Oddity Shop
This podcast examines the oddities of the world...Cryptids to Conspiracies, Cults to Curiosities, Myths to Mysteries, and so much more! Stop by the shop, where the bizarre is always on sale... Each week your curators, Kara Perakovic and Zach Palmer will be opening the shop and sharing stories with you.
Oddity Shop
Wendigo VS. Skinwalker Pt 2: Unmasking Ancient Terrors
Welcome To The Oddity Shop, Where The Bizarre is Always on Sale. This week, your Curator Kara is talking all things Skinwalkers, Listen at your own Risk!
The shadows between what we know and what we fear are often populated by entities that defy explanation. This week, we venture into territory that makes even the most seasoned paranormal enthusiasts uncomfortable – the realm of the skinwalker.
Following our previous exploration of wendigos, we now turn to these shapeshifting entities from Navajo tradition, respectfully referring to them as "flesh pedestrians" throughout our discussion. We trace their origins as medicine men who chose a dark path, performing forbidden rituals including the ultimate betrayal – the killing of a close blood relative.
What makes these entities particularly terrifying is their ability to blend seamlessly with normal wildlife. Unlike the distinctly monstrous wendigo, skinwalkers appear as ordinary animals with subtle "wrong" qualities that might be difficult to detect until it's too late. They select their forms strategically, choosing for speed, stealth, strength, or deadly capabilities, and can shift between shapes if pursued.
Would you recognize a skinwalker if you encountered one? More importantly, would you know how to protect yourself?
References:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendigo
- https://www.britannica.com/topic/wendigo
- https://allthatsinteresting.com/wendigo
- https://www.facinghistory.org/ideas-week/more-monsters-deeper-significance-wendigo-stories#:~:text=In%20most%20traditions%2C%20the%20wendigo,from%20possession%20by%20a%20spirit.
- https://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/strange-creatures/wendigoes3.htm
Shop MI Mystical Forest on Etsy – where spirit meets craftsmanship.
For a limited time, enter code “oddball” at checkout to receive 10% off plus a free pendulum. Or simply Click Here
Each Week at the Oddity Shop, Your Curators Kara and Zach will bring you Creepy, Strange, Weird Bizarre Stories from around the globe!
The Shop's phone lines are open! Give us a call and leave a voicemail (Or two!) with your creepy personal tale/oddity, and it could be featured on a future episode!
616.320.4935
JOIN US ON PATREON: Click Here!
Join the Oddity Shop on Patreon for Day Early Access to Episodes and tons of bonus content!!!
Visit our Website to learn more!
Email Us at: oddityshoppodcast.com
www.OddityShopPodcast.com
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. Affiliate programs are designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to the partner site.
I want to dance with the mothman at the IA shop, baked in the moonlight at the IA shop. Creep through the graveyard to the IA shop. The door's always open at the IA shop. Welcome back to the Oddity Shop, our little oddballs. This is the podcast where we tell you stories about the odd, creepy, weird, bizarre and those who shall not be named. Oh, apparently that's a new one. I like it. I'm your curator, zachary, sitting here with the other halfway decent curator, kara, hello.
Speaker 1:What's behind your world is if anybody cares. Ugh, okay, so uh, ash, hello, what's counting?
Speaker 2:your world is, if anybody cares, okay. So, uh, ash from morbid recommended a book and so I was like, oh, okay, and it was called um, so thirsty, and it's by rachel harrison and it's a van the pyre uh book, and so I was like, oh cool, I'll read it, uh. But you know, I don't really have time to sit down and read. So I listened to it. So I don't think it counts as reading, but I listened to it and it was really good. So for those that like books like that, I am not a smut book person. It's just not my jam. I don't need very smut, I don't need. It's just that's not what I'm into. So I was kind of hoping that this wasn't going to be like a vampire smut, but it's not. It was actually pretty good. It was still a love story, but it was really cool. It was about being turned into a vampire and the crazy effects of it, and I really thoroughly enjoyed it.
