I first met “Ortyn and The Aliens” late one starlit night, while I was vacationing at my summer home on the shore of Lake Coeur d’Alene, in the beautiful panhandle of northern Idaho.  Although it’s been a few years since then, I still remember that event quite distinctly.  After all, it’s not every day (or summer night, for that matter) that one can say he’s had the opportunity to experience a close encounter of the most remarkable kind.

          The brief story I’m about to relate to you may seem, at first, to be just a little unbelievable… especially if you’re a grown-up.  Now don’t get me wrong.  I don’t really have anything against grown-ups.  The truth is… I am one myself.  Not only that, a lot of my best friends are grown-ups, too.  I do think, however, that grown-ups invariably fall into one of two diametrically opposed categories – the ones who, like me, fully trust their imaginations and the others… who don’t!

You know what I mean, don’t you?  You and I know very well that there’s a Santa Claus, for example.  Every kid knows and believes that, and a whole lot of grown-ups do, too.  But, let’s face facts… there are some people in this world (not one smart kid among them, I’m happy to report) who have convinced themselves that there is no Santa Claus!  Isn’t that a shame?  They’ve lost their ability to imagine and they’re depriving themselves of all the fun in life that comes with that.

          Well, just maybe, if you’re one of those unfortunate folks, this little tale of adventure might point you in the right direction and help guide you back to where you might find your own childlike imagination again.  I surely hope so and I invite you to come along with the rest of us “children of all ages” because I think you’re really going to like meeting my odd little friends from outer space; Ortyn, Weldyn, Zeldyn and Myles.

          Now, as I was saying… it was a lovely summer night.  The Moon was in its “new moon” phase, and, consequently, it was quite conspicuous by its absence from the night sky.  As a result, all the stars were shining so much brighter than usual.  I was sitting in a small clearing on the side of a very big hill… or a little mountain, depending upon your own personal stature and point of view.  I had a fairly powerful refracting telescope with me because I wanted to get a really good look at ‘The Show.’  For those of you who don’t know about the show to which I’m referring, please allow me to explain.

          As the Earth makes it yearlong journey around the Sun, it passes through the same area of space at the same time of every rolling year.  It just so happens that the area of space through which our wonderful planet traverses every August contains lots of little bits of space debris.  I guess we could call this stuff “comet dust” for lack of a better term, because that, essentially, is what it is – the leftover particles of comets that pass through our solar system from time to time.

          When the Earth flies through this “Perseid” neighborhood of space, those comet dust particles strike and enter our atmosphere at the speed of around 130,000 miles per hour.  Naturally, this causes a great deal of friction, so the particles catch fire and burn up on their way down toward the surface of the Earth.  You may have seen this phenomenon yourself… maybe you called it a “shooting star” or a “falling star.”  It can happen at anytime of the year, but every August, without fail, comes “The Perseid Meteor Shower” – and, in my opinion, that’s the very best one of them all!

          OK, where was I?  Ah, yes… so there I was, minding my own business, just gazing up at all those incredibly brilliant shooting stars.  That cosmic display was so dazzling; I was hoping the night would never end.  Then, all of a sudden, I noticed, through the lens of my telescope, a tiny speck of eerie greenish light flickering against the backdrop of the pitch-dark Idaho summer sky.  It was a different kind of light than that of the meteors I’d just been observing.  It was moving, but its movement seemed somewhat purposeful, as compared to the uncontrolled, self-destructive, fiery descent of the flaming Perseid meteors. 

          That greenish speck of light would move… and then stop for a while.  Then it would move a little again.  It was sort of like someone who was standing at the back of a crowd, trying to catch a glimpse of what was going on in front… and having to change vantage points from time to time, so as to see over the heads of the throng of people gathered before him.  Back and forth it would move.  To and fro it would go.  I found it all so very fascinating that I completely disregarded my initial intent for being there.  I totally ignored The Perseids.  After all, I reasoned, August comes around every year and so does its annual meteor shower, but this eerie greenish light… this was totally amazing!  And, for all I knew, having never observed it before, I might never see it again.

          After about half an hour, that eerie greenish light, once a mere speck on the horizon, had moved slowly and steadily across the night sky… closer and closer to the spot where I, myself, was camped out.  At last, it began to hover directly overhead.  In order to observe it comfortably, I was more or less forced from my original sitting position into lying completely prone.  So there I was with my back pressed flat against the dank, dark soil of Coeur d’Alene’s beautiful and forever-wild landmark, Tubbs Hill.

