The Ax.
It's August in Sarasota, circa 2016 and like every August in South Florida, it is straight- up ridiculously hot, humid and sweaty.
Most of the residents on Siesta Key have left for cooler options for the Summer thus I am the concierge for a home of friends on the island.
They live on a fairly remote dead end street, off of a side road that then connects with 2 of the 3 main traffic arteries that run through the key. Either will ultimately take you within easy walking distance to the water's edge.
Unique unto itself, this particular road is deliberately marked private and left as a mixture of dirt and gravel in order to avoid any unwanted traffic from assuming they can use it at all. The densely tropical landscape adds to its charm as a relaxed and relatively low-key retreat of high-end homes that have managed to both disguise and hide themselves from the outside world without the use of gates, fences or pavement.
It is Sunday morning, 5:30AM and I am wide awake.
I am the scheduled guest speaker for the morning service at a spiritually-focused church at 10 AM. I must arrive by 9:15.
The talk I plan to give is on my mind and I am unexpectedly feeling anxious instead of how I expect to feel, which is settled and grounded.
My plan is to share a story from a few years earlier about a time when I was working with a client and was assisted by some quite magnificent Angelic Beings. The unusual part was that they had said that while they were here to assist me, they would also be working directly with me as well.
Not completely understanding their point but feeling deeply safe and reassured, I had simply sat very still and observed their actions. Carefully following the flow of energy at the most refined levels,I had listened as my guidance reassured me that all was in absolute alignment with the highest good.
Two gentle giants positioned themselves behind me while 4 others had begun to work directly with my client's energy. My eyes and attention never left her so I have no other way to explain it except that it was simultaneous, multi-dimensional, and completely connected to my client’s narrative as well as my own. Remembering this experience as I lay in bed, I recalled the details of feeling a sensation similar to a real backpack being unzipped on my back. It had actually felt like it was a part of my own back and that somehow it had always been there and I had just never noticed it before. One of the beings had then reached into the “pack” and begun to remove several of what looked to be ancient medieval weapons. I had watched as this continued and then, more than a bit bewildered, had finally asked, “what is going on?” “What are we doing?”
One of the Beings had leaned down and comfortingly touched my shoulder as he replied,
“We are removing all of your hidden weapons.”
Startled, I had asked, “what do you mean?”
The two of them had smiled at one another as they answered me:
“We are removing your hidden weapons.”
“You no longer need them anymore.”
Trying to comprehend the magnitude of what was happening,
I had simply nodded, “Thank you.”
From that point we had continued on until my client’s journey was complete.
I knew I would be sharing this particular experience with an audience this morning who thrived on understanding the connection between life on Earth and life beyond the physical realms. Source has always used me as an instrument for conscious sharing and is especially attuned to the details and specifics of how my real-life experiences come together for use as a greater teaching tool.
The decision to retell this particular story came to me when I asked what I should focus on and share. So I did exactly what I always do. I followed my trusted directive.
*****With this and the unexplained anxiety on my mind I decided to take a walk to the beach to be with the sunrise. I am aware that I will likely need to walk fast in order to be gone for the hour it will take and still stay within the timeframe needed to efficiently manage a cooling down period, shower, eat, prep my hair and makeup, review my notes and still be out the door on time without having to rush.
It is still dark as I leave the house. I am aware that I am quite literally the only person in any of these homes this particular week.
The whole island is very quiet.
As I head towards “The Village” I take the liberty of walking straight down the middle of the road because I have never seen zero movement on the streets of Siesta Key. The silence along with the dark gray sky is quite delicious.
As I grow closer to the edge of the retail section there is a gas station on my left and a significant hedge on my right.
Out of the blue, the hedge moves and a young man of about 20-22 half bolts, half stumbles out of them as if perhaps he had a rough night and has just come to.
He doesn't look at me and I don't give it much thought except to give him some room to cross the street in front of me.
I continue on and eventually take a right and head west to the beach.
It is a particularly sticky, humid morning. I walk the beach as the sun begins its ascent and enjoy the grace and relief of a balmy breeze .
The coastline curves back to the east just a bit and and continues on toward “point of rocks.” I try to calculate the time on my own as I did not bring my phone. I round the bend at the condo’s we simply refer to as “TheTowers” and decide to cut the walk short by heading North through the Village.
This puts me on a straight trajectory through the main retail, restaurant and bar section of Siesta Key. Until this point.
I have yet to see anyone on the beach other than one woman out shelling.
Walking toward the Village, I see movement ahead at a bike rack in front of Daiquiri Deck. I slow my pace down to watch and realize it is that same kid from the bushes and it appears he is checking to see if any bikes are unlocked.
I lean against a wall, essentially hiding, and wait until he moves on and then I purposefully continue through the village.
I am in a really good place internally now, feeling strong and rebalanced.
