The Thing of Thoroughfare Woods

As a child, you tend to look at the world with rose coloured glasses. You would believe that the oven was hungry or would say sorry to the door if you bumped into it. But as one grows up, you slowly start to unravel the safe haven and refuge you believed your life was in. With every cut or bruise that marks your body, evermore chipping away at the lens of childhood imperviousness, or with every negative experience. being bullied, abandoned, failure. With every aging year crumbling the mental walls in which slowly reveal to you that the world is not as sweet as you once thought. you are not as invulnerable nor safe from the threats of the violent that wish to get to you, be that man or malevolence....

Maybe you found this out through loss of a loved one, or though heartbreak or even through the various mysteries that steal our curiosity. Now many (and most likely you) brush off many of these dangers that surround our lives, after all it is the brains way of coping, one last effort to stop your mind corrupting from realisation that it's 'safe-place' is no longer safe. Does "It will never happen to me!" sound familiar? Does the phrase "It's probably just a wild animal" ring a bell? Or perhaps "there is nothing in the dark!", even though your own mind races with the horrifying possibilities around the situation.

Well...I used to be the same, I would study various mysteries from around the globe, Kentucky goblins to the phoenix lights, brushing off the stories with coincidence or desperately trying to give ration and reason to mysteries where the only explanation was not of this world. Until ultimately my denial of such things would shatter into pieces on my visit to thoroughfare woods. I write this to educate others, to save the lives of those in denial and as naive as I once was. I ultimately write to tell humanity that we are not the top dogs of this earth we think we are.

Thoroughfare woods was not distinctly popular, nor inherently creepy for that matter, and the birch trees would shine with shimmering colours as the orange sunlight danced through slender branches. That was until you walked far enough, the entrance to thoroughfare woods was planted birch, perfectly paced and a sculped pathway, however if you were to walk far enough you would come to the dark pinewood giants in which light struggled to penetrate. Now it was not dark by any means, more like a thick stormy sky was overhead when you entered as the dim light would dance about you in an alien fashion, a vast change from the sunny rays coming down from the warm sky.

I was there on a hiking trip, after recently being relieved of work and friends, to give myself a break from the stress. If only I had known. I had packed a light lunch, not planning to be there for too long, and would stop for a break at the perimeter of the pine forest. A solid 3-and-a-half-hour hike, I would turn around at the pines at take the long detour back to my car. Just before I set off, I saw another car parked alongside the dirt road that led up to the forest. I was going to brush it off as just another hiker until I glanced inside, dust and belongings strewn over every surface and dead leaves blanketing the hood of the car. It was obvious it had been there for a while, but it wasn't an uncommon sight as many people in the area at the time would abandon cars they could no longer upkeep or sell. Nevertheless I would call it in to someone after the hike, not wanting to waste the gorgeous mid-day light. I pressed on.