I Often Wonder What We Don’t Know

I was sitting here early in the afternoon looking out on Collier Creek and watching many of the fishing and pleasure boats gently gliding through the waterway as they make their way either out to the Marco River or in towards Smokehouse Bay. I’m actually trying to figure out what I want to write about today in my column and a friend walks up to the door and rings the doorbell. 

He brought me a back brace to let me try to see if it helps alleviate some of the aggravation I’ve been having with my back. Some time ago, they discovered I was having issues in L3/L4 in my back. Since then, I think I’ve bought my doctor a new Porsche and a cruise in the Caribbean for him and his wife, and I’m still in agony at times and driving my editor crazy missing deadlines. 

After talking for a while and reminiscing about an old friend of ours who we both were quite fond of, Janet returned from errands, and I came back into the den to continue working on my column for this week as he pulled out of the driveway. 

I looked up at the skyline and saw an aircraft make its way across Collier Bay headed west, and I began to ponder what interstellar travelers must think about this planet and its inhabitants. I am surethey must be monitoring our communications at all levels. Afterall, these species must have some fairly sophisticated electronics and are capable of intercepting some of our TV programs and communications systems.  

Surely, we can’t believe we are alone out here. It would be foolish to think we are the most intelligent species ever to gaze into space and want to explore it, “going where no man has gone before.” 

They must be amazed at how brilliant we are to believe a “gummy bear” or two will take off decades of unwanted weight and in one week, fit back into our old jeans from twenty years ago.  

I can only imagine what they must think of our political process and how we get anything done, whether it involves cleaning up the water we drink or the air we breathe. How we continue to spend money we don’t have and think someone else will pay for it by printing more of it. 

The other great mystery that must puzzle them lies in why we insist on destroying our neighbors. Does it lie in the fact they don’t look like us, the color of their skin, the languages they speak or how they worship? Has our species not learned yet how to cohabitate with one another? All you have to do is turn on the nightly news and view the carnage yourself on your TV. 

It seems easier to create weapons of mass destruction rather than utilize the great knowledge which lies within us to heal those things that afflict us. 

Have travelers from beyond our galaxy failed to make meaningful contact for fear we may contaminate their thought process, therefore limiting their potential for good and meaningful accomplishments? They choose instead to ignore a species that has yet to evolve to the level of intelligence necessary to make meaningful contributions to our segment of the galaxy in a positive manner. 

Now of course, I’m just grasping at straws and only thinking out loud, but why, with all the sightings of extraterrestrial craft buzzing around our skies, making passes at our own craft in space, you can’t help but wonder what our own government might be hiding from us. Why would they think we couldn’t handle the truth? What good does it do to hide from us what may be known by those in the know? 

For years, fighter pilots, commercial aircraft and our own astronauts have been making these reports about seeing the unexplainable. Only recently have those agencies in charge of categorizingthose reports started releasing some of that data. Even archeologists have uncovered some relatively earth-shattering discoveries that may reveal some interesting glimpses into our past that may hold answers to some of our questions regarding whether we have been visited by other travelers.  

I’m not sure what the truth is, but I am sure we have much to learn about ourselves that has not been totally revealed to us. We should never fear seeking out truth, for only then will we discover it.