Vision of Saint Francis of Assisi

The following is a letter sent to me in early September, 2009, by an old friend. He's an animist, and he's had many interesting, and somewhat unsettling, paranormal experiences over the course of his life. In the interest of his privacy, I'll let him remain anonymous.*******************************************************This past couple of weeks have been a mixture of sweat and toil, culminating in perhaps onefo the strangest events that I have ever encountered. One that would be worthy of "TheTwilight Zone".It began with trying to play catch-up on the numerous outside chores that had been delayeddue to the excess of rain of late. After a couple of drying out days, I manged to finallyget caught up on mowing and turn my focus to harvesting the apples and Asian pears for theannual donation to the Sienna Francis House. Mama had gone to Kansas to aid your sister,but, at the rate the apples were dropping, I knew I couldn't wait for her return andbesides, it wouldn't have been fair to her to put her to work harvesting as soon as she gotback.To make a long story short, after a couple of long hot days, I managed to harvest all butthe late season apples and had gathered enough fresh produce to make the folks at SiennaFrancis happy and give them a nice change from the stale baked goods that are usuallydonated to them. By now, Mama had returned from Kansas but had to go to work so, I loadedup the PT and began the long drive to east Omaha.I was already hot and tired and wracked with muscle spasms, made worse with every bump inthe road, but when I ran into bumper-to-bumper traffic I began to seriously question as towhether or not my efforts were truly worth this kind of pain and aggravation. I had toremind myself that yes, it was worth it, and continued on but, rather than take thecongested I-80 route, I opted for the slightly less congested 680 route, entering downtownOmaha via the airport road. Exiting on 10th Street I entered a world inhabited by theshadow people, you know, the folks that other people prefer not to see as they hustle fromplace to place. The shadow people did indeed cling to the shadows that day as temperatureshovered around the 90° mark, and only those seeking their own patch of shade ventured outinto the light and heat of the day. Neither age nor gender were spared amidst their ranks,and their sheer numbers seemed almost unfathomable to one such as myself who entered thisnetherworld, this land of the lost. This was the realm of societies unseen whose solepossessions were carried in worn-out backpacks and plastic bags, and the Sienna FrancisHouse provides for the desperate. A kind of light in a dark place one might say.At this time however, I was tired and hurting and all I wanted wto do was unload my cargoand be on my way, hoping that there would be someone at the loading dock to help me out.Now I know you've never gone with us on these trips so allow me to describe the scene alittle. On the west side of 17th Street is a long structure that offers shelter to theshadow people while on the east side is the communal kitchen, dining area, and loading dock,such as it is. One pulls into a long, say, 70' driveway alongside the building to get tothe dock, and on the south side of that is a narrow patch of grass bordering a chain linkfence. Running up the side of the building are a half dozen steps that lead to the loadingdock, girded by a simple handrail. At the top, there were a couple of empty bread racksshoved into a corner, leaving barely enough room to pass by before reaching the door. Thewhole dock is only about 12' long and on the driveway level; I have to maneuver between thestairs and two large dumpsters on my right just to get as close as I can.Upon entering the driveway, the only soul I see in the area of the loading dock is one verytired-looking black gentleman, who I have to maneuver past on my way in. I exchangedgreetings with him as I pulled past him, and then I took note that there wasn't a soul onthe dock but, as I slowly pulled to a stop, the gentleman caught up, climbed the steps andstuck his head in the door, saying something to someone inside.OK, now this is where things get a little weird. As I sat in the PT waiting to see what wasgoing to happen, something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye towards the topfo the steps. There in front of the empty bread racks where once there had been nothing,stood the tall, gaunt figure of a very pale, ancient-looking man. He came neither from theright of the loading dock nor did he pass me climbing the stairs on my left or I would haveseen him. He simply appeared, seemingly out of thin air. He neither moved nor spoke; itwas as if he were frozen in place, but his gaze was intensely focused on me!About that time, two men in their 20's came out from inside the building and began clearingaway some boxes that someone else had left on the dock so I could unload, while the blackgentleman stepped inside. They took absolutely no notice of the tall gaunt figure to theirright as they moved things about and I thought, how odd that they didn't see him. Still, asthey worked, the old man's gaze remained steadfastly on me, so muchso that I began to feel alittle uncomfortable. Taking note that the other two guys were nearly done moving boxes, Iexited the car so I could open the back hatch and retrieve the fruit. As I opened the hatchhowever, I suddenly noticed that this strange figure of a man began to descend the stairstowards me, his eyes never leaving mine.As he came, a thought entered my mind, no, a question really, and for the life of me I can'texplain why but, the question I asked myself was "St. Francis?" Perhaps it was because hereminded me of El Greco's rendition of St. Francis, only aged, because the figure before melooked to be in his late 80's or early 90's. While he wore the old style, hand-sewn leathersandals upon his feet, the rest of his clothing was modern, and yet, the question remainedin my head.Something else caught my eye as well. As he made his way down the steps he moved slowly butsteadily, his eyes never once breaking contact with mine. For a brief instant I tried toavoid his piercing gaze by casting my eyes downward, and it was then that I noticed that hisfeet appeared to hover above each step as he came. In disbelief I started to lift my eyesand noticed that his left hand, which I had believed was grasping the railing, was in factfloating just above it."Hey mister, still want that receipt?" One of the guys hollered back at me, startling meout of my confused state. "Sure," I said, and made my way up the stairs. Once there, bothguys began bombarding me with questions about the Asian pears, but as I answered eachquestion in turn, my focus was still on the wide-open space where the old man disappeared.Finally I couldn't stand it anymore, and I asked them both, "Who was that old guy outthere?" They looked out where I had pointed then with confused expressions, turned to meand asked, "What old man?" "You know, that old guy that was standing down there right nextto me," I answered. They turned and looked at each other with that, "oh, boy" look beforethe older of the two finally said, "Why mister, ain't been no one here 'ceptin' the three ofus and maybe old Hank inside there," pointing to the black gentleman I'd seen earlier.Realizing this was going nowhere, I thanked the guys for their help and they in turn thankedme for the good eats, at which time I figured it was a good time to leave. I backed the PTout very slowly so I could look for that mysterious old gentleman, but to no avail.To this day that old man's peaceful face and penetrating stare are with me still, and Iimagine that they will be for quite some time and, oh yes, these events really did happen.
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Drekx Omega left a comment on Comment Wall
"UFO Sightings RISE! New Jersey Drone Frenzy...Now helicopters are chasing our Sirian scoutships......wouldjyabelieveit...!!😲🪩🪩🚁✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨👏🏻

