Things that are not at all, are never lost… {Marlowe}
I’ve oft walked the back lane linking the village with an old Salt Gate, pondering on the forgotten history that the now metalled road must have seen come and go … cutting across the slope of hills long enclosed for pasture.. many a foot and cart has plied along here and I prefer personally to travel this way.. it’s warmly spirited… the surrounding fields and Sychwell wood.. {source of a spring fed stream that drops into an ancient hollowed out stone well}.. feel very elemental.. I’ve sensed many an unknown thing flitter around your peripheral vision in there, even though it’s a very young copse in the scheme of arboreal things…
Often inspired to snap photographs on that stretch.. a strange series of irregular images cropped up from the Monday evening after they had turned the Christmas lights on in the village.. I’d toured the illuminations.. (didn’t take long ) and felt compelled to walk back over the old lane by torchlight.. from the village end you pass a private, evocatively overgrown garden that has always fascinated me.. I presume it belonged to a long lost cottage or croftstead, though I don’t know.. just a hunch sort of thing.. maybe I’m completely wrong, perhaps there had once been some sort of Victorian style summerhouse stood on a beloved plot…? Just that sensory sort of vibe that someone used to spend a good deal of time there.. the access to this semi secluded patch is {or would be} via a chained gate.. (seemingly someone owns it)? I usually take a photo from ouside that gate.. {have had some really picturesque results}.. but when I was sat at home later with a hot chocolate, scanning through them… I nearly spat out my drink in excitement…
There.. lurking in the long weeds… Was something looking like a Hob… sat cautiously watching me..!!
Resembling a faun faced, horn headed, hairy legged fairy of domestic service (so long as you rewarded them with white bread and milk they would diligently perform daily chores for you ).. this could be nothing else but a Hob surely…?? And there were some strange orb of energy in front of me as well.. the night was dry, plus I’ve had that phenomena before show up on photos taken in haunted buildings.. and the garden boundary had definitely felt out of kilter…
I confess I let my paranormal excitement get the better of me.. several back flips of joy (not easy in my condition) were tempered by the realisation I would have to return to see if garden statuary had been installed or not.. So next evening.. about the same time.. I stood in the same spot and flashed another series of photos off… This time though, to my utter disappointment… I could see the Hob face show up pointedly on my gallery store screen… it must be pareidolia.. but for the life of me I couldn’t see what was matrixing the image.. and the face was slightly more dissolved back into foliage like some furtive green man.. Crest fallen.. I realised I would have to return in daylight to identify the truth of the anomaly!
I put the camera over the gate .. took a few shots, saw nothing distinct. telepathically urged.. “come on.. if you show yourself to me.. I’ll bring you a mince pie..” (yes I admit.. was still hoping it was a Hob..) when the camera took a flip.. lagged on the lens..? The battery drained flat from 90% full. Hopeful that may have been brought about by some spirit interference… decided maybe I had best bring a treat up later just in case..?
This was the Wednesday.. the fairy garden had had me distractedly besotted all week.. was playing persistently on both my waking and dormant mind as if there was something more required from me perhaps.. I was to go back at twilight…
..took a few choice snaps on my way to the garden gate and got this strange almost manifestly effect showing up on a series of four… paranormal friends suggest a white lady event.. I can’t claim anything, no feeling of a supernatural sort at the time.. oddly though this was very close to the fairy garden location..
I did stand at the gate and take more photographs.. curiously the camera, with almost full battery, drained flat again and crashed spectacularly.. took me several moments to restart it.. which it did as soon as I took it back onto the lane side of the gate… Full power restored.. sadly nothing out of the extraordinary showed up on the gallery , but it eventually dawned on me that there possibly were phantom things lurking in the cover of that dense shrubbery that aren’t yet certain whether they want to come out or not.. assuming that spirits can make approaches with pareidolic measures I wondered if they had deceptively produced the Hob effect as some sort of deterrent.. or even attraction.. because what’s the chances of hitting a remarkable pareidolia image like that out of the blue..?
I decided not to push it any further… I live close so I will manage the situation gently.. let them make the first move if they wish..
So that done and dusted I walked along the old back lane, dropped down Salt Gate to pick up a pork pie from the local garage convenience store.. returned home via the pitch velvety black of old lane and noticed one of the large houses on there has a nice tree trimmed with Yuletide lights in their front yard.. having an artistic bent I pause to take a few photographic shots of it…
..have you ever thought the spirits of a place are having laugh at your expense…? Glad I was able to provide them with a little entertainment… They can be a tad deceptive at times….
[Apate was a deity in Greek mythology, the personification of deceit. Her mother was Nyx, the primordial goddess of night, and her father was Erebos, the personification of darkness.]
Hubert Hobux 