Speaker 2:So then, effects on the libido, the lust of blood and murder. So I listened to that and I really liked it. So I listened to that and I really liked it. So then I bought another book from her, called such sharp teeth, because it's a werewolf book.
Speaker 1:This is how you slowly get sucked. If you start reading stephanie goddamn meyer I don't think I will, but maybe.
Speaker 2:Uh. No, I really liked this rachel harrison. She has a whole bunch of books, I think, ones on like a witch, like stuff like that. So I plan on like listening to them all because they were just good, they weren't long ones, they're nothing crazy, just like zones you out into, you know this reminds me of a time I went into a bookstore with Julia amazing bookstore girl that I once knew so it was.
Speaker 1:It's like one of those like the floor creaks every step.
Speaker 1:It's just oh yes, a labyrinth of shelves, okay dusty. So I was like hey, do you guys have like a paranormal and occult section? Because, yeah, it's back in that corner when so I walked over there, uh about a year ago probably, and I get back there and I do find the paranormal and occult. Like when I say shelf, I'm not even talking shelf top to bottom, I mean like half of a shelf, but it was surrounded by three full floor-to-ceiling shelves of paranormal romance oh no, I didn't realize there was such a draw.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, must I can't?
Speaker 1:that's not my thing okay, so while you're reading your smut books, well, it seems like.
Speaker 2:It seems like a gateway to smut um I would rather have a gateway drug into real hard drugs than read smut books it'll happen.
Speaker 1:No, I've been thinking about plants. So you know, we've been doing some. I've been doing some researching of my bedroom and some other things. Wait, do you remember when? Um chris jenner?
Speaker 2:was trying to spell like zhuzh of my bedroom and some other things. Wait, do you remember when um chris jenner was trying to spell like zhuzh? How do you spell zhuzh?
Speaker 1:oh, I actually don't know I, I actually almost said that to somebody at work today. Well, like I mean not, how do you spell it? I almost typed it to somebody in slack. How?
Speaker 2:do you spell?
Speaker 1:it, I think the closest I've seen is j-h-u-z, but I don't know but anyways the zhuzhing has been happening and now I have a couple empty.
Speaker 1:So I'm not going to replace all the plants that died. This last year I've been going crazy. I've had way too many plants. It's been stressing me out so I'm downsized. But now I have the perfect setup and I know which exact five plants I want. Where did you put the plants you got rid of, or they just died. So I had quite a few that died this last year because last summer I just didn't do my best. Now the ones that I have placed are all doing really well, because everything that I have placed is actually in a place where that plant should be.
Speaker 2:So when you say you downsized, you mean they died yes.
Speaker 1:But my orchids are now where they should be and they re-bloom.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And like so. But so now I know specifically what five plants I want, based on the lighting, as I've learned now. So I'm not going to go back to 40. I'm going to keep it to like 25 to 30.
Speaker 2:I think I'll look 100.
Speaker 1:But I know exactly, I know Well you. Just your house has way more natural light than mine, I natural light than mine.
Speaker 1:I do, I do. It pisses me off, I'm sorry. So what? Five plants, zachary? Um, I well, I realized I used to have the most. I used to have like four or five spider plants and I don't have any now. So I'm I'm putting a spider plant back in, okay, and I need a couple like, um, philodendron style vines that are low light vines, okay, and then I have a ton of cuttings going, so you can, okay, perfect I do still want, even though every time I get one I don't know how to do it but a pilea.
Speaker 1:What is that one? Pilea, pilia, it's the um one. It's like a stalk with a saucer on the end, like an out of the water lily pad, but they have a bunch of them.
Speaker 2:Oh okay, chinese money plant is, oh I have a couple of those, so those can be hard I know well.
Speaker 1:So I finally had a um god, I'm I'm blanking on the scientific name of it now, and it's when you and I, the alacasia, my alacasia, is doing fantastic the arrowhead oh god, you know, I'm so bad with the names of these plants.
