By Leila Briggs
In my early teen years, my family and I were on our way home. My mom was driving and my sister was in the back, passenger seat. We were all quiet, focused on our own thoughts listening to music. It was a dark and cool night. I had my head pressed against the cold glass of the window, lost in thought. As we neared our home, I looked up into the sky at the stars.
I suddenly saw a shadow….no a definitive shape in the sky. It looked like a bird of some sort; except it was massive! It stayed close to the trees. Its wingspan was incredible!
My brain tried to comprehend what I was looking at. It appeared to land in the trees near my home. My heart was pounding. What did I just see? All my brain could supply was, “pterodactyl.” I knew that wasn’t right.
When my mom parked the car, I ran inside through the house to the back door. I ripped it open to stand on the back porch and look at the tree line. I kept my hand on the the door with it open (just in case the weird bird came for me and I needed to duck back inside).
To my surprise my sister joined me. She had seen it too!
In some ways it is a relief when others experience events with you; but in other ways it’s creepier. Your brain has a difficult time rewriting the event if others experienced it as well.
When we heard our mom open the front door to go back outside for something, we both screamed at her to stay in. We couldn’t make out anything unusual within the shadows of the trees. All appeared normal.
We watched the tree lines for a few nights after; but saw nothing. What did we witness?
A few years later, as a family, we watched The Mothman Prophecies. Of course, my sister and I were petrified. Surprisingly though, we were not convinced it was the Mothman we saw. We just knew for sure it was something within the realm of the creature in the movie. We both agreed to not discuss it and let it drop from our awareness. At that time, neither of us wanted to encourage any more paranormal activity then what we naturally got on a daily basis.
Many years later, I had moved back into my mom’s house. I was upstairs one night, showering. All the bathrooms in her house face the back tree line. I suddenly heard a sharp shift in air followed by a loud thump amongst the trees. I just knew.
You get to a point when you just know. Looking isn’t about gaining evidence to support acceptance of abilities or the paranormal anymore; it’s about making a statement to the unseen, letting them know: you know.
In the tree line, I saw a massive figure looking back at me, with eyes that had a hint of red or amber to them. Rude. It got my attention. However, it didn’t gain my respect showing up unannounced while I’m showering. I rolled my eyes in annoyance at it (though inside the panic was REAL). I turned the water off and nonchalantly removed myself from the bathroom.
I got into bed and refused to look out the windows in my bedroom. Rolled on my side, away from the windows, and watched a tv show on my tiny iPhone until I fell asleep. I didn’t sense anything outside or within the treeline the following night.
Less then a week later, I got a call from group of paranormal investigators. They asked if I knew anything about the Mothman and if I would be interested in joining them in a Mothman investigation. Ah, so that was the second visitation then? I truthfully responded, “yes I believe I have a sense of the Mothman. I would love to join your investigation!”
*The above image was created by Wix Ai, as I could not find any images within their library of the Mothman