At the same time that I opt to cut right and take the back way through the surrounding neighborhoods to get home, I see a quarter on the ground. I smile as I pick it up because I instantly hear a familiar inscription from one of my favorite Angel cards as if it is being spoken to me :
``We drop feathers and coins along your path to let you know we are always with you and that you are never alone.”
Saying thank you, out loud, I lean into the knowledge that I am being given the confidence to calmly and clearly present my talk and not be anxious about how it is received. Trust. I put the quarter in my pocket and kept going.
Focused on getting back and getting ready, I picked up my pace.
Winding through the heavily wooded backstreets of this old island neighborhood, I eventually turned onto “our” road. I could see the sprawling house with the substantial mosaic staircase in the bend in front of me and began to aim myself directly toward it when without warning I hear an urgent, strong, male voice in my head literally say:
“Turn Around.”
Lost in my thoughts I reply out loud: “huh?”
And then I hear it again, except this time it is not a request, it is a command:
“Turn Around. NOW.”
Confused, I completely stop and look back over my shoulder.
The kid from the bushes and the bike rack has just rounded the corner onto the street with me and is acting as if he is “exercising” exactly as I have been doing, with his movements almost identical to the rhythms of my posturing and gate.
The road is quite narrow so I do as I’m told and turn around.
I start walking directly toward him and pass within 4 feet of him. He does not look up.
I quickly walked back to the “top of the road,” turned left at the corner and hid behind a giant tree in the neighbors side yard to watch him. I know that these neighbors are out of town and I don't usually scare easily but I suddenly realize I might seriously be in a compromised position. A quick assessment of my surroundings reminds me that all of the homes leading to Ocean Blvd are empty. I know this because I make it a point to know.
It is 6:50 AM and I am utterly alone.
I turn toward The Pass and keep moving when instinctively, I just stop.
I don't know why except that for some reason I know cannot just run from this.
I can feel every cell of my body vibrating in a heightened state of primal fear as I hear myself blurt out into the empty space in front of me:
“I AM SCARED.” I don't know what to do.” “I need help!.”
AND I mean it.
Like most of them at this point, the big old house to my left has a giant stucco wall that fences in the house and prevents you from seeing inside the yard except at the gated driveway. I am standing where the pavement meets the end of the driveway. On either side of the driveway there is about a 2.5 foot expanse of dirt between the pavement and the wall that lines the street.
I am not even aware of how incredibly hyper-focused I have become because it's as if I am not thinking at all. Just super present. At that moment I noticed something in the expanse of dirt to the right of the end of the driveway. My brain literally cannot process what I am seeing, so it doesn't.
There, In the dirt, lying less than a foot from me, is an Ax.
Not a small hatchet, but a big-assed, Paul Bunyon, old-fashioned, logger-level, heavy duty Ax. Its blade is rusted but completely intact and its handle has taken on the same weathered look of the dirty sand.
With zero thought and pure instinct, I keep my back to him and in one big sidestep left, lean down and pick up the Ax. .
I have not even turned around to see where he is.
It's as if I am in a bizarre trance and have somehow managed to find and pick up a very heavy, very substantial Ax and am now holding it in my hands, completely unsure of how it materialized, how I saw it, or what to do next.
I do not kid you when I say my brain and hands were literally trying to catch up to its existence.
I slowly turn around and the kid is about 6 feet behind me.
My mind takes snapshots that I don't remember nor understand until later.
He has something in his hands that looks like drumsticks and is holding them in both hands as if he is doing arm exercises or something. He is not looking up so I call him out. I am eerily calm but I don't hold back.
“I know you are following me.”
“I'm not following you, stupid btch.”
“Yes you are and let's be clear about something,”
(He does not look into my eyes, ever, but I see his eyes register the ax in my hands).
“I know every inch of your face and body.
I can describe you in any line up and to anybody on this island.
By this afternoon everyone on this fcking island is going to know what you are doing right now and you won't be able to hide.”
He growls loudly back at me,
“Fck you bitch, I'm not fcking following you, you stupid cnt.”
My mind registers every word in some weird internal data bank and takes another snapshot of his hands and the drumsticks.
They seem to have some kind of wire attaching them together.
This doesn't register at the time.
I simply take the photo.
I don't have time to think about this at all.
Out of nowhere I feel myself snap into a higher gear.
It is not like I am absent nor is it like I am out of control.
It is an absolute survival instinct that I don't have time to analyze.
And I am a big analyzer.
It is at this exact moment that I see the man who is always on the sidewalk on the key, usually asleep in the boiling heat at various points on Ocean Blvd. He appears to live in his wheelchair even though I have heard that he does have shelter and means.
I have also heard that he is a Viet Nam Veteran and that there are some mental health issues. I have encountered him on my walks and have said hello for years but he does not respond nor appear to be coherent when our paths have crossed.
