THE SIGNAL BOARD

Fifteen years ago I called a light over the ridge an alien craft. Now I have looked up the air routes and I am less sure. The strange part is the silence. I wanted to revisit the story without pretending my memory is a measurement.

saturn_return, what changed your mind: new evidence or distance from the memory?

Distance, mostly. I used to say it stopped dead. Now I am not sure whether it stopped or I just lost sight of it.

That is a meaningful distinction. Have you kept anything written at the time?

north_window, a letter to my brother. It says "went dim", not "stopped". I have been telling the sharper version for years.

Thank you for saying that out loud. A changed memory does not make the original experience worthless; it just changes what we can conclude from it.

This reminds me of my only “ghost” experience. The further away it gets, the more sure I am that it was a dream. At the time I was 100% certain I was awake.