Speaker 2:I have have so many plants but I don't fucking know the names.
Speaker 1:That. So I think I'm going to get some more of those. Okay, but the other thing is and I don't even know if I've told you this I paid off my car two years early, and that's my good thing.
Speaker 2:You did not tell me this. I paid off my car. Oh my God, I'm so proud of y'all. I am lean free. Oh God, I am lean clean.
Speaker 1:Drive and machine. There you go. All right, those are my exciting things for you. Wow, All right Well those were more better than my books. Do you know? You know what? I was going to tell a story about?
Speaker 2:something you and I did last night, but I'm gonna hold on to this one, that's so funny because I was just gonna tell that story but then I was like, maybe not, let's hold on to it because I think we're gonna have an update for it.
Speaker 1:Y'all. I'm trying to scheme my way into a house that I think is haunted. I have no idea, I just walked by it the other day. I'm gonna do, I'm gonna, I'm gonna really show my crazy and I know it's just a route for me the most unhinged human.
Speaker 2:Last night, when we were talking for like an hour and a half, the most.
Speaker 1:You just saw my real estate side and this is the the level of no things I have access to and creeping that we do.
Speaker 2:It wasn't even just for that, though, just in general you were very hinged last night I've been on very little sleep this week okay let's open, do you have?
Speaker 1:no no, my question figure it out okay, did you sage oh god, I know what we're talking about this week too, and I I would love to say yes okay, maybe everybody, if you have some sage, be saging it up sage spray. We need to like buy our listeners, at least the patreon. Some sage spray for all the freaking shit horrible energy we bring into your house. Yeah, okay, sorry about it. That's our question. Shop's open, let's go. Sorry about it sorry about it, sorry yeah, because we're gonna have to pretend to be Canadians.
Speaker 2:Okay, we're now going to from last episode. If you didn't listen to last episode, I guess you could listen to this one first, because it's just a comparison. But you probably should start at last episode, because we talked about the Wendigo, the Windy Boy, and this episode. We are now talking about the commonly mistaken or confused for or intertwined thought of the Skinwalker.
Speaker 1:Bum, bum, bum.
Speaker 2:As a refresher, we are going to call them flesh pedestrians.
Speaker 1:And disclaimer nobody will be mad if you fall off this episode, because talking about them can draw them.
Speaker 2:Yes, so if you leave, I'm good, all right.
Speaker 1:We'll miss you.
Speaker 2:See you next week.
Speaker 2:Who knows, might be crazier next week. Oh God, all right. They say there's a name you shouldn't speak lightly Yee, nald Loshi, the one who walks on all fours Ew, who walks on all fours. Among the Navajo, it marks a being of dark power, feared not for what it is but for what it used to be A skinwalker, once human, now something else, something twisted by forbidden rights, lurking in the form of beasts and shadows. Flesh pedestrians can shape, shift themselves as different animals, making them easily undetectable, and I'm not sure what's less terrifying, both equally. Is it more terrifying to see it or for it to be shapeshift into an animal that you just normally see?
Speaker 1:Oh well, I would say like for the fact of being able to ignore it. So if you think about like, if I didn't know.
Speaker 2:But OK, so let's get. I'm going to backtrack a second. So if you think about the Windy Boy, what that presents as OK, that's very terrifying, terrifying. Or an animal that you think is just an innocently animal as a flesh pedestrian, it's more terrifying. They're just, they're actually both very terrifying. It would be terrifying to see a visual of that crazy.