He becomes one of my snapshots.
He is watching all of this from a heavily wooded area across the street. He is alert and conscious and I can literally feel his presence there with me.
The kid's level of aggression is of a hard, simmering, insidious level of meanness and I hold my ax firmly and tell him that if I ever see him again I will chop him into a million pieces.
(I understand in the retelling of this that my reaction seems to advocate violence. Please withhold judgment around this as it confused me as well until I understood the totality of the experience).
As I am saying this to him I also realize that I have no idea why I am saying it. I knew for a fact that (most likely) I wouldn't and couldn't chop anything up into a million pieces but the threat coming from him was so real that it felt as if my energy literally mirrored his and it was mandatory that he not take this for granted.
At the same time I can still see vividly the alert, bright blue eyes of the man in the wheelchair watching from across the street. It is like they are searing into me as if he has left his body and is right there with me as I am saying these things to this kid.
Like he is imprinting on me exactly what to say.
The words, the tone, the emphasis. All of it.
It is at this point that the kid backs down.
Although he is growling hard like an animal and still spewing obscenities about me, he redirects them to himself and begins to walk away from me and back down Ocean Blvd in the direction of the Village.
I can still see the man across the street in his wheelchair even though it feels like he is somehow standing right here with me. I feel stuck in the spot in the street where I've been standing.
I cannot get my feet to move.
I am still holding the handle of the Ax exactly as I had picked it up, upside down. The blade is dangling just above my ankles.
I can feel him and hear him inside my head now as first he urges,
then commands of me: “Move.” “Go, now.” “MOVE!”
So I do. I don't look back at him or to see where the kid went.
I turn and begin to walk back to our road and hesitate before I turn because
“what if he comes back?”
Clearly he knows I am alone.
Did he see what house I was going to?
I was almost at the driveway and to the mosaic front steps.
All 17 of them and then the porch landing.
The big wooden door.
Everything is so hyper focused.
I let myself inside and realize I am sweaty, hungry, and emotionally wiped out. I look at the clock and panic. I have moved into a complete fight or flight response. I have lost so much time and now I have to go give this talk and I need to call the police but what do I tell them and can it wait because I have to do what I have to do this morning? My mind is all over the place as I step in the shower and begin to shake.
What the hell is going on this morning?
I get out of the shower, wrap myself in a robe and head to the living room. It is a spacious and quiet space and I choose the most comfy chair in the room and focus on settling myself. I force myself to breathe calmly, in a rhythmic pattern.
Finally feeling exhausted yet gratefully more at peace, I speak internally to my Guidance, saying:
“I do not understand what just happened. Please show me.”
Instantly I see the first snapshot I took of the boy with the drumsticks. He is holding them out in front of his body as he walks past me as if he is exercising, just after I was told to turn around.
There is a wire attaching the two drumsticks.
I am heading up the front steps. He is quick.
Running up the steps behind me, he separates the drumsticks and puts the wire over my head and around my neck.
I am immediately jolted from my seat in shock.
Holy sht!
He was going to strangle me.
And then I see the snapshot of the Ax in the dirt and I hear them (My Guidance)
as clear as a bell:
“We gave you an instrument that matched the level of harm that He intended to inflict on you.”
I am as still as I’ve ever been in my life. I honestly don't know how to respond or react. Frozen solid in the present moment.
A few minutes go by and still I am not moving.
At all.
A voice inside my head reminds me that I have a commitment this morning.
I realize I may have been sitting like this for a very long time and I have to snap out of it. I start to move and am aware that I am somehow split down the middle. Part of me is moving forward to get ready because of course now I have to rush and the other part of me is still literally glued to the chair staring into space.
I cannot help her right now. I have to get my act together and leave. I think to call the police but I do not. I don't have time to do it right now.
I quickly dress, grab my things, put the ax by the inside of the front door so that I will be able to see it when I return, say a quick prayer of thanks, ask for guidance with my talk and leave.
All the while I am somehow aware that part of me is still sitting in that chair.
I honestly do not remember much about my talk that morning.
I asked to be utilized for the highest good and to use my voice and my vibration for the good of all and the harm of none. I can only surmise that it was done as I remember a number of people saying it was powerful and that a line of people wanted to connect with me afterwards. I know I was there, and I also know that I also was not.
Returning to the house was discombobulating. I called the police and the dispatcher literally said sarcastically, “Well what do you want us to do about it?”
I said perhaps you could share it with your officers on the Key?
Perhaps you could take down his description and alert the community?
Perhaps you could have someone drive down this road for a while so that it is clear you are in the vicinity for some reason?
It was a very disheartening conversation.
