(BONUS) THEY TOOK MY DOG: Because He Knew Too Much #MindOfMarlar
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According to Bill Diamond, CEO of the SETI Institute, an organization that claims to search for alien life but suspiciously seems to spend most of its time not finding any, we have no compelling evidence that extraterrestrials have ever visited Earth. Nothing. Not one single flying disc, blinking triangle, reverse-engineered doodad, or freshly scorched pasture mysteriously flattened into an intergalactic QR code.

Bill's explanation? Interstellar civilizations would never be sloppy. They'd never crash. They'd never leave behind crashed debris. They'd never show up on radar. They'd certainly never get filmed by bored Navy pilots with GoPros strapped to their cockpits saying, what the heck is that? over open comms. And what if they did? Well, that's just, you know, unidentified weather. Right.

This is the kind of explanation that requires one to ignore decades of sightings, stacks of declassified documents, first-hand pilot accounts, radar confirmation, and at least one guy in Montana who swears he woke up with a sunburn and a Bluetooth signal in his molar. But fine. Maybe the government isn't hiding aliens. Maybe they're just hiding funding for better excuses. But I'm not buying it.

and neither was my dog. His name was Baxter, part beagle, part terrier, part early warning system for things that shouldn't exist. He didn't chase cars. He didn't bark at mailmen. But he did howl at suspicious clouds, triangulated formations in the night sky, and certain delivery drones that buzzed like they were scanning his microchip.

Baxter had a gift. He could sense them. We both could, and we were so close to proving it. It happened just after midnight last Thursday. I was in the backyard checking the perimeter EM field reader, which had been spiking all night, while Baxter sat alert near the fence line. Then the humming started, low and electrical, like a light bulb vibrating inside your spinal cord.

The temperature dropped. The clouds parted. There it was, a craft, silent, metallic, triangular. Three soft lights on its underside, pulsing like a sleeping creature. It hovered above us. No exhaust, no noise, no reason to be there except us. Baxter stood. His tail didn't wag. His ears went stiff. The beam hit him. Soft white light like a flashlight made of fog.

He didn't resist, didn't bark, just turned to look at me once. That look that dogs give you when they're trying to tell you something no human language can understand. Then he was gone. Gone. Lifted into the air, up through the light and into the belly of the craft. The ship shimmered once, turned slowly, and drifted upward into the clouds like it was never there at all.

I ran. I screamed. I even threw a wrench at the sky. But Baxter was gone. No fur. No collar. No scorch marks. No barking from the woods. Just silence. And that stupid EM reader, still redlining at max. You want proof? I had it. And they took him. They took my dog.

So, when Bill Diamond tells you there's no compelling evidence that aliens have visited Earth, just know that he's never had a four-legged witness abducted from right in front of him. He's never watched the only living creature who knew vanish into a floating triangle without a trace. SETI keeps saying aliens wouldn't crash here, wouldn't stumble into the desert, wouldn't leave bits of metal, wouldn't let themselves be seen.

But what if they do want to be seen? Just enough to toy with us. Just enough to let you know they're there, watching, choosing what to take and what to leave behind. And let's be honest, the government's behavior doesn't exactly scream, we've got nothing to hide.

They've got black budget programs, secret desert installations, and an entire lexicon of acronyms that can only make sense when you realize UAP means Unidentified Absolutely Plausible. Diamond says that if aliens were really here, the government would be funding serious research into it.

I say, if they were really not here, the government wouldn't need to spend millions keeping every military contractor with a blurry photograph and a twitching eyelid under NDA for life. He also asks, smugly, where's the mothership? As if it would just park on the White House lawn and ask for directions. Maybe the mothership isn't anywhere.

Maybe it's everywhere. Maybe it's cloaked in orbit right now, watching, collecting, deciding who goes next. And don't even get me started on crop circles. According to SETI, advanced civilizations wouldn't waste time bending wheat into patterns. But what if those circles aren't for us? What if they're not messages to humans, but markers for other ships? Huh? Beacons? Checkpoints?

"Portals? They've been leaving messages in plain sight for decades. We're just too proud, too arrogant or too complicit to admit it." And now Baxter is gone. No body, no evidence. Just a gaping, fuzzy absence in my home and a chew toy that still smells like static.

So go ahead, Bill Diamond. Keep denying. Keep pointing your shiny dishes at the stars and pretending nothing's out there. But I know better. I saw them. They took something from me I can never replace.

And if they're listening to this, if they're monitoring me the way I know they are, then listen up. You took the wrong dog. That one had opinions. And if it were safe to remove the tinfoil from around my head right now, I'd come find him myself.

At Bright Horizons, infants discover first steps, toddlers discover independence, and preschoolers discover bold ideas. Our dedicated teachers and discovery-driven curriculum nurture curiosity, inspire creativity, and build lasting confidence so your child is ready to take on the world.

Come visit one of our Bright Horizons centers in the greater Chicago area and see for yourself how we turn wonder into wisdom. Schedule your visit today at brighthorizons.com. They've been here for thousands of years, making their presence known in the shadows. They might be seen by a lonely motorist on a deserted road late at night, or by a frightened and confused husband in the bedroom he's sharing with his wife.

Perhaps the most disconcerting part of this phenomenon boils down to this question: has the government been aware of their presence all along and is covertly working with them towards some secret end? In the audiobook, Runs of Disclosure, what once was fringe is now reality. While listening, you'll meet regular people just like you who have encountered something beyond their ability to explain.

You'll also hear from people of great faith and deep religious belief who continue to have these strange and deeply unsettling encounters. Author L.A. Marzulli explores these ongoing incidents to discover the answers to these questions: Who are they? What do they want? And why are they here? Can you handle the truth? Listen to this audiobook if you dare!

Rungs of Disclosure, Following the Trail of Extraterrestrials and the End Times, by L.A. Marzulli. Narrated by Darren Marlar. Hear a free sample on the audiobooks page at WeirdDarkness.com.

Now there's a new way to share weird darkness with the weirdos in your life. It's a skill on your Amazon Echo device. Just say, play Weird Darkness, and you'll immediately start hearing the newest episode. With your Amazon Echo or smart device, you can let me keep you company all day and all night. And it's easy to tell your friends how to tune in, too. Just tell your Amazon device, play Weird Darkness, to start listening.