My Date With The Lizard People
A Poetic True Story
The following details an entirely true story in the format of a poem. Some details have been changed to preserve the anonymity of those involved.
There is also a video version of it here, if you’d like to see some authentic live-audience reactions.
In and amongst the sea of women and men, Hustling and bustling each rushing to escape some commuted fate I am here waiting for a second date. The first date happened a few days before And I don't know what it was she heard or saw But she seemed to have a good time Or in me saw some good signs, We spoke about our lives, talked and shared We exchanged a kiss at Trafalgar Square So we agreed to meet up again And hence here I am standing at Paddington station at ten to ten. She’s from South America, her name Valentina And she has this lovely warm, inviting demeanour Her world is politics, history, mine physics, philosophy We had chatted about current affairs, and it was not lost on me That she was really smart. I joked I felt dumb She was perfectly speaking her second language, I barely have one. Politically she was a lefty, and we shared the same concerns When we had previously walked through London’s twists and turns For the record, we had matched on Bumble And while usually in text I stumble She had been flirty. She was in her thirties and she was in Oxford for ten weeks to do a human rights course She worked for the UN - in some advisory role of sorts She was smart, elegant, perfect, practically without flaw. I say practically, maybe there was one thing wrong Minor detail really, not something to focus on More of an incompatibility Not a cause for incivility You see, she had revealed to me between these two dates that she was into… Astrology. No matter, we've been here before, cue my well rehearsed honest apology: “I'm sorry that's not really my thing” I say “I'm sceptical” “But some of my friends share those beliefs as well And so while I can't say it means much to me I will of course respect your beliefs As I would hope to do with any religion or spiritual tradition” She replies “thank you for your honesty, it is important to me, I think it has good predictive qualities So I'd like you for a moment to partake And please offer me your birth place, time and date.” Which over WhatsApp I did. “We're very compatible” she tells me quickly “Possibly meant to be” She points out my rising is Aries She asks if I’m sexual, I say fairly. Allegedly my signs line neatly in her chart Some planetary geometry predicting matters of the heart Specifically my rising Aries parks happily in her house Which is supposedly destiny’s sign of a compatible spouse She tells me our north nodes - our synastry - ties our fate And I reply to all this “Great! Let’s see!” (I try to dampen my incredulity) She sends me charts and explains her system And I of course dutifully listen And it's interesting I suppose? Perhaps my mind is just too closed But at least she knows where I stand Regardless of what the fates may or may not have planned. “Anyway this is minor, not important at all” I tell myself as I see her approach me from the platform She felt like spending some more time in London to see some sights And here I was a willing tour guide, more than happy to oblige. We kiss hello, the date has started off well, My nerves are quelled. She's lovely, and though she'll be returning to South America soon It's nice to spend another morning and maybe afternoon In good company, that's what I foresaw Or rather hoped for. So we walk down Ladbroke Grove arm in arm She seems incredibly cool and calm, and I hope I’m not being a bore As I begin a brief local tour. Before long we find ourselves in a bakery - specifically a bagel place - to pause for a beat. She said she had never had a bagel before, and I'm not one to gatekeep So soon in a corner we sit: salmon cream cheese, spreads, and dip And almost immediately as we sit there’s a blip as she quips Something off-handedly to do with "quantum" and "healing" I jump in on instinct and say “for me that phrase is deeply unappealing It's an example of these spiritual types leveraging scientific language and terms To make their claims sound more legitimate by using fancy words To dupe those for whom physics isn't terribly clear into thinking that scientists support more fringe ideas” Valentina pauses, "but don't you think your energy is quantum?" she asks "Well it depends what you mean” I reply, taking a sip of water from my glass. "The atoms and molecules that make up my body surely obey the laws of quantum physics, But there's nothing mystical about that, that's just….science" She continues “But don't you think that people who are more spiritually developed are more radiant?” I'm confused, her point is less salient, more…alien “metaphorically I know what you mean sure” I say “I've described some people as bright before: that they light up a room against gloom and doom, or that that they're warm or that they glow, and maybe this correlates in some way to emotional maturity or those that pray, but I'm hesitant, no dare I say reticent, to say that these folks glow in the dark, or that they're bioluminescent.” Valentina then drops the first bomb with zeal: “But there are large conglomerates of people stopping research into psychic abilities. Psychics are real” “Uhm.” I say “I think that's unlikely, There's no one organisation that controls the