§517

‘It was June 2016. I was with my mum walking through a lovely moorland garden on ***moor which only opens every summer, during May to July, for charity. Mum and I had been looking around the gardens and we were on the way back to the cafe. We were in good spirits as we had just been laughing at an unflattering photo that she had taken of me. We were walking along the footpath. To the left side of the path is lawn backed by bushes and a stream runs through towards a large pond. We were walking past a large log on the lawn to our left. As we walked by, I clearly saw, out of the corner of my eye, a little person dressed in brown with brown skin perched on the end of the log. He was sat with his knees up and arms wrapped around his knees. Looking sideways to me and my mum. To me he felt mischievous and curious. It was a flash of a few seconds. I exclaimed to my mum ‘Oh, there’s a pixie!’ And she replied ‘Yes, a pixie’. We were very matter of fact about it and carried on walking and talking. When I looked more closely at the log, I saw that the place where the pixie had been sitting was the stump of a branch, sticking out from the log. I felt very excited by this experience. Mum was diagnosed with cancer about six months after this, in the early part of 2017. So I feel that perhaps we had this experience because she was in a liminal place with her health. I’ve often reminded my mum of this, but recently her memory has faded. However, the other day when I asked her: ‘Do you remember when we saw a pixie?’ She replied ‘Yes, we saw a pixie’. ‘Brown skin, brown clothing, brown pointed cap. Short trousers and long-sleeved top. Mischievous expression, grinning, dark eyes, twelve inches or so high.’ Why a fairy experience? ‘It’s because that’s what I feel it was and it looked like it was a nature spirit – same colours as nature.’ Fairies ‘are nature spirits and part of nature’. ‘This was a very special experience and a turning point in my life and my mum’s.’