Speaker 1:Oh, I don't know it's I will say, though, like here's the deal, at least with the windy boy if you see it, you know exactly what you're dealing with where I've seen some you think videos of yeah, like, and you know most times the videos on youtube and reddit and stuff, like I count them off, but I've seen some videos of the flesh pedestrians where it's like it presents something at first and then just slightly alters or changes, and that to me is horrifying, because then you don't trust anything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it reminds me of the not dear yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, that's, I think, how we got on this originally. I'm saying kind of. Yeah, if it, if it slightly shifted, I actually think to me that's more terrifying to see the fleshy than the Wendy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I kind of agree, OK, but I think the fleshy than the wendy. Yeah, I kind of agree, um, okay, but I I think that we might be able to all also picture the image that is a lot of times referenced, with a flesh pedestrian and it's a creature that's on all fours but its body is like a u-shape. And I think you know what I'm talking about, zach. It's very creepy, it's like fleshy, pinky tones, it's's like all fours, its body is U-shaped but its head is protruding out. Is that a good description of what I'm trying to? Yeah, do you know what picture I'm talking about?
Speaker 1:I know exactly the picture you're talking about. It's like very back rooms. Ask, I would say Google it.
Speaker 2:Well. So I don't know if that's very like a new age, like now representation of it. I would say, if you're going more with the Navajo, it's more of just like presents itself as an animal.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay. So the Navajo speaks of two paths of a practitioner may walk, One of healing and one of no harm. Those who learn to use spiritual forces for the good of others become medicine men, using their knowledge to heal, protect and guide their people. But there are others who turn toward darkness. These are witches, followers of the witchery way. They are said to work with death itself, using human remains to craft tools of harm bones shaped into instruments, flesh and blood brewed into potions meant to curse, wound or even kill In certain tales. Witches were not always evil. They once walked the path of healers and spiritual guides, using their gifts to aid others. But somewhere along the way they turned from the light and embraced the shadows. To become a skinwalker, One must undergo a secret and forbidden rite, hidden from the eyes of the world. It is said that to gain the dark power of transformation, the ability to take the form of the beast, a witch, must commit the ultimate betrayal the killing of a close blood relative, often a sibling. Okay, what the fuck? What? Give me your thoughts?
Speaker 1:I hate these things and I actually, I like, I think these are more real than uh, not more real, more prevalent than what we talked about last week. I also, I think I've possibly experienced one. Well, so did I?
Speaker 2:We'll talk about that at the end.
Speaker 1:These ones make me a little bit more uncomfortable, which is for the OK. My brain is still going on some things. I want to hold my comments for, though, so you keep going.
Speaker 2:All right, some things I want to hold my comments for, though. So you keep going. All right. Skinwalkers are most often seen in the forms of wolves, foxes, coyotes, cougars, dogs or bears, so again, think of the creature that walks on all fours. But their power allows them to take the shape of nearly any creature. They choose their form with purpose, which is so creepy to me, so selecting for speed, stealth, strength or sharp claws and teeth. If chased or cornered, they can shift again, slipping away as another beast, which is so cool. It's very cool to me Because I wish I could just. But their gifts don't really end with transformation. A flush pedestrian can paralyze a victim with a single gaze, bending their own will to its own. It's said they can read thoughts, spread illness, bring death and ruin homes with dark magic. They commend the night's creatures owls, wolves and worse of magic. They commend the night's creatures, owls, wolves and worse, and some say they can summon the dead or even rise them from their graves.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's horrible so it's weird because I think that to me, before I was kind of researching these two uh, I guess, if we will, I kind of thought that the flesh pedestrian was more commonly known, but it's actually not. It's the Wendy boy is more commonly known from people. But I think now some of like the paranormal researchers, investigators that you and I know of, they've been going to a lot of places that have more flesh pedestrian sightings or things. So that's, I think, why I thought it was more prominent I think there's.
Speaker 1:There's two things that have helped it. I think one is in the last, I would say, decade we've had a huge resurgence of appalachian lore becoming way more prevalent in the paranormal society and regular society as well, right like a lot more of those stories coming out being told, and these are very common out there. I also think we have tv shows like well, like Skinwalker Ranch exactly, which has nothing to do with it, but it has put them from being something more native and cultural to being more in the spotlight. So I think they've kind of been having their moment, yeah.
