day was to operate an asphalt roller to pack the ball-fields. I got upon the machine and put ear-plugs in thinking the noise would go away. It didn't. It got louder!

A fog fell over the field. I didn't think much of that either. Nothing was moving. All I could see was six of what I thought were headlights across the field. I remember feeling suspended, numb....it is hard to describe.

They — I say “they” but I don't know who it was, I didn't see anyone that I can remember — informed me that they were "taking the transmitter out." I knew exactly what “they” meant. (I had an outstanding experience as a child — outstanding in that I have always remembered it — I woke up one morning, immediately reached around to my lower back and felt a scar or scab and couldn't remember having a reason for it.)

Anyway, I was also informed that “they” were done with me, and that I would have another child. That in itself was most ridiculous. I was informed, or warned, that I should tell no one about this because people would think I was crazy, but that “they” knew me well enough to know I would tell. They forewarned that it would not go well, and my current children could be taken away from me.

The fog lifted, and amazingly the three guys on the crew hadn't missed a beat. Two of them were still behind me on a nearby field and the third was still turning circles on the field in front of me. I felt as though I had been “suspended” for quite a while, but in “reality” it was no longer than a minute or two at best. I remember feeling bewildered. Confused. Drained. I don't know if there was any missing time, it was the sort of job that didn't require a clock. I was quite upset for about a week, then it just faded.

Last year I checked out a book from the library that seemed to detail many parts of my experience. That I chose this book was odd because I get spooked easily and do not even watch commercials for scary movies. My kids are the ones who tell me when it is safe to look at the screen again.

I need to know if I am crazy or if this was real.

Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
© 2000 Center for Psychology & Social Change