My Lady of the Woods: Part 2 Adopted into the
Family
When I was little my cousin and I built a large tree house in the trees about two miles off in the woods beind his house in
North Texas. When the evening arrived we finally talked our parents
into letting us camp out in it on a hot summer day. I guess they
thought that we would not endure the heat and would be traipsing in
around supper time. Even though we were excited we finally managed to
fall asleep. Later when the moon was full and bright we were awoken
by the sound of leaves and sticks rustling and snapping. We looked at
each other bright eyed and waiting, noticing that the sounds were
getting louder. We were livid with the jitters when the sound stopped
right under our tree house. After the hair on the back of our necks
would not relax, we slowly took a peek down through the cracks in our
floor. There, about a foot away from the bottom of our floor was a
strangely looking human face with two shiny eyes glaring back at us.
I told that story
for years as a kid with a creative imagination. But the story is the
only untruth that you will find in My Lady of the Woods. The tree
house was actually a cabin that never got finished. But I held that
story dear for years after we stopped working on the cabin. It was
exciting and I wanted it to be true after having seen a figure off in
the distance looking back at my cousin and I. The figure barely moved
about five hundred yards away, leaning up against a tree. That was my
only encounter with the people from the woods until recently.
I called Thomas
Hughes again a couple of days later and asked him how I should
continue. It was a real eye opener to find out that a big female, who
lives in the woods up where I live, knew who I was. As we spoke he
began to slip into the language of the universe. It was a choppy,
square sounding language yet very simple. He came back to me and
said, “She says that you already know what to do and that she has
been talking to you for the last two days.” The shock was gone but
the excitement grew. I said, “I have been hearing some one calling
me Cowboy in my head for the last two days, but I don't know what
that means. I mean, I'm not a cowboy.” She chimed in with mind
speak and told Thomas that she has been calling me Cowboy because of
the neat things that I can make out of two sticks. I didn't
understand what all that was about but later It hit me.
My wife, two
daughters and I are outdoors people. We go hiking, camping, canoeing,
swimming in lakes and rivers most of our spare time. On every outing
we always pick up beaver chewed sticks. We walk with them and take
them home and build things out of them. How did she know that? As I
was working the next morning, my oldest daughter gave me a call.
“Dad! We just had some pebbles tossed in front of us on the trail,
we smiled at each other and pretended not to have heard and they
tossed more even louder!” There was nobody else around. I had
learned so much by now from Thomas that I knew that this was
conformation for our families to have a meeting. My Lady of the woods
had asked Thomas earlier to ask me how I would feel about my kids
meeting her kids. Yes. The future was bright.
The next day my
family and I went to the lake in order to make contact. I had no idea
what to expect but I only knew that I wanted to experience it with my
wife and two daughters. They were as excited as I was. Equipped with
a big bag of sunflower seeds for a peace offering, we headed out to
our swimming beach off the beaten path. As most people don't like to
walk, we have never encountered anyone else; at least not the kind of
people that we were used to meeting. As we were walking through the
woods my wife reached down and picked up a beautiful rock. She said,
“She left this for me.” “Who did?” I asked. “The lady of
the woods. The lady of the woods left this just for me. I can still
smell the palm of her hand.” I was as bright eyed as the kids. She
left some sunflower seeds at the same spot and we continued. We were
amazed to find a pyramid of small stones on the trail to the beach
with a feather sticking straight up from them. My oldest daughter
found it and said, “Look! Look what they left for us!” Our peace
offering was met well. We left more sunflower seeds there too. As we
got to the beach, there were two sticks there left in the sand. One
was sticking in the ground with the fork sticking up. And the other
was laying perfectly aligned with the direction of the fork. I
thought that maybe a fisherman had left it there at first. But there
are no fishermen where we go. We were puzzled by the sticks but
enjoyed our swim.
Later that evening
is when it all came together. I called Thomas and excitedly began to
tell about the adventure. He began to slip off in to mind speak and
began to talk to My Lady of the Woods, only this time I too was
picking up the yes and no answers. My beginning stages of mind speak
had begun. He told me that the stone was, in fact, left for my wife.
And the feather was for all of us. She asked Thomas not to tell me
her name because it was up to me to learn how to find out. Then she
told Thomas and I the most beautiful thing. She said that she left
the sticks there to protect us. Those sticks tell all other clans
that me, my mate, and my two kids belong in her family now. She told
me that because I had taken my family into the woods alone without
guns or cameras showed trust.
This was as exciting
as it was new so I asked Thomas to describe the rock, feathers, and
sticks. It was going to be hard for him as he and I live on opposite
sides of Texas from one another. He began to speak with My Lady of
the Woods again in mind speak. He was talking to both of us at the
same time. He listened to her and said, “ She said that the rock
was left for your mate.” “I know that, Man. What did it look
like?” I asked. “Wait... yes.... Okay... she said that the stone
for your mate was an oval about two inches long and about an inch
wide, off white, with a line through it. The feather was black with a
hint of purple. And the two sticks were about two foot and one foot.”
I was amazed! I said, “Okay, Okay...one of the sticks was a beaver
stick. Ask her to tell you which one it was.” “She told me
already. The beaver stick is the one that was lying on the ground.”
Amazing! I ran in the house and asked my wife for the stone and my
daughter for the feather. They were spot on! My daughter told me that
the feather had lost some purple that was on it earlier. Wow! The
sticks are still there today. We see them every three or four days
when we go swimming.
I told Thomas that I
had a confession to make. I would appreciate him telling me her reply
about a lie I had created as a kid. I told him and her about the
fictional tree house and that I was sorry for having made up such a
story about her people. I told her that I was just so excited about
meeting her people that I just couldn't contain myself. For the first
time I heard more than just a yes and no answer. She said where we
both heard, “It's okay, Cowboy. Good story!” And then we both heard her laugh.