Speaker 2:Flesh pedestrians are feared for their potential to bring sickness, death and misfortune to those they target. Like I said before, because they present mostly as animals, it's hard to detect. Yet some say there are signs to watch for Strange behaviors in animals that just don't seem right, creatures that move with an eerie purpose, stare with glowing eyes or behave in ways so unnatural Even in human form. Flesh pedestrians are said to move in twisted, unnatural ways, their motions wrong in a way, their eye contact like just quite. You can't really explain it, but it's just like everything about them is just like not right. Their presence is often felt before it's seen, bringing with it a heavy dread and overwhelming sense that something nearby is deeply, dangerously wrong.
Speaker 1:See, this makes me think they're not that different from the not deer?
Speaker 2:No, they're not, and I know we did kind of like touch on that, like the not deer, whether the not deer are just a flesh pedestrian and they're not just an own thing of itself, would make a lot of sense. So I guess, what are your feelings? So I'm going to let you take the stage and I'm going to let you do your little bit of a present presentation because, I'm going to be honest, there isn't much more about flesh pedestrians than what we kind of just went over. So this is a great time for you to kind of go into whatever you'd like to, before I I kind of teased it last week but here here is.
Speaker 1:Here's why I asked you. So last week I asked you if you found anything in your research of the um like draining of people's energy right, because I have heard that about wendigos, but I've also heard that about flesh pedestrians, which you also just stated. It makes people sick, it makes them worn down, this and that. So there's also a couple of things that you've mentioned across both episodes which are very similar. Yeah Right, so don't look at the Wendy boy, right, it'll lure you outside. But this one, if you see it, it kind of has that same psychic control.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I can't remember. I'm so sorry in this episode if you've mentioned it yet, but one of the things, at least in the Appalachian version of the Flesh Pedestrian, is a high chance of mimicry. Right, don't go into the woods if you hear somebody screaming your name, somebody who sounds familiar. Well, we talked about that with Yep, the Wendy boy.
Speaker 1:The Wendy boy. The other thing is the closing of the, the blinds right. You don't look outside in areas where both of these reside, so there's there's a lot of similarity between the two, and I think that's why they get mixed up and it's like look at the. The animals they take on are are different enough, but if we add in the not deer of it, right, it's all these like four-legged creatures. You're just talking.
Speaker 1:You're talking about flesh pedestrians right now flesh pedestrians to the not deer, right to now the wendy boy. I'm trying so hard not to say them some of the representations of the Wendy boy, while it looks like they walk in uprights their front like, even though they're like, mostly bipedal they have very long long, long front arms that they can almost creep along the ground.
Speaker 1:With One of the things that's been going through my head as we've been going through both of these episodes, I kind of go back to when Sam was on the show and he was talking about how certain things appear differently, for how you can best have it, and so one of my thoughts and I'm not sold on this right- but just a point for us to jump off on is are these two or even the three things all the same type of entity that is appearing differently for different people?
Speaker 1:or do we have something because both of them right both the lore is is similar it's somebody who has taken their course off or their path has gone off the course and they've either become a cannibal or they were going to be a healer and they went this wrong way. Like is this entire phenomena the embodiment of when somebody has a choice between good and evil and now their spirit's gone evil? And is it that spirit that lives on that now has the ability to take on these things? And, and maybe it looks a little different. Maybe I'm not saying they have to be the same thing, but there's enough similarity between them that I don't always think we're talking about like the difference between a turtle, a deer and a duck right, whether it's like three things of the same species or genus, I don't know okay, I just think it's really interesting to play off that.
Speaker 1:So what are your thoughts now?
