In my first email I related how my father's stalking by an unseen entity had the hallmarks we all recognize, an invisible following force, the perfect cadence of footsteps, matching his. He saw nothing, but heard every leaf and twig break, for three and a half miles. He was gravely spooked. Just a few years ago the same thing happened to me.
Later my Dad learned he had lung cancer and now I’m sure the Sabe that followed him knew that, and I'm sure now signs were left for him to self diagnose and self-treat. That autumn and winter Dad was deep in chemo, and by the following spring he seemed to make a full recovery.
Now I understand the purpose of Sabe revealing himself to us from across the lake. The tall lean Sabe on the beach seemed to be signaling that we needed a catch-up on the topic. He safely and communally announced himself, to father and son, and let us know he existed. He strode into a portal, and became invisible, with drama, with optimism. It was a show, a performance, from a distant strand of beach. It’s as if he was acting out what death actually is. Someone walks between realms into another body. It's a process Sabe has mastered, so he may repeat it again and again. Think of an ability to store one’s soul somewhere safe, then reoccupy one’s body anywhere or anytime one wants. He had a stage, in the crimped circular view of our binoculars, and on that stage he made a theatrical performance, then disappeared.
At that time I hadn't admitted Sabe’s existence. I needed more signs to analyze, footprints to see in fresh mud, gifts to exchange, huge things moved unexplainably, favors done. I’ll list some of them here. The old guy showed he understood me. He even collected a few pieces of my pottery. As a result I fell, almost reluctantly from the status of a potential believer, to a knower.
In some ways I wish I had been jolted, so I might have put the pieces together earlier on. My experiences were arrayed broadly in time. I've misread situations along the way, no doubt, but I want to allay any notion up front that I’m not sympathetic with those who have been terrified, or those who have suffered loss of property or livestock or whatever, so long as I see you get back in the saddle and let go of your grudges.
Me I’ve been lucky. No two people will have the same experience, that's just how it is. Know that's where I’m coming from - I see Sabe as a positive force. I believe that no matter what one's situation, you can go back and meet the big guy head on, and negotiate something. They are incredibly forgiving. Be sincere and be fair. Don’t make empty threats. Ask how you can help him and his family.
Holding on to empty puzzle voids to fill in later, meant they would be solved at once by a single evening's confrontation. I sat next to the big guy on our front porch, at my own invitation. I’ll deal with that moment in my next email, but first I'll describe some key experiences leading up.
In the summer of 2014 a number of cousins participated in a mycology seminar offered by a State University of New York professor. For those that don’t know, mycology is the study of mushrooms and fungi. We have hundreds maybe thousands of species of fungus in the Adirondacks alone. We sampled mushrooms that smelled like maple syrup, made stew of lion’s mane and other varieties, and were always hunting for the illusory Chaga mushroom. Late one afternoon we finished at a small boathouse on a remote stream. I left the group early, since my Mom was hosting a shindig back at the lake so I headed back over the same trail we had all just trod over.
Then I saw it, a naked footprint, at least 15 inches long (three inches longer than my Bean boot). That footprint consolidated all my previous experiences. Direct evidence, at last.
Our family has a difficult time paying taxes on our land holdings; which forces us to lumber our property. From about 2000 on I became a vocal anti-lumber advocate within our family group. I admit this now because I have a lot of evidence that Sabe listens to human conversations, and understands every word we speak, in addition to our thoughts. I think Sabe befriended me because of my anti-lumbering stance.
In December of 1995, my Dad died. His lung cancer came back rapidly and took him in a matter of weeks. I started a business with my brother in New York, and with added income began began making frequent trips north. At that time I also started experiencing with psychedelic mushrooms, in what I call vision quests. I’d go up to the lake, then after a day’s fasting I’d eat some mushrooms. Psilocybin connects you with the forest. It’s a semi-religious experience, a revery with nature at it’s most beautiful time, sunset. This is a Native American practice dating back thousands of years.
