Roswell truth or disappointment?
Since I was a little girl, I had heard the stories, watched the documentaries and listened to the rumors about the famous Roswell New Mexico UFO crash landing. I remember being fascinated by the tales of the cover-up and promised myself that someday I would visit this town for myself and witness first hand all the mystery behind it. That visit just happened a few weeks ago some thirty-five years after having made myself that promise.
Driving from Albuquerque to Roswell, I couldn’t help but notice how desolate everything was. As far as the eyes could see there were miles and miles of nothing. It didn’t take me long to decide that if I was an extraterrestrial and needed to crash land a flying saucer this was definitely the place to do it!
Just coming into town, right on the outskirts there stands a tall white water tower. I found it odd that this tower strongly resembles an alien head, and yet nothing had been done to promote that fact. After checking into one of the larger motels in town I couldn’t help but be drawn to a rack of site seeing brochures in the corner of the lobby. There must have been well over fifty brochures for site seeing, and yet I didn’t find a single piece of literature pertaining to Roswell’s very own UFO museum, which was the reason for our visit.
I walked back to the desk and asked the young lady who had just checked us in if she would be so kind as to give us directions to their UFO Museum. Trying hard not to roll her eyes she gave me that look of “ oh...Your one of THEM! She then informed me that it was located in the center of town, and I couldn’t miss it, even if I tried. She then went back to being consumed by her computer activities.
Before leaving for Roswell, I was told not to miss out on one of Roswell’s local hot spots cleverly named the “Not of this world” Café. I was guaranteed to love the coffee and all the UFO memorabilia adorning the walls. Imagine my disappointment when we drove there in the morning to find that it had now been CLOSED. We decided to drive up the road a bit and settle for breakfast at one of Roswell’s coffee houses, the not so cleverly named I-Hop. I want to stop here for a moment and highly stress to any coffee drinkers visiting Roswell not to drink the coffee or the water, for that matter, unless it’s filtered. I assure you that consuming the local tap water will turn even the whitest of humans into a beautiful shade of alien, green or gray.
After breakfast, we headed over to the museum. Finding it was easy, as promised, simply because everything having to do with aliens or UFO’s was confined to a three block radius centered around the museum itself. Once you leave that three block radius you would be hard-pressed to find anything pertaining to UFO's or extraterrestrials. After parking in the museum's parking lot, I couldn’t help but feel that this was somehow the shame of the town. Just like small towns across America keep their strip clubs segregated to a certain area of town and don’t let it filter into the other parts, Roswell does the same thing with their UFO and alien stuff. It would not have surprised me one bit if I would have found the museum entrance to be around back in order to not be seen entering the establishment by the general public.
The doors however, where around front facing the main street. When you walk up to the front doors you can’t help but notice that the building was at one time the town’s old movie theater. Once inside you’re asked to pay a “Donation” fee of ten dollars. The people are friendly; the gift shop well stocked and there are plenty of documents to read and well done exhibit’s to see, even though everything is a replica, nothing is original, and everything they have can already be viewed on the internet.
Before saying my final farewell to Roswell, I had the opportunity to chat and gather some information from one of the local residents. Now In her twenties, she was born and raised in Roswell. Since her youth, she has had the privilege to witness the madness that is the anniversary of that famous July 1947 UFO crash. Every 4th of July weekend the freaks gather she says. The older generations that were here to witness the Government involvement, and the chaos still believe. The younger generation like myself just wants it all to go away!
Every woman who is born lacking beauty learns to play up to their strengths as she matures. The best part of you is what you want to play up to, because it draws away from the things that are less favorable. Roswell may have matured since that 1947 crash, but they definitely need to realize what their attraction is, and start playing up to those strengths instead of being ashamed of them!