Speaker 2:let me uh try to maybe easily easier leely, oh my God are to do what you're saying. To me it's like how so many people speak a different language. We all speak a different language, but come to the same conclusion when we're having a conversation with somebody that is speaking that same language. But if you were to, for example, like Arabic, if you were to translate a sentence that we say into arabic, it doesn't correlate correctly the context gets very correct it's like just it's just not, it's not exactly the same it reminds me of like multiple choice.
Speaker 1:Two answers could be correct, but pick the one that seems the most.
Speaker 2:No spitting yeah, so I think that I do agree with you, right, because we're talking about algonquin tribes and navajo, so separate, yeah, but they are experiencing some of the same phenomenon entity, I don't know what is less. I don't want to offend anybody, but we're experiencing these same things, right or not, or not same, but similar things. So is it almost like a language where it's because it's like different, um, wow.
Speaker 1:No, you're, you're literally on the right track. No, no, you're doing very well on it. It's um yeah, a difference in language, or is it a difference in idea?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm not necessarily saying it's because of the language. I'm just trying to articulate that to make it something. So, if we're talking about people who have two different languages.
Speaker 1:it could be totally similar, it could be different, and you and I aren't educated in language and etymology enough to know. But it's just an interesting thought experiment.
Speaker 2:And again, like I kind of said at the last episode, we're not trying to offend anybody and, to be completely fair, we don't know what we're talking about. We can dive into so many articles and books and facts and things like that about these different tribes and their cultures and their beliefs and their spirituality, but we will never have the right to know and understand it the way that they do, because it is just such a true belief to them and like a religion and it's just spirituality, is so magical to the person that believes in it. So we don't have the right to really know everything. But my biggest takeaways from doing this research and it's you know, it sounds very simple, but my biggest takeaways are a Wendy boy is brought from like greed and gluttony right and basically was pushed to the extreme I don't even know madness or whatever you know. Uh, uh, that should have never been and it was brought to the point where they had to either eat somebody else like a cannibal. Uh, they become a cannibal and then became that creature.
Speaker 1:Your traits have taken you so far off of human you become a monster.
Speaker 2:And then, once you're there, then you can bring other people into that misery. So that's that right. So it's based on cannibalism and the flesh pedestrian is basically like you were saying, in a nutshell the good and the evil. You were a practitioner of evil. You were a practitioner of good, you were a medicine man. You were like these high looked upon people and you got too full of it and the magic took over too much, basically, and then you took the dark route and then you became this dark entity. So again, it's kind of like that good and evil, but is it like I don't?
Speaker 1:it is very different when you look at it that way, because it's I, I think you can look at that differently, but I think you can also look at that similarly, like, not not even just like the right, the practice of it became evil for the, the witch, to turn to the pedestrian, the fleshy pedestrian. But you can also talk about it as somebody who's giving into their like both of them have given into some sort of power or carnal desire, where they've lost their humanity along the way. Yeah, um, so like it can be very different, but it also can be very similar no, I agree, I, yeah, I agree I don't know enough about either of them to say they're the same thing or different.
Speaker 1:I just think it's an interesting debate to have to say, hey, these things might not be as diametrically opposed as they're presented to be.
Speaker 2:No, and I agree, and I, and that's really why I wanted to do the episode, combining them and not combining, but the differences between the two, because I think that they are so vastly different but also very similar, where people do confuse them or not, maybe like they're just like wait, which one is that? Or what does it do? Again, like what's the characteristics, things like that. So I agree, it's just like fascinating. And again, I think it's just like the difference in the tribes and the culture. And it just again, like we said last episode or last week, supernatural is it'll never be fully understood, it's always ever changing or ever um, developing. Like we can never be experts. I don't feel in anything like this, because we just will never actually know.
Speaker 2:But even in, like the last episode, I think it's like lean into the elders, the ones that are you know, I guess. Oh my God, my brain just left my body. I swear to God, my brain left my body Lean into the people that do know what they're talking about and that are a part of these types of things, like if you did really need help, because I think those would be the only people that you could ever trust and rely on, if you really needed anything about these two.