          Now, the fact that this light, or object, or whatever it was, had moved from the horizon to its new position directly overhead didn’t phase me much, one way or the other, at first.  I was just a detached onlooker, in my own mind’s eye.  But then something started to happen.  I could feel the effects of a huge increase in my body’s production of adrenaline.  My heart began to pound, my pulse was racing and little beads of perspiration were beginning to form on my forehead and in my palms, despite the rather cool ambient temperature of this typical, yet most unusual Idaho summer night.

          The eerie greenish light was on the move again – but not in its heretofore expected horizontal plane.  No, now it was moving, ever so slowly, ever so deliberately… downward.  It was descending directly toward the very spot where I lay frozen, in my state of surprise, against the formerly safe ground of Tubbs Hill!  I was completely immobilized.  I could do nothing but gaze into this light that had now become more than just a light.  It had become a “presence” or an “entity,” if you will.  There seemed to be a vibration of consciousness that surrounded it… that permeated it.  Barely breathing, I watched… and I waited…

          I sincerely apologize for the blank space that now occurs in my story, but I cannot describe to you the events that apparently happened next.  I have absolutely no conscious memory of them.  One moment there I was… casually lying on Tubbs Hill and the next moment - or so it seemed…

          Have you ever been to the doctor’s office for a physical examination – you know, your yearly “check up”?  Sure you have.  Well, then you know how sometimes your doctor will ask you to lie on an examining table… and he’ll do stuff, like listen to your heartbeat and take your blood pressure and other things like that?  I guess that’s the only way I have to describe the situation in which I found myself.  Only this was no doctor’s office and the four people – no, the four “beings” - who were standing around the table upon which I lay didn’t look like any doctors I had ever run across in my fairly ordinary, but generally merry life upon the great planet Earth!

          Now, I suppose that I should have been really scared… but, somehow, I wasn’t.  Actually, I felt very relaxed… kind of the way you feel when you’re just hanging out, after school, with a bunch of your best friends.  The only difference was, as I lay there, I couldn’t move any part of my body.

The beings were totally silent… they’d look at me and then at each other and then back at me again.  I had the feeling they were communicating with one another, but on some sort of non-verbal, telepathic level.  Well… whatever they were thinking, I didn’t have a clue in the universe.

          Then the one being… I’ll tell you what… why don’t I just make this easier… from here on out, in my story, I’ll just refer to them as “lads.”  Although they weren’t really lads, you must realize… at least not as you and I might generally picture a lad in our own frame of reference and in our own general understanding of that word.

There was a pale greenish hue to their skin… or outer covering… or whatever they might call it in their anatomical nomenclature.  And their eyes… now, their eyes were very distinctive.  They were black and very, very large in proportion to the size of their heads.  They did have arms and legs… two of each… so that was unremarkable, but they had six fingers on each hand.  As they were wearing shiny, silvery colored boots, (which matched, exactly, the color of their snugly-fitting spacesuits), I couldn’t tell you how many toes were appended to the ends of each of their little feet.

Now, these lads had no hair on top of their heads, but they did have twin protuberances that were rather slender and seemed to be quite flexible.  I naturally assumed that these were their antennae.  I wondered if these antennae might not just be the way they were able to silently communicate with one another and, indeed, with all the others of their species back wherever it was that they called home.

Well, I digress… let it be sufficient to say that these lads were more than a little weird looking to me, and believe you me… I’ve been around!  They would have fit right into the crowd had they been parading down Hollywood Boulevard on Halloween night!

But back to my story…  As I was telling you, the one lad who appeared to be the leader of this fabulous foursome, left the area of the examining table for a brief moment.  When he returned, he had, clutched ever so gingerly in his cool little six-fingered hands, some sort of apparatus that consisted of a bunch of colored wires with what appeared to be suction cup devices affixed to the ends of each wiry strand.

He then proceeded to attach two of these suction cups to my head (one to either temple) and did the same, with another pair of cups, to his own head.  The other three lads did as their leader did.  So there we all were… yours truly, lying immobilized on an examining table, surrounded by four green lads from heaven knows where, all connected to one another by some strange sort of electrical wiring device for some summary purpose which, at that moment, was far beyond even my wildest imaginings.