world's science, and rightly. There are thousands of journals around the globe Each acting as an individual knowledge node To censor them all would be insanely hard Plus scientists wouldn't want to guard A discovery like that, whoever got there first would have fortune and fame They’d entirely rewrite how we understand the brain The whole way we see the world would never be the same If psychics are real, and no-one has been told, who could you possibly blame?” “The Lizard People” “...The what?” “The Lizard People. The ones that are trying to enslave the human race” At first I think she's joking, a smile starts across my face. But then it freezes as I stare Seeing her demeanour and glare, And the lack of irony in the air I realise she is serious. This is a new experience. I must admit, I’m totally perplexed, unprepared (for how long was this going to go undeclared?) So I simply state: “Right, my mistake, erm, could you please elaborate?” Which she does. “You see, the Lizard People are from another planet, thousands of light years away. They ruined their home, through fights and wars, and now they seek a place to stay. They developed intergalactic travel, and incarnate here in human form They wish to dominate and control our lives from the very moment that we're born” I’m sat kind of dazed, but Valentina is entirely unphased Her tone has not changed, as though what she’s saying is as clear as day. And I can no longer hear the noise of the busy bagel café So baffled am I, my thoughts astray, what to say? “So if I may… the Lizard People - “ “The Draconians” she cuts me off “that’s their name” “I see, so if they are here, why do we seem to live in relative peace? If they’re so scientifically advanced, surely it would be easy to cause our existence to cease? Through some new weapon or engineered virus that’s tailored Or maybe just some big ass laser To turn us to dust?” “Well, that’s because Angels protect us” Oh, angels exist too, good to know. There’s clearly more to this still, and so I centre myself, prepared to further learn Mentally noting that we’re probably doomed long-term But even so! “How do you know all this?” I ask Working out what the hell is going on is clearly the most pressing task “What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence” I say, “and on this I will not waver” (To quote the most beloved Hitchens’ Razor) “I’ve spoken to one for a bit” she says “my psychic teacher acted as a conduit” “And I heard first hand what the Draconians have planned And I have to say it’s all so sad There’s this holy war that goes on all around And most people never hear a single word or sound It’s really quite tragic” she ends Nonchalantly digging into her bagel again
And this sends me into an internal frenzy of What the fuck is going on? All this stuff is - to say the least - wrong! Yet it’s clear she’s being sincere, So I try not to be dramatic And opt for an approach that approximates the Socratic “So who’s an example of a lizard person?” “Donald Trump” she says, “other world leaders too, you can always tell” I take a moment to sit and dwell “Oh wait, are you a psychic healer as well”? She nods “My mistake”, I say, and hey, no-one can say I don’t ask good questions on a date. The conversation continues, and between some bagel bites and suspicions of Big Pharma Valentina drops another bombshell: the existence of Karma. Yes Karma’s real, and as I eat my meal, She tells me for every law of physics, there’s a spiritual law, Like Newton’s 3rd, providing balance as a cosmic seesaw “But the universe isn’t fair” I opine “Bad things happen to good people all the time” “Not true” she defends “all will get their due in the end” So I pose an example for which I think there’s no answer “Tell me, how do you explain kids dying of cancer? What wrongs have they done that I have not? What sins could they possibly commit from a baby’s cot?” This doesn’t affect Valentina’s vibe “Well they must have done wrong in a previous life” Ok so psychics, Karma, Lizard People, and past lives, this is quite the conspiracy stack Still, I try to keep my good nature intact “So you think they deserve it?” I ask “Or” she says “they chose suffering as a spiritual task. You see before we’re born, we can choose our fates Sufferings and pains to willingly undertake People and places that are spiritually relevant All to help our souls’ development” Good grief, I think, this is a hateful belief Victim blaming to a cosmic decree Judgement for others but not for me If I’m lucky, therefore I’ve been good? Is that what I’ve understood? I’m cashing in points from a previous life While millions and millions are paying for their apparent misdeeds with strife If something naturally exists, then good it must be This my friends is the naturalistic fallacy So let us moralise unfairness, don’t give it a second thought For in this life you surely reap what you wrought (Or worse, you chose it yourself? This life you elected So empathy? Freely rejected.) Unsure of what would or should convince her otherwise I take a step back and try a slightly different tack “Your beliefs are unfalsifiable” I claim “Totally un-pliable. If I show you A bad thing happening to a bad person that goes in your evidence pile, But if I show you a counter example, good things happening to bad people Or the reverse, you have an out - past or future lives. Which you can’t see or know or hope to show. So please