Speaker 1:So let me ask you this, yeah, and feel free to discount this if you have more to go on. But I think we kind of teased everyone last week or now I'm confused if it was last week or just earlier this episode where we both feel like we've had experiences with them.
Speaker 2:That was this episode.
Speaker 1:That was the beginning of this episode.
Speaker 2:Do you want to share yours. I think, probably over a year ago, I have said not the word of what I saw, but that I had a really crazy experience and I did not want to talk about it. I still don't even know if I want to talk about it because I don't know where that thing is, but it was definitely one of these, not the other, and the reason that I say that is because it was pretty much that creepy, fucking, all fours U-shaped weird thing that I described. And if we are saying that that is a flush pedestrian, that is fucking what I saw and I've kind of showed zach where it was, but I was just driving home from work. It was really.
Speaker 2:It was like got really late so it was dark out. I mean, there are street lights, but it was just like on a street, but it was kind of like where that cemetery is, but not quite there, and I was at a stop sign and then I was like turning and I like look in my rear view mirror and it was in the road, just in the middle of the fucking road, and I knew instantly. I knew instantly what it was. I literally just said to myself like clear your mind. No fucking way. Nope, it's not like I knew it was there. I wasn't telling myself it wasn't there, but I was telling myself that I am not going to acknowledge it and give it any any of my thought, presence being whatever. I just remember like I looked at it in my side mirror one more time, cause I'm like am I nuts? Nope, and then I just looked forward and I kept driving home because at that point, where that stop sign is, from where my house is, yeah, you're not far.
Speaker 1:You could do it with your eyes closed.
Speaker 2:Oh I could. So I just like. I never looked back at any of my mirrors, I just kept going and I just was like, and then I pulled up my driveway, shut the door and came right inside and I don't even think I told you till a couple of days later, because I did not want to give it any sort of acknowledgement at all At all, and that's that.
Speaker 1:So I've had two and they were very close together.
Speaker 2:And you think they were flesh. I'm not quite sure.
Speaker 1:I've always put them in the camp of the flesh pad.
Speaker 2:But I the first story to tell us, and then out, and then we'll, we'll discuss.
Speaker 1:The first one, I was driving with a really close friend of mine and I mentioned them on this podcast, I just don't know if I should in this story. We were driving up north north michigan, uh, total dog man country, which again another thing that is very similar to the story of the flash pedestrians, but in the, the culvert of a road, okay, okay, there were eyes that hit the headlights that glowed like kind of like a deer's wood, right, okay, like you know how a deer's eyes glow at night, or any animal, so lilas look crazy right, any animal.
Speaker 1:It was about deer height, though, but then it went down a foot and up a foot from each place, so it was like almost like it was like hopping up and down for a second. Oh, as we got closer to it it went from that you know, three to four foot, where it's kind of going back and forth, to all of a sudden human height and bright, glowing and we're we sped down the road, we're like out of here. I don't know what that was. I'm not sticking around to find out what that was. Well, we used to camp back in that same area, and this is one of those things where, in high school, you go camping and you know what we were all doing back in the woods.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We were partying our asses off and there I like how you said it Like we all know what we're doing, like we don't need to say.
Speaker 1:And then you're mad. You, you knew what I was doing. It's been a while since we had a hey denise, hey denise, uh, mom, mom, mom, um, so no, mommy, she would slap me. I feel like if I called her mommy she'd slap me I mean she would just slap you for no, I I'm kidding, but other stories, so we're all in the woods. Okay, there was this girl who became the butt of the jokes that evening.
Speaker 2:Okay, wait, so this is not the same day.
Speaker 1:Not the same day.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay.
Speaker 1:Same general area. Okay, she was kind of like an acquaintance, not a friend.
Speaker 2:She had way too much water in the woods and way too much water in the woods she was just drunk as hell oh, I've never heard that way too much water in the woods I just made that up off my head.