Did I forget to mention that there was a central control box, out of which came all these many colored wires with their suction-cupped terminals that now connected me with these beings?  Well, if I did… there was.  And on this control box were a number of little lights and switches and dials.

The lads all looked at each other, then looked at me and then at each other again.  Their leader flipped a switch on the control box and I immediately felt strange, tingling sensations in the areas of my right and left temples.  It wasn’t an unpleasant feeling, mind you.  Actually, it kind of tickled and made me giggle quite a bit.

After about two minutes, the leader flipped the same switch (this time in the opposite direction) and the tingling sensations stopped.  He proceeded to remove the suction cups from his head.  His companions followed suit and did likewise with their own wires.  The leader then removed the cups from yours truly and he sharply poked me in the area of my collarbone – midway between my right shoulder and the base of my neck.  At once, I could feel that my power to move my body at will had been restored!

I sat up and allowed my legs to dangle over the side of the examining table.  The lads all shifted positions so that they were now standing, more or less, in front of me - in my direct field of vision.  They all gazed at me, not with any sort of cold and calculating scientific stare, as one might expect, but sort of lovingly… like you might look at one of your closest friends who had just done you a very big favor.

The leader spoke: “I am Ortyn.  Are you feeling well?”

“Yes,” I replied, “I’m fine, thank you.”

“Thank you,” he said, “for giving us the ability to communicate with your species.  The process we have just completed, with your assistance, has enabled us to use and understand your language.  It is difficult to explain, but suffice to say that we have just ‘downloaded’ the entire content of your knowledge, including your language, into our own organic databases… our minds, as you might understand it.”

“I understand,” said I, “and you’re welcome, Ortyn.  I’m honored to make your acquaintance and pleased to be of assistance… I hope.  Do you mean to cause the people of Earth any harm?”

“We are beings of peace.  We are incapable of causing any harm to any other life form.  We do not even cause harm in our own self-defense.  We have developed a method of self-protection that renders ineffective any attempts to cause us harm.  We are able to do this without employing any means of violence.  Our only weapon is, in your terminology, called ‘love’.”

“Well, in that case, Ortyn, I’m very pleased to meet you and your companions… I’m sorry, I didn’t get their names…”

The others then spoke up, each in turn… “I am Weldyn.”  “I am Zeldyn.”  “I am Myles.”  Then, in unison, in perfect three-part harmony, they all said: “We are very pleased to meet you, too.”

Ortyn continued: “What is your name, sir?”

“Oh, yes… me… I’m Damon.”

“Will you be our friend, Damon?” he asked.

“I will indeed, Ortyn… and, you, too, Weldyn, Zeldyn and Myles!” was my instantaneous and enthusiastic response.

So there you have it.  That’s the story of how I came to be acquainted with Ortyn & The Aliens.  I’d always heard stories about alien abductions, but I never much believed that such a phenomenon was possible.  Boy, was I ever mistaken!  I must confess, however, that the whole idea now has me just a little bit weirded out.  I can very well remember my own disbelieving attitude about such stories and, in telling you about what has happened to me, I cannot help but suspect that somewhere, in the back of your own mind, may linger just the slightest hint of doubt as to my credibility.

I don’t blame you.  This little tale is more than a tad fantastic.  There was a time, in our history, you know, that the mere mention of details such as I’ve described to you would have resulted in the teller of such stories being confined to a “rest home” way out in the countryside… far from the “normal” members of our society.  Thank goodness things like that have changed.  Nowadays, people just look at you funny and go on about their own business… at least they don’t lock you up in a “rubber room” anymore.

Now, a lot has happened in my life and in the lives of Ortyn, Weldyn, Zeldyn and Myles since the night we first met.  All of which brings me to the purpose of this introduction and, indeed, to the book for which it is intended.  Please allow me to briefly summarize what happened after my initial encounter with Ortyn & The Aliens.

After we became acquainted, they told me that they were interested in learning more about our planet and our human race.  They asked if they could stay with me for a while and I, of course, agreed.  After all, I was easily as eager to learn about them as they were to learn about us.

They landed and parked their spacecraft on a remote part of Tubbs Hill and were able, after we debarked, to shield it from view.  That’s right… they made it invisible to my and every other human being’s eyes.  We then proceeded, under cover of darkness, back to my summerhouse.

