The boogyman in Midlothian
Hello all of you beautiful people! Today, I want to tell you about something weird going on here in Midlothian. As most of you know — well, you know if you read this column on the reg — I live next to a fairly large wooded area. We see all of the regular critters, ranging from opossums and racoons to coyotes and even a few wild turkeys. We even have a big ol’ heard of boars that show up every once in a while and fuck up my front yard.
But you know what: Something else lives out there.
About six years ago they tore down a bunch of the trees a few acres away from here, closer to the freeway.
That is when I started to see it. At first, I thought it was a pair of orange-red bicycle reflectors someone had left out in the woods. One second, I would see them, the next they would be gone. I thought it was just a trick of the light or possibly even the taillights of a car on the freeway.
It was during the winter, so there were no leaves on the trees, and sometimes you can see lights from 287 through the trees.
Then one night, a few years back, I came home around 3 a.m. after the show and took the dogs out. At the time we had six dogs, so it is always a little bit of chaos taking them out. I opened the front door to let them out, and they took off. But then they all screeched to a halt — like they do when it is raining — and refused to leave the porch. Each one quietly turned and slowly walked back inside, refusing my commands to go out and go potty. The last one in was our terrier, Benji, who let out a low growl before he turned and walked back inside.
It was so weird. I walked out into the yard to look but saw nothing.
A few months later it happened again. I came home about 3:15 a.m., opened the door to let them out and — nope! They all refused to get off the porch. This time they went back inside really quickly.
I looked out into the dark wooded area and saw two huge, glowing red eyes looking back at me. I totally pussed out and ran inside and woke my husband, Jamie, to go check out whatever it was I saw. He didn’t see anything though, and for a few weeks he made fun of me, joking about the monster in the woods that was going to get me.
That was until he saw it himself a month later. But when he saw it, it was 30 or so feet up in a tree.
Even though it freaked him out a bit, he convinced himself that it was an owl. We hear them all the time. I asked him, “Did you hear an owl?” He said no, but the only explanation was that it had been an owl. I was like, “Would the dogs be scared of an owl?” He said, “The little ones definitely would.” “What about our Chow?” (She is huge, but the truth about our Chow, Lucy, is that she was scared of her own shadow.)
The next day we went to visit our neighbor, Chris, who lives diagonally across from us and is basically next door to the same woods. I needed to ask him if he had seen anything out there in the dark.
Chris is in a wheelchair and had his house built on his lot a few months before we moved in. That was 15 years ago. Fun fact about Chris: His entire house was built to fit someone in a wheelchair and has been featured in many magazines. It is perfect for him; even his pool has a ramp into the water. It’s really cool.
Chris told us that both he and his girlfriend had seen the red eyes in the woods and even argued over what it could be. He also thinks that whatever it is, has been leaving animal skins next to his lot. He said it is like someone just completely skins the animal without tearing the fur too much. They have found a couple of rat skins, a racoon and a fairly large coyote. I was like, “That ain’t no owl doing that! Not a coyote, it’s way too big for an owl!”
Finding out about the skins really freaked me out. We decided to only take the dogs to the back yard where they are fenced in and to never leave them unattended. It terrifies me to think anything could ever happen to them.
It has been a while since anyone has seen anything in the woods, and Chris said that he hasn’t found any skins anywhere. Plus, during the summer months there are lots of leaves on the trees, and you can’t see that far into the woods. But trust me, I look. Sometimes I look obsessively. But I hadn’t seen anything in a long while — until the other night.
Last Tuesday night I awoke from all of the dogs moving on the bed. (We have five dogs now; we lost Lucy a while back to old age.) All five dogs sleep on the bed with us, so when they all get off the bed and get under it, even when they move as quietly as they can, you can feel it.
Before I could even yell at them to get back in bed, I noticed the two huge, orange-red eyes looking at me through the sheer middle panel of the curtain! I froze and prayed that I was dreaming. Fear bubbling in my throat like acid reflux until I screamed.
Of course, none of that actually happened. I am bored and couldn’t think of anything to write about, so I thought I’d bullshit y’all.
That was kinda fun, hope you enjoyed it.
Remember to always love more, bitch less and bullshit whenever you can; it keeps the boredom away. XOXO! Cassie Nova