Dude Was A Wizard!
Last week as I was returning from Atlanta to Phoenix, I had a layover in Dallas. While walking through the terminal, I passed a guy sitting on the ground, and out of the corner of my eye something that he was doing with his hands caught my attention. I turned to look at him and what I saw was so strange that I stopped dead in my tracks. Imagine that there was an invisible sphere in his lap; his hands were slowly moving around the outside of the sphere, and in the middle, there was a pen levitating.
Yes, levitating.
I was no more than three feet from the guy and there was clearly nothing visibly connecting his hands to the pen. The movement of his hands seemed to be coaxing the pen to stand upright, almost as if he was pushing and pulling its energy to keep it stable. After a few seconds he looked up at me and the awkwardness of it made me start walking again. Rounding a corner, I turned around and continued watching the guy.
Impossibly, nobody else seemed to notice for a good two or three minutes. Eventually, a few other people started staring too, but as this was just a normal guy in an airport terminal and not a street performer, rather than a crowd gathering around, people tried to watch while simultaneously trying to hide the fact that they were watching.
After a few more minutes, the guy put the pen away and pulled out his boarding pass. This he placed in one hand while holding the other hand above the first, slowly "lifting" the boarding pass up until it was standing vertically on his hand and then off of his hand, again just floating in front of him.
It was at this point that I finally remembered that my phone has a camera, and I quickly but stealthily snapped a few pics right as my plane was boarding. Because of the poor resolution and distance, the pictures came out predictably crappy, but you can still clearly see the boarding pass in his hands, and I can tell you from seeing it with my own eyes, it really was floating between his hands.
The guy got on my plane after me and passed me as he moved toward the back. In retrospect, I really wish I'd talked to him, as everyone I've told the story to is convinced that it was some sort of trick. I, too, would be sure it was a trick if I'd only heard the story and not actually seen it. But the fact that I walked within a few feet of this guy and got a very close look at the whole thing makes it much harder to brush off as an optical illusion or a cheap trick. I have no idea how he did it ... but I know what I saw.
Yes, levitating.
I was no more than three feet from the guy and there was clearly nothing visibly connecting his hands to the pen. The movement of his hands seemed to be coaxing the pen to stand upright, almost as if he was pushing and pulling its energy to keep it stable. After a few seconds he looked up at me and the awkwardness of it made me start walking again. Rounding a corner, I turned around and continued watching the guy.
Impossibly, nobody else seemed to notice for a good two or three minutes. Eventually, a few other people started staring too, but as this was just a normal guy in an airport terminal and not a street performer, rather than a crowd gathering around, people tried to watch while simultaneously trying to hide the fact that they were watching.
After a few more minutes, the guy put the pen away and pulled out his boarding pass. This he placed in one hand while holding the other hand above the first, slowly "lifting" the boarding pass up until it was standing vertically on his hand and then off of his hand, again just floating in front of him.
It was at this point that I finally remembered that my phone has a camera, and I quickly but stealthily snapped a few pics right as my plane was boarding. Because of the poor resolution and distance, the pictures came out predictably crappy, but you can still clearly see the boarding pass in his hands, and I can tell you from seeing it with my own eyes, it really was floating between his hands.
The guy got on my plane after me and passed me as he moved toward the back. In retrospect, I really wish I'd talked to him, as everyone I've told the story to is convinced that it was some sort of trick. I, too, would be sure it was a trick if I'd only heard the story and not actually seen it. But the fact that I walked within a few feet of this guy and got a very close look at the whole thing makes it much harder to brush off as an optical illusion or a cheap trick. I have no idea how he did it ... but I know what I saw.
posted by GregP at 5:51 PM
3 Comments:
Hate to be a naysayer, but the pictures don't have me convinced.
I particularly like the part about you stopping, staring, running away, and then hiding and watching from afar. What are you, a two-year-old?
MB, I know, like I said, the quality's terrible, but I'm TELLING YOU, man, I know what I saw! I was two feet away from him!
B, it was an extremely creepy situation. Seeing somebody on the street do a trick like this is one thing; seeing an average joe in an airport terminal do it is quite another. Stopping and staring at a guy in an airport is just so socially awkward that it never occurred to me to actually try it until it was too late.
Post a Comment
<< Home