Mysteries of the Supernatural. Darrin W. Owens

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       Supernatural Crossroads: The Threshold between the Seen and the Unseen

       (A Special Note to the Reader)

      The crossroads, a place where two roads intersect, is the subject of many religious and old-fashioned folk belief systems worldwide. In my neighborhood, most crossroads are outside the borders of a town or intertwined in deep hollows in the countryside. These locations are often considered to be supernatural. As a child, I lived near a crossroads. There were two well-worn dirt roads that crossed each other, smack-dab in the woods. I was a country kid, and we lived in the boonies. When I disappeared, my mother would always go looking for me at the crossroads. There I was, sitting right in the middle of it. Even then, I must have realized there was power there, a thinning place of the veil between worlds. I believe there is a crossroads for every realm of the supernatural.

      The crossroads legend became popular with the story of the renowned, American blues singer Robert Leroy Johnson and another musical colleague, Tommy Johnson. Both say they met a mysterious helper at the crossroads. There are many versions of this tale—all with a variety of storytelling—but I’m going to choose the most popular version and tell the one about Robert Johnson, who recorded in the thirties. According to the legend, as a young man living on a plantation in rural Mississippi, Robert Johnson wanted to become a great blues musician. He was instructed to take his guitar to a crossroad at midnight. There he was met by a mysterious black man who took the guitar and tuned it up to perfection. The crossroads spirit played a few songs and then returned the guitar to Johnson, giving him mastery over the instrument. Robert Johnson was able to create great blues music and become famous for it. I have always loved that story. As a matter of fact, Robert Johnson’s music in the background is helping me to write this chapter; that is inspiration at its best!

      With further research and study, I have learned that the idea of a crossroads as a supernatural entryway is not uncommon. The crossroads is a place that is not claimed by the living or the dead; it’s an in-between place where our physical world and the supernatural world merge. While investigating house hauntings, I have experienced several instances in which the origin of the supernatural happenings happened at the crossroads near those houses.

      In this work, I’m going to describe my experiences, insight, and thoughts about the supernatural. I am on a symbolic journey and standing at the crossroads to record a very elusive reality that at one point or another will cross the threshold into our everyday existence. At that time, we will be forever changed in the way that we see life, death, and destiny. With each chapter, you will enter a different cross-roads into other realms, deepening your understanding of what resides behind the inspirited curtain that separates us from the others. All of my books have been a journey and an evolution of my own spiritual viewpoints. This book is the most intimate of all because it is where I truly live and breathe. For the first time, I am opening up and exposing my innermost, cherished supernatural experiences. I’m sharing them with you as examples of a big, wide world that surrounds us but is not located within the physical. In an honest moment here, I admit that the supernatural world is where I am most comfortable. Whenever I pass a crossroads, I always feel comforted by the fact that no matter how concrete, plastic, or fake this world gets, there are still some actual supernatural wonders and magic somewhere in this great country of ours. No one can duplicate or fake the real supernatural. The answers are at the crossroads, and we are all headed there to see what wonders await.

The Veil: Pay Attention to the Man behind the Curtain

       “Curiouser and curiouser!”

      —Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

      Since the beginning of time, man has been fascinated and even obsessed with the unseen worlds that exist all around us. From the communion of spirits within sacred rituals performed by our ancestors to the saturation of current paranormal reality television, a deep desire to know and connect with the mystery behind the invisible curtain that separates our world from “theirs” is in our very core. I truly believe that even the harshest of skeptics embraces a quiet wonder of what else lies beyond in the unknown realms. I myself was born into a world of ghosts and folklore. In the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas there still lives a rich tradition of spiritualism and magic. Underneath the very buckle of the Bible belt, it is easy to sense that there is mystery and supernatural wonder in those hills. For whatever reason, souls that lost their way hundreds of years ago continue to wander in a perpetual dream state, lost in the dark forests of the Ozarks. I have felt them. I have heard the lonely cries calling from a world beyond mine.

      As a child, the supernatural was natural to me. My grandmother filled my childhood with stories from her own childhood of things going bump in the night, ghosts walking up creaky stairs, and spiritual miracles of healing performed by granny witches who had the power of herb and chant. Little did I know at the time that my grandmother was telling me of very real occurrences. She was nurturing my own abilities to see these things for myself by keeping my mind open to the possibility of different realities. I realized long ago in metaphor that the “man behind the curtain” was real, and I should pay attention—close attention.

      What if the dark figure we have seen in the corner of the room were real? Or what about the big, hairy creature that ran across the road one rainy night; was that Bigfoot? How would you see your life then? Accept that all of the ghost stories, angelic encounters, mystical visions, and the monsters of folklore just might be real. You might sense a completely new dimension of living if you allow yourself to believe, just for a moment, that the realms of the supernatural and its inhabitants are as real as the pages of this book. We can recognize that the interest in what is beyond the veil is at its peak these days just by watching the subject matter on films and TV and by reading about it in published media.

      The reason I wanted to write this particular book and throw in my two cents’ worth on the subject was to give you, the seeker, a more grounded and factual perspective on a very elusive reality. This book will help direct you with some discernment to the many mansions beyond our world. With the sweet, comes the sour, and with the many opportunities of publishing and video accessibility, anyone and everyone can throw out their thoughts on psychic and supernatural studies. Some of it’s good, and some of it is just plain baloney. I could not stand by any longer without writing