tell me What evidence could I possibly find That would cause you to change your mind” “There isn’t any” she replies “but the thing is it all makes sense And so hence, I believe it” I pause, trying to shut down the stores of fallacies And philosophical clauses within me that disagree vehemently. “That’s not enough though is it?” I say “most explanations work” “Like the idea that in the corner of this room, there is a man who lurks Except he wears a cloak of invisibility, hence there is nothing to see I know it seems like he’s not there, and no matter how long you stare You won’t see him, but trust me! You see it all makes sense, it explains what we see But do you believe in this man? Or do you think he’s imaginary?” “I don’t think he’s real, I have no evidence for that” she says as she gives me the smile of a Cheshire Cat. We sit there for hours, and to her enormous credit While for me it was a bit of an emotional ride She took all my questions and poorly suppressed facial derisions in her stride Despite our verbal bout, she seemed to never waver or doubt With her demeanour she simply seemed to say “Don’t worry, you’ll understand one day” So we decide to head back to Paddington Station After a brief vacation At my flat, where we made out for a bit (This may surprise you given the prior clashes of ideas and wit, But despite her - to me- making little sense And it sometimes being tense, with the contents of our talk bordering on the psychoactive I still found her quite attractive. The conversation was in a sense fun And I think she felt the same too So what to do? I wasn’t going to not invite her back That would have just been rude.) As the date comes to an end I can feel my mind trying to bend With the weight of a problem, that’s tough to disguise As I said, Valentina is not dumb, she’s intelligent, even if we don’t see eye to eye So how does she end up believing in Draconians, psychics, past lives and star charts? How can people be so physically close but live in worlds so far apart? She listened deeply and respected my ideas, as I tried to do with hers Mulling over the various implications of her words Maybe the issues aren’t all hers, perhaps they’re mine I was raised on equations, maths, physics - some new age spiritualism is her god, but science is mine - Must love demand identical views? Can we exist in separate truths? Am I afraid, perhaps? Of feeling stupid and absurd? Of admitting truths beyond those that I can understand or have heard? No. Some ideas are bad. And wrong. And worse. Not all ideas are created equal. Some belong in a hearse. As you may recall from history, there have been loads of really bad ideas About the mysteries of life, or morals, or fears we once revered The dominant narratives aren’t perfect, this is for sure And science isn’t finished, there’s always more to do and to discover and criticise and improve But how we improve is partly by discovering what’s true But hey, maybe there are lizard people, Perhaps some are in this very room. Walking among us, secretly planning our doom. Behind the scenes supporting every terrible cause Putting humanity’s growth on pause. Or perhaps the truth is complex, that people are flawed. And that there is a lot more to understand and explore The truth is, I do not know for sure. Maybe I am wrong. But for now I’ll place my bets With beliefs that don’t fail an evidence test. In any case, eventually we’re stood face to face Near the Paddington station ticket gates. And for our last topic, perhaps it isn’t odd That we were discussing the existence of God “But isn’t the beauty of nature enough” Valentina says Just look at it, the wings of a butterfly, a baby’s sigh The light of an owl’s eye, the sound of thunder How could you see all of that and still wonder?” “Valentina, nature is brutal and savage. It wants to kill you. And it’d do it too, were it not that you and I are here in the station. If we were to be teleported to any “natural” place in the world I don’t care what you say, nature would kill us in a day. We have beaten nature back with a stick, for it is powerful yes But it is sick. It is built on kill or be killed, pain and suffering, and there is more pain. As Schopenhauer says, when describing the nature of the great mother “...compare the respective feelings of two animals, one of which is eating the other” And seeing all of this, I can assume that if God exists his or her base nature is wrought with wrath - That is to say if they are real, God is surely a psychopath. Apologies if this comes across as tactless but there is no God, we live on a rock in the infinite blackness, And when you come to that view and finally see I’d love a third date, feel free to call me.”
Post-script
As I said at the outset, this is really is a true story.
While some bits are made to rhyme for the sake of the format, much of this is verbatim to the best of my recollection.
In particular my retelling of our early exchanges - whereby Valentina revealed her beliefs - is accurate. Everything seemed totally normal, until she innocuously dropped in a phrase to do with quantum healing. After I told her I lamented the term, she went on to ask if my energy was quantum, followed by an assertion that spiritual people are more radiant and so on. I did say people weren’t bioluminescent, I did use the example of a man with an invisibility cloak, and yes, I really did end the date quoting Schopenhauer.