* Please understand that I am actually in support of law enforcement when upheld for the protection and good of all and I KNOW that there are many who take this pledge and put their lives on the line for us 24/7 and absolutely uphold it while risking their own. My respect and gratitude is beyond genuine and authentic. Nevertheless, let’s just say that this was not a conversation of the finest hour.
I called my son and told him what had happened.
He didn't miss a beat. He came over, listened to me and then without my asking, he calmly announced that he was spending the night. He stayed for several nights over the next few weeks, as if this was the norm, again without my asking.
For my own peace of mind, I made the decision to keep the ax by the inside of the giant wooden front doors so that it would remind me to be aware, know that I have a “weapon” that is NOT HIDDEN and that (They) “drop coins and feathers along my path to let me know they are always with me and I am never alone.”
Later that same afternoon I mentioned the incident to one other person on our street who is a local and who also attended to a home a few houses down from mine. He got a funny look on his face and said that he knew of the kid I was describing and that he would ‘put the word out’.
A few weeks later he said that no one had seen him at all since my experience but that “ the word was out and people are watching out for him.”
I tried to let it go. I tried to not be afraid. I talked myself into believing that I was not afraid. Nevertheless, I occasionally went to the ax and picked it up to remind myself that it materialized out of nowhere and that I had protection.
I convinced myself that keeping it there was intentional and that it was truly given to me to know I had a way to protect myself and for me to feel safe.
Meanwhile, I ignored the undercurrent of simmering anxiety that I was holding at bay.
Especially since my son was there and he kept me company in such an easy, no big deal kind of way so that I could begin to relax a little.
And then the time came when I was by myself again.
I gave myself courageous little pep talks as I left for work each day and looked around at the deserted neighborhood. Sometimes I would even step back in and look at the ax or pat it occasionally. Always thanking ‘THEM’ before I left. This went on for several more weeks.
Finally, one day, I hit the wall with unexplained anxiety and sat myself down for a little talk about this. Once again, I grounded my energy and connected with my center. I did my rhythmic breathing to stimulate my vagus nerve. Finally I felt the stillness completely settle into me. I heard myself addressing Them:
“Please, help me. I truly don't understand what purpose the ax is to serve now. I feel like I want to keep it (forever) and that you want me to keep it at the door so that I know I am safe. I get all of this, it really does make sense to me and I am grateful. What I don't understand is why I am still so anxious. I seriously feel like having it there makes me more anxious instead of more settled but I am also afraid to move it because you gave it to me and this truly does not make sense to me. Please help me to understand.”
Firmly, yet very gently and with a respectful sense of humor, I hear light laughter and an utterly pure and loving response to me:
“LeeAnne! We didn't give you the ax so that you would keep it at the front door! And we didnt give it to you to keep you safe!”
“We gave you the weapon for exactly the opposite purpose.”
“We gave it to you so you would have something tangible.
This is always your request and we love when you allow us to honor it.
Please remember, WE GAVE YOU THE QUARTER FIRST. We let you know right away that we knew what was coming before you ever realized it.
We imprinted the message of the Angel Card into your mind.
And then, when you asked with the purity, innocence and complete trust of a child, We gave you the appropriate tool to match the energy of the event.
We didn't “mess around” as you like to say.
We meant business and so did you!
LeeAnne!
That ax was not for him Dear girl.
That ax was for you to know you can trust us.
In everything you do. And yes, we mean everything. “
“So, let's be clear!
When you looked down and saw the ax you said your mind couldn't compute what it was seeing, right?”
“Right”.
“But you also knew, instantaneously, that you could completely protect yourself in that moment against a truly dangerous predator, correct?”
“Yes.”
“So, again, you immediately knew when you picked it up and it was HEAVY with a GIANT blade, that you would win in that situation, yes?”
“Yes, all of my fear went away and I was filled with a sense of power I couldn't explain.”
“So you see, we didn't mess around.
And we DON'T mess around.
We work for you, my Dear.
And by “you” we mean we work for the Good of all and the Harm of No One and that is the Vision to which we are all committed.
We made it CLEAR for a REASON.
It is important that you have circled back around to ask these questions.
We have been counting on it.
It is also important that you have experienced your anxiety to such a point
that in order to get REAL relief you have simply had to
step back again
and in the purity, innocence and trust of a child,
ASK US for our intervention.
Our relationship with you
is based entirely on TRUST.
We trust you
To
Trust US.
So yes, DearHeart, keep the Ax.
Use it to share your experience throughout your life.
And perhaps one day you will write it down, for them and for us.
Until that time comes, just remember that Hidden weapons or weapons of any kind make no sense in our living, loving, thriving Universe.
You have been here and you have been there and you have lived among all of us and yes, you do remember.
Now use that memory and help them remember.
Our support is not just for some, it is for everyone.
YOU DON'T EVER NEED
to have a weapon.
YOU HAVE US”