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3 hours ago
Justin89636 commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"I would say yeah good chance animals may see them sometimes."
5 hours ago
Justin89636 commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"Since they have been caught on camera before maybe I should find my video camera and film the area. It's worth a try :)"
5 hours ago
ET Hugger commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"Animals may see devas, I’m quite sure about that."
5 hours ago
ET Hugger commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"You don’t need to do much, just sit somewhere or walk around, take your time and look at the trees, birds and other animals. You may feel a tingling sensation but may not see the energetic interaction between you and the devas. I’ve always been…"
5 hours ago
Justin89636 commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"Thanks for that. I actually posted something a while back on my health page that talked about forest bathing. I'll have to go back and read that again as well."
6 hours ago
Drekx Omega commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"To prepare you for deva watching I recommend trying the following starter process:

"What is forest bathing?
This Japanese practice is a process of relaxation; known in Japan as shinrin yoku. The simple method of being calm and quiet amongst the…"
6 hours ago
Justin89636 commented on Drekx Omega's blog post An Introduction to the Devic Kingdom
"A lot of other people like to go through that area that I mentioned so I gotta time it carefully. Folks like to ride their dirt bikes in that area so definitely can't do it during that time. Definitely gonna give it a try one of these days though.…"
6 hours ago
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