Naturally, many of the other exchanges from this three-hour bagel-fuelled sit-down were left out of this poetic retelling. Some others that didn’t make the cut include:
A prolonged motte-and bailey-exchange whereby Valentina asked “Don’t you think there are large conglomerates of people trying to control our attention?” Which I of course agreed with (see Meta for one). But our views differed in that I didn’t think this was a shadowy, reptilian cabal, and she did.
There was also the hour long backstory/lore drop I received about the Draconians. Apparently civilisations can be understood under three dimensions - emotional, spiritual and technological development. The Draconians are really good at the latter two, hence why they’re here and can appear human, but apparently they’re just not that emotionally far along. Sad times.
She also told me about her 100% success rate diagnosing health issues with people who walked into her and her psychic healer’s clinic - just from sensing them as they entered through the doorway. I asked her if she had ever heard of confirmation bias.
You get the idea.
It’s easy to write-off someone with cooky beliefs as dumb or unintelligent, but in my experience that is often not the case. We can’t infer defunct hardware from dodgy software. I tried to stress this in the poem, but to restate it once more: Valentina was genuinely intelligent - the conversation in the first date was wide-ranging, with her clearly knowing a lot about geopolitics and social issues (which I’d expect given her line of work).
So what does this mean? Well, as much as we’d like to think so, intelligence doesn’t make one immune to strange ideas.
Perhaps the best historic example of this was Isaac Newton. Despite being known as one of the greatest scientists to ever live, he possessed an exceptional amount of material on alchemy and theology. We revere him for his work on gravity, optics, mathematics and so on, but he also spent an inordinate amount of time trying to decode biblical scripture to predict apocalyptic events in the future, and experimenting to try and understand the mythic Philosopher’s Stone.
Writing off these people with some sort of derisive insult probably serves to reassure us all that we’re the logical ones - that we’d never be so laughably deceived. Yet, I imagine most of us possess some fringe belief - or at the very least an inkling - that the reality of some domain is much stranger than some widely accepted truth about it.
Intelligence doesn’t even prevent one from other forms of mysterious conversion. For a long time I had been sceptical of accounts of religious experience, writing them off as either fictitious or highly embellished, until one such thing happened to a friend of mine.
This friend of mine - a die hard atheist since her teens - walked into a church in her late 20s while on holiday and was overcome with a vision of the Virgin Mary. In that moment, she said, she was forced to accept the existence of God, and the truth of Catholicism. I was told this story over dinner at hers, and she ended it with “I know, it’s really weird for me too.”
I’ll admit, it was hard to reconcile this with my understanding of her - this person I knew who sat at the back of Religious Studies class with me, both of us drunk on Dawkins and Harris, giving edgy-atheist wisecracks about the absurdities of religion. Yet here she was. She ended up having a hybrid Catholic-Pagan wedding with her wife. It was hosted in a treehouse, it was fun.
Anyway, back to Valentina - though it’s up there with the stranger dates I’ve had, in many ways I felt I had been preparing for this date my entire life. It has since had me pause and consider how many people out there - in positions of authority or otherwise - might quietly possess (shall we generously say) unorthodox views.
I tried to examine this experience in an essay, but it felt difficult to recapture the strangeness of it, so I parked it for a while. But then two things happened:
Firstly, my poet friend Isabella Dorta kindly gave me a supporting act slot for her London show of her most recent tour.
Secondly, I happened to rewatch Tim Minchin’s Storm, which I had absolutely adored when it was first released nearly 15 years ago. I figured I could have a crack at something similar, minus the smooth jazz backing track. I had a deadline and inspiration, all I needed.
Incidentally if you’d like a really amazing analysis of the philosophy/thinking behind conspiracy theories (and an analysis of their frightening prevalence in modern day politics) Contrapoints recently released a fantastic video essay on this. I’d highly encourage you to check it out.
And no, as of now there hasn't been a third date.
I’ll keep you posted.
that's a lot of words just to say you wanted to shag with a woman you didn’t really respect, but were more interested in dissecting and 'fixing' her beliefs. really rational of you to patronize her ideas like that, I must say. and how thoughtful of you to invite her back to your place after dismissing her values—definitely less rude than using her for content and putting it out on the internet, cheers