1968. Take me away.

 

1968…was an important year in my life for many years, one of which will make you snicker, hopefully.

One girl in my junior high school English class brought a National Enquirer-like paper to school.  Our circle of girls encircled her as she read aloud:  “UFOs need young women!”  That’s what we are!

Apparently, alien planets desperately needed healthy human teen-age girls/women with which to reproduce, replenishing their depleted planet.  The first requirement?  These breed stock must be healthy, with no flaws. The second requirement?  These healthy perfect females must stand in an open area north of any dwelling at ten a.m. on a certain day.

Did I want to do that?  Heck, yes.  Anything to escape a male-dominated farm life of repeated drudgery! Oh boy howdy.

Flawless?  I was a little weak on the one, being near-sited.  BUT the eye doctor said that this was probably due to the excessive amount of reading I did, and this would clear up when I reached the extent of my growth.

To prepare, I ceased heavy reading and ditched the glasses for a week. The night before the transporting I showered thoroughly, put my hair in rollers (so I would look like Mary Tyler Moore), and slept lightly.

Ten a.m. found me pacing eagerly in the wide open driveway and pasture. Here I am!...Please take me!...I waited over an hour, scanning the clear sky.  Nothing.

Why did I do this??

Escape has already been mentioned.  Another reason was I was darn curious about sex.  In a rural environment, birth control was virtually impossible to obtain, even for an unmarried woman.  Getting pregnant by an aggressive teen age boy would be a certain padlock in farm life.

 

So…I continued to think Here I am? Until my college years. 

 

Sorry to be so wordy.  That is not like me.

1968, part two

The 1968 UFO never showed up, although I waited from 10:00 to 11:30 when it was time to help Mom fix dinner.  Sadly no aliens zoomed in to pick me up.

Source

Oh, sure.  BUT the next week a dull green fighter jet zipped over my house, clipping the leaves from the top of the maple tree near the house (on the north side!). I saw it, heard it, and felt the sound. 

This had never before happened: a fighter jet in our own skies, from an air base two hundred miles south of St. Louis.  The pilot rotated, dipped over the nearby creek, and disappeared.  What was he chasing?? 

The same girl who had shared the last headline from the National Enquirer sneaked another copy of this respected newspaper, on which the header said “UFOs Seen over Corn Fields”.  We all gasped, knowing darn well that each of us had waited at 10 AM last week, on the north side of our houses.

Were we getting a second chance?  Were the Aliens giving us second look-over before making their decisions?  What next?  What next?