I have a confession. I am a huge weirdo.
Aliens, ghosts, parapsychology, conspiracy theories, cryptids, secret societies…you name it, I find it fascinating.
To that end, I am a Patreon member for the Travelling Museum and of the Paranormal and Occult. The museum is run by two lovely people named Greg and Dana Newkirk. I first became aware of them through a documentary called Hellier, they (and others) created it through Planet Weird, their production company that shares its name with their YouTube Channel. I may have talked about the documentary before, but if you have a chance you should check it out. You can watch it for free on YouTube or on Amazon Prime.
Since the lockdown due to the pandemic, the Museum (a.k.a. Greg and Dana) have been doing a lot of live stuff and features. Earlier in the year, they had an idea to create the world’s first online, live streamed paranormal conference. As a museum member I attended for free. It was fantastic. This last weekend they did it again. This one was better than the first and I’d like to tell you about it.
The first thing I want to say about this con is that it included a wide variety of topics that you just don’t get at a traditional one. Topics vary from time loops and pre-cognition, to alien abduction and building a better ghost hunting tool kit. The speakers are all greatly respected by Greg and Dana and because they planned and executed the entire thing, they had the luxury of inviting a highly curated group. All the talks were highly interesting this time around (they were the first time too, but I will speak only of this round as it’s closer to my mind). Whether it was Professor Michelle Belanger speaking on the secret occult life of some of history’s most well respected figures (we’re looking at you Isaak Newton!), paranormal investigator Adam Berry talking about creating a good group dynamic, journalist Linda Godfrey telling us about the cryptids of Wisconsin, or Dr. Dean Radin speaking on the laboratory proof for precognition, all the lectures were amazing.
But it wasn’t just lectures. There was also music. One of the most memorable things was the live performances of some of the original songs from the Hellier Soundtrack performed by the composer Anthony Cistone and a friend. So beautiful. So raw. So haunting.
The con ended with a talk by John E.L. Tenney, host of Realm of the Weird and a seasoned, old school paranormal investigator. He’s been doing this for thirty years and he just has a way about him. He talked about how the only thing we all have in common is our differences. How we are all made of the stuff of the universe: “You are thirteen billion years old and it took everything in the universe to create you.” How the second we decide that we know how something really is, we are fucked (his words, not mine). He is one of the most thoughtful and honest speakers I’ve ever heard. This is the fourth time I’ve heard him speak and he blows my mind every time.
There were people begging Greg to clip Tenney’s lecture and save it on the Museum’s website. This is not done. The lectures at the conventions are not saved; they are be there or be square events (kind of, they are saved for 16 hours so people over seas can see them, but then taken down). But Greg refused. Because that’s how it should be.
Because, isn’t that the nature of things like this? Not to be recorded permanently. Not to be watched a billion times and lose the spatial/temporal uniqueness of the moment. Not be be made an impotent, flat sound bite. Like a piece of meat chewed so long it loses all its flavor. But to be experienced live and remembered and reflected upon as one of those moments that you never really forget, but that creates echoes and ripples upon your soul.
Sure the ‘facts’ of the moment may distort; it may flex and shift as your memories become altered by the ravages of time. But that’s okay. That’s how it’s meant to be. Moments like these are meant to be melancholic. To make you elated and moved and happy that you were able to experience them; then, sad that they are over. Never to return. Impossible to be repeated or recaptured. Never to be lived again, but to exist forever only in your memory as a fond reminder of a time you were truly present.
And perhaps that is the real magic of an event like this. The combination of knowing you are among friends, engaging in something you love that makes you unique, and that this particular event will never come again.
I’ve had many such experiences in my life. Some I look back on fondly; others, I wish I could forget. But each becomes a part of me. And in the end, I can’t bring myself to regret any of them. Those moments have led me to who I am. And others will lead me to who I will be. And every single one of them will be just as it needs to be, when it needs to be.
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