Because of my upbringing in an environment I knew and trusted totally, I’d do these quests in the forest, way past sunset, until late at night. My typical schedule was, walk to a remote pond with a few bottles of refreshment, pop my mushrooms around six pm and wait for night to come on.
I never took a flashlight, or a firearm, only alternative hydration like iced tea or kombucha. We are surrounded by potable water. In those years there was nothing about the dark that was potentially frightening, I’ve always trusted the forest, I grew up there, the trees and creatures were my friends as a young boy. None of us ever suffered any aggressive behavior, from any animal or being, at least not recently.
My family felt the same trust in nature as myself. but I do have cousins that will never leave their homes without a large bore firearm. This is the reason I’m staying anonymous, because it’s entirely possible that others within my family group have had a different level of experience altogether.
That summer in question one of my cousins improvised a line-walk, where our kids followed a fishing line run through the woods, blindfolded, and at night. I’m sure Sabe was out in droves on those occasions!
I carried with me two bottles of homemade iced tea. My wife made me swear to return the bottles, as they were the high pressure sealing type. My mushrooms were tucked deep in my pack wrapped in plastic. Yet just ten feet into the woods, three whitetail deer started following me. They must have smelled the mushrooms, and wanted some. I didn’t have enough to spare, so I told the deer to beat it.
Two miles or so and I reached a shady grove of old growth hemlock and cedar on the north side of Noah Pond. A short time after eating my bitter dinner, I was amazed how invincibly strong they make one feel. I was in my mid 40’s when I started to do this, and though somewhat trim was in no way in the kind of physical shape I had been as a teenager. It was nice to be able to run and galavant through the woods without following trails. No matter how dark it got, I could see! If you take mushrooms, and you see a tree, you can instantly spot that tree's parents, children and grandchildren, and see them all knit together in a familial pattern. Plants and animals start talking. You become exposed to knowledge which you're perfectly able to go back a day or two later, when sober, and verify. I believe this has to do with elevated sensory perceptions.
I sat in a hillside of ferns in revery, watching the sun set across the pond, when all of a sudden I felt hands all over my thighs.
I looked down and saw four hairy hands gripping the flesh of my legs. They were small children’s sized hands, and I heard giggling, joyous childish shrieking. But I couldn’t see the rest of their bodies! It was only when the hands touched me that their arms became visible, as if my own body was grounding their invisibility shield. The hands disappeared as soon as they took them away. Initially I thought this experience was a vestige of the psilocybin, so I ignored it. But the gropes persisted, and I knew the physical sensations were real. So I shouted “Stop it!”, and swatted the hands away.
I’ll remark that one never sees something on psilocybin that does not exist at all. There’s always a basis in reality. The images before one's mind with eyes closed is a different subject, but with eyes open, what one sees exists, always. Though forms may seem morphed, they are always there. I saw a familiar trail, a familiar pond, familiar trees and sky, just illuminated with networks of patterns and lines.
Those little child sized hands had grey-black skin, dark black brown hair that was not thick on their backs It also seemed as if there was a lightish green moss growing at the end some of the hairs, as if the body carried with it a mossy growth, perhaps used as camouflage.
But again, I could not see where the forearms went to arms. Beyond the upper wrists, the rest of their bodies were invisible.
For years, I doubted these memories. I had doubted myself. Now I know they were as real as the pond I knew by heart, and the trail, and all the different species of plant and tree. Now that I’ve had several direct sightings, I speculate the Sabe father knew I was headed out to trip, and sent his kids to give me a feel. “This is your chance to touch a human. Don’t be scared, he won’t bite, hell he’s high as a kite!”
That experience was lent real context by my first experience of gifting, because the same afternoon in 2014 after I saw the footprint, I was left a pile of mildly psychoactive Adirondack mushrooms by our front door. There were also some folded fern stalks in the shape of a bowtie, and a small polished stone which I later learned was Labradorite. I also was missing some of my largest pottery bowls! I was leaving pots made in my Connecticut studio outside, as a kind of honor system pottery sale. Two of my largest bowls, one yellow and one black, had gone missing.