In our ensuing conversations, they indicated that their desire was to live amongst and mingle with our people.  While I applauded them for their willingness to expose themselves to the onslaught of curiosity that would no doubt precipitate, I felt it my moral and ethical obligation to point out the downside of their little plan.  I told them that if they were to just show up in public and declare to one and all that they were alien beings from another world, then I couldn’t be held responsible for what might happen next.

First of all, I related, human beings are, by nature, very curious creatures, to say the least.  We, for the most part, are also just a little reluctant to trust strangers or to believe that their intentions might be anything other than self-serving (as, unfortunately, that’s the way many human beings are, themselves).  So I cautioned the lads against this, otherwise they just might find themselves confined to a zoo… or worse!

I did have another idea, however…

As I mentioned, at the beginning of this humble narrative, my reason for having been in northern Idaho that summer was because I was on vacation.  My permanent home isn’t in Coeur d’Alene, but rather in a quaint little district of the City of Los Angeles, California… known as Hollywood.  You may recall that earlier, I made a reference to Hollywood Boulevard on Halloween night.  If you’ve ever spent any time in Los Angeles, then that reference will require no explanation.  For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of visiting the “Movie & Music Capital of the World,” let me just say that there you’ll find people of every conceivable description… so completely odd, in some instances, that your ability to be shocked will soon be diminished to a level approaching absolute zero!

“Lads,” I said, “if you really want to hang out among us, there’s only one way I can see you being able to do this… you’ll have to form a band and introduce yourselves to our world as yet another group of silly, cartoonish musicians.  Then no one will even bat an eyelash at your unusual appearance”

Ortyn & The Aliens heeded my advice.  The next day, I went to the local music store and procured the necessary instruments and other electronic equipment I thought they’d need to present themselves as a musical group.  Being the bright fellows they are, it only took them a few hours to completely master their instruments.  Ortyn took up the electric guitar, while Weldyn played with the keyboard, Zeldyn embraced the electric bass and Myles wailed, with much gusto, all over the drums.

The rest, as they say, is history.  We all came down to Hollywood and I got them a gig playing in a local nightspot where an executive from one of the major record labels “discovered” them.  Having been asked by the lads to be their manager, I helped them negotiate a favorable contract and they’ve been growing in popularity ever since.

Ortyn & The Aliens have come to really love life on Earth and, especially, life in America.  They’ve expressed a strong desire to become United States citizens.  I’ve helped them make the proper applications for citizenship and they’ve been studying for their final examination to complete that process.

The last required element of their knowledge of United States history, that they absolutely have to know, is to be able to name all forty-three of our Presidents in order.  I happened to mention to them that the average American school kid, who was born in our country, probably couldn’t do that.  That’s when they first came up with the clever idea for the very book you’re reading right now.

Ortyn said: “Hey!  Since we’re a band, why don’t we just write a song that contains the names of every President America has ever had?  Then the kids can sing along with us.  In that way, once they memorize the lyrics, they’ll know the names of all the Presidents!”

Weldyn added: “I’d like to see pictures of all the Presidents.”

Zeldyn agreed: “I think it’s always easier to remember a name when you have a face to associate with it.”

And, finally, Myles contributed his brilliant opinion.  He suggested that they not only record the song that Ortyn had in mind, but that they also create a book that has pictures of every President and also tells a little something about each of their lives.  “Maybe,” he speculated, “kids don’t bother to learn enough about history because they think it’s boring.  Well, anything can be boring… unless you make it fun.  So let’s just make learning history fun!”

Well… there it is!  That’s the whole story, more or less, of how I met Ortyn & The Aliens, became their friend and manager and was asked by them to write this introduction to their first of what they hope will be many books to come: Our Yankee Doodle Presidents.

I, along with Ortyn, Weldyn, Zeldyn and Myles, sincerely hope that you’ll enjoy this book (and the song that comes along with it) and that you’ll take the time to learn the names of all the great Americans who have served our beloved country as its President.

Dr. Damon Leigh
Los Angeles, California
April 1, 2002

          P.S. – Please remember this… every single person who grew up to become President of the United States was just a little kid at one time, too.  So always study hard and never quit trying to attain your goals in life.  Who knows… someday you may become America’s President, too.

© 2002 Damon Leigh (ASCAP)

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