i know how this sounds. i know. i dont drink, i dont smoke, i work as an engineer, and i have a good memory. just for context.
a few years ago i was driving at night — long highway, middle of nowhere, no streetlights. around two in the morning. completely straight road, almost no other cars. i put on a podcast and drove.
then i see it — three lights ahead of me on the horizon. not blinking, not moving. just hanging there in a triangle shape. at first i thought — a tower maybe, or a plane. but they werent moving at all. i drove toward them for about five minutes — they didn't get any closer or farther. then i blinked — i dont know how else to describe it, like a frame just got cut — and they were gone.
thats it. darkness. highway. podcast still playing.
i pulled over. got out. silence, stars, nothing.
okay, i thought. fatigue hallucination, happens.
got back in, kept driving. then i looked at the clock — 4:18.
i left at one in the morning. to that point on the highway — i know it well, drive it all the time — its exactly one hour. an hour and a half at most.
three hours had passed.
the podcast — id been listening from the very beginning — was halfway through the second episode. each episode is 40 minutes. so roughly 60-70 minutes of audio had played. but three-plus hours of actual time.
im sitting on the shoulder at four in the morning just staring at the clock.
phone battery was normal. car was fine. i felt fine, nothing hurt, head was clear. just the time.
i didnt tell anyone for two years. then i told a friend — he laughed and said "you obviously fell asleep at the wheel and dont remember it." maybe. but i have never once fallen asleep driving. and if i had — i wouldnt have stayed on a straight highway for another 60-70 minutes of podcast.
one detail i cant explain at all and try not to think about — the seat. i always have it pushed all the way back, im tall. when i pulled over and got out — when i got back in — it was moved forward. not by much. but noticeably. i had to adjust it.
i was alone in the car.