Last weekend, I sat straight-backed and alert whilst listening to Loren Coleman tackle the Mothman enigma. I was curious as to how the UFO’s in John Keel’s account of the Mothman saga took a backseat to the mythology.

Without rehashing Coleman’s explanation behind Keel’s motivations, I will say that after listening to Nick Redfern tackle the phenomena of phantom monsters, like Werewolves, Tulpa’s and the like, I did not leave MONSTER MASH 2008 thinking about cryptids.

I left it thinking about the after-life.

How I got from A to Z had more to do with the idea of things happening in this world that we have no grasp of. No understanding of whatsoever. It’s almost as if we are strangers in a strange land. Sometimes I feel like E.T., being left behind and spending the rest of my life trying to phone home.

I think collectively, those of us who tackle the unknown all feel that way.

So there I was, at about 3:42am, sitting at my laptop thinking about how cryptids---black dogs, Yeti’s and werewolves can seem to float across the tarmac, or growl at you without actually making a sound, or worse, make a snarling sound without ever moving an orifice. How out of sync can nature be?

Illusions perhaps, but never natural.

And so, I came to the conclusion that everything, somehow, somewhere must be recorded and if so, maybe these things---these monsters---that seem to be out of their element, are nothing more than imprints of some long passed event, replaying itself over and over.

Maybe they did exist at one time. Maybe they did haunt certain locations, and maybe the natives of those locations erected standing stones or dolmens as markers of the things seen and unseen. Is it possible that even the afterlife is nothing more than a recording of a life spent?

What if every memory you have is recorded? What if the life lessons from every holy book across the world preaches about committing no sins and having no ill will because everything you do can never be erased? What if your memories become the building blocks of your own personal heaven?

Imagine reliving the same thing over and over again like your worst memory, because you couldn’t let go. Can that explain ghosts? Can it explain residual hauntings? Can it explain strange undocumented creatures showing up in the same place at the same time, doing the same exact things, over and over…for decades?

I don’t know. That’s my answer. My answer is that I have no answer. I met some great people at Monster Mash ’08: People that probably went home that night and pondered the mysteries of the universe, just like I did. I don’t know if any of them actually found any answers, but hey…I’m all ears. Email me.