Back to my vision quest: an hour or so after dark, while running through the marshes where the pond flowed into a beaver meadow, I put my bag down somewhere in the dark and lost it. The energizing effect of the mushrooms had me running all over the place, through the bogs, over logs, around the pond, on and off the trails. It would be impossible to re-trace my steps. I knew my wife would be furious if I lost those bottles.
I wondered where my bag was. I hadn’t touched it in hours. Where in all the territory I had run over, did I put it down?. Thinking about it I sat down in the grass. Then standing up I suddenly felt it, right beside me! Later I told my wife that “The power of the mushroom is incredible. It helped me locate my bag in the pitch black.”Now, I honestly believe Sabe returned it to me.
Old puzzle pieces are re-arranged by new knowledge. This sleight of hand interaction has became a feature in my ongoing relationship with these beings. They form the basis of our active conversations. All to be explained in time.
I had lost my pack, Sabe had noticed, and returned it to me. That’s my theory now, but what did I honestly think then? I could only scoff off these experiences internally. The invisibility problem is a tough mountain to cross. If what is real can be seen, what is not seen, may or may not be real. There’s always room for doubt.
I’m sure my evening antics in the forest were a great source of entertainment to these creatures. When the effect of the mushroom wore down, and my energies subsided, I headed home.
There is a point along our trail that is very peculiar. The footpath goes up and over the crest of some small rocks, then passes through a sort fairy ring made of four boulders spaced unevenly. There have alway been four. The trail goes up and over some small stones, then between the boulders, two big ones on the left, two big ones on the right.
Now while there was a partial moon, the mushroom made it possible to navigate easily. It helps one avoid getting stuck in the eye by a spruce twig, You can place your feet firmly on the ground, running or walking. Mushroom sight does not illuminate the darkest spots, boulders, or tree trunks, etc. Naturally our trail, here and there, tucks beneath dense upper foliage, and the ground beneath is as close as pitch dark as can be on a full moon night.
That evening returning home, I noticed five big rocks on the perimeter, not four. I thought at that time, 'suppose one of those rocks is a Bigfoot!' I had suspicions then, but no visual facts to anchor them with. I wasn’t about to start feeling the rocks, yet no amount of human imagination may turn four into five.
A few years later I went to the same spot to trip again. Just setting out, and completely sober on the trail, but only a short distance from our settlement, I noticed three cousins carrying fishing rods, walking towards me. They emerged over one hummock, dipped down, then suddenly appeared around a corner. At a glance, I realized they weren’t relatives. Or were they? They were haphazardly dressed. A bunch of odd belts around their waists, a few wore shorts, one didn’t, but instead wore a sweatshirt. It was the kind of clothing one gets from Goodwill, or recycling. Each was carrying a fishing rod. All three were male. Their skin was light, sort of a golden tan.
Then I noticed, as they bobbed past, that each was bent over, a lot!, They seemed like teenagers but whereas their heads glided by at maybe five-feet five in height, if their legs had been extended, and were walking tall with backs unbent, they’d easily have stood a foot higher than me. I’m six one. They clearly were walking in a crippled fashion in order to minimize their height, with thighs held nearly parallel to the ground! It couldn’t have been comfortable, but they made it look easy. As they faux-walked awkwardly by me, I saw that each was covered in light reddish hair from head to toe, except around the face and eyes. As they passed they mumbled hello. They were friendly and they smiled. And then I knew, these were forest beings I’d never met before. I didn’t even know the word Sabe then. Could these be brothers of the ones who had felt my legs years earlier?
When I saw the clothes and fishing rods I thought to myself, what a load of theatre! These guys have a sense of humor! If they read minds, - and I felt they read mine perfectly - I realized the whole thing was a ruse enabling them to reveal themselves to me. If I’d seen them unclothed, and at full height I might have freaked out. Pure genius.
I’m finding it immensely purifying to let go of these experiences, as they have been difficult to carry in detail all these years. For now, I think this is a good place to break.
In a future email I'll describe my sit-down with their patriarch on our porch, and how that went. Hint - it didn’t!
Best regards,
Postmark Winter Owl
