There did seem to be a lot of confusion, though, and perhaps even an emotional response on my part greatly out of proportion to what seemed a minor disturbance.

TWO

O plunge your hands in water,

Plunge them in up to the wrist;

Stare, stare in the basin

And wonder what you've missed.

The glacier knocks in the cupboard,

The desert sighs in the bed,

And the crack in the tea cup opens

A lane to the land of the dead.

—W. H. AUDEN,
"As I Walked Out One Evening"

DOWN THE CAVE OF MIND

Hypnosis. The Uncertain Mirror

My next step was clear. I was going to become involved with a therapist. But I had certain criteria. It could not be somebody who believed anything in particular about visitors or the disk phenomenon. The ideal therapist would have an open mind: I could have a mental problem. It might or might not have components unknown to science. Or it could be just what it seemed.

Because of the evident presence of fear-induced memory lapses and even possible amnesia, this therapist would have to be a skilled hypnotist as well. And again, not just any psychiatrist using hypnosis in his practice would do. I wanted somebody with a reputation in the scientific community as a real expert. I wanted both scientific rigor and therapeutic skill-and the two are not always present in the same person.

I chose not to approach any hypnotist to whom Hopkins had made previous referrals, despite the excellence of their credentials. One of these, Dr. Aphrodite Clamar, had worked extensively with Hopkins and was a very fine and highly professional psychologist, but I was firm in my desire to do this with somebody who had had no previous involvement.

Hopkins remembered that Dr. Donald Klein of the New York State Psychiatric Institute had expressed interest in the phenomenon and appeared to be open-minded about it. I looked up Dr. Klein's credentials and found them to be superb. If he would take me on, he was the ideal man.

A few weeks later I was in his office undergoing a searching three-hour pre-interview. I had provided him with a document outlining all my memories. We worked for some time trying to find ways into my mind, but I could recall little more than I already had. At his suggestion, I spent a week trying to do so. When I was not successful — in fact, all I got out of it was dizziness and strange nightmares — we decided on a trial hypnosis session.

I was dubious about hypnosis. I'd read in Science News of a study that suggested that anybody under hypnosis can be induced to remember a "UFO abduction and experience,"

complete with little men and all the trimmings. The hypnotist has only to ask the right questions. and the stories apparently just come pouring out.