Speaker 1:I was trying to be euphemistic, but you didn't pick it up. So anyways though, she kept saying she kept seeing this creature and we're like, okay, well, it's probably like a deer or whatever you know, or a dog. She, I keep seeing a mountain lion.
Speaker 2:I keep seeing a mountain lion you're like you're a drunk dumb bitch pretty much.
Speaker 1:I mean we called her dg all night for drunk girl oh that's nice. It wasn't until we all heard her scream in the woods where we're like, okay, somebody's got to go get her. Let. We all heard her scream in the woods where we're like, okay, somebody's got to go get her, let's go Like we took all the flashlights.
Speaker 2:You're all like, oh God.
Speaker 1:We're going and she comes behind us, who had passed out, and goes what are you guys looking for? We're like you. You and then the mountain lion that she kept saying she saw went by us right where we had heard her specifically scream.
Speaker 1:yeah, it was uncomfortable at best it just walked by, you guys like I mean when I say walked by, like I mean it was like 50 yards off but down by the creek, but it was like straight where we heard her scream. Now, all night she kept saying she was seeing a mountain lion. We're like, girl, you're not seeing a mountain lion, whatever. Then we believed her.
Speaker 2:We all slept in the cars that night instead of in the tents, but um so when you say you believed her at that moment, did you just believe that like oh yeah, she saw that mountain lion, or did you believe that?
Speaker 1:so all night she kept saying so every time she went to use the bathroom she kept saying she was seeing a mountain lion. We're like, we've been camping out here for years, we've never seen one. Now we know they're in the area, right Right, but for some reason she kept seeing this thing where, like we hadn't. So then we hear her scream later. Well, we think she sees it again. We go to find her. She comes up behind us going what are you guys doing, like? What are you guys doing Like? We just heard you screaming in the woods and then we saw that thing move off.
Speaker 2:But what I'm saying is, or what I'm asking is at that moment were you like oh, fuck something weird's going on?
Speaker 1:Or did you just believe that like, oh shit, there is a mountain lion? I think it was the first of all oh shit, there is a mountain lion, because that's what we saw, saw Right. And we're like everyone get back to camp, we have to take care of that. And then it's like when you get back and your, your adrenaline wears off. You're like we all went, why was she behind us?
Speaker 2:like yeah, okay, okay, that's I was wondering in the moment. Did you realize that part, or like?
Speaker 1:there. There were other times we were out camping that same spot, which is very, very I mean we we were 16, 17. We were making sure we were going where the cops couldn't find us, yeah, yeah. So you're deep roads to two tracks, to a single track off the teacher. I mean we were 10 miles from civilization but you, every once in a while you'd hear the random, just the, these weird screams and things out there. It was a very unsettling area, ew, and also not that far from where I could tell you some other really horrifying native stories.
Speaker 2:But oh, that's not for today yeah, no, I.
Speaker 1:I think this is. This is enough for today on unhorrifying, but I don't know. I think they're. It's really interesting in the fact, though, that these all come from like humans turning into something. So another thought that crossed my mind yeah, right is like right. So we have the witch who succumbs to this, and we have the practitioner practitioner, person with carnal desires that becomes a witch yes, practitioner who becomes the witch. Or we have the person who gives into their carnal desires of greed and gluttony, and everything sort of has both a human, animal, spirit aspect to it. The other thing I start to think of is are these evil entities that exist on the planet, whether they're elemental, demonic, whatever you want to call it, whatever your belief system is, and when they find somebody who is susceptible and going down a dark path, now they have a physical form they can take on. So they have that spiritual element, they have that corporeal element, and maybe the differences we're seeing in them come from the body of which they possess.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because I think that it's like does each of us have this Wendy boy flesh pedestrian inside of us just waiting to like be brought?
Speaker 1:forth A little bit different than what I was saying, like I thought maybe we'd like show up to them and say, oh hey, this is a host, but that's interesting too.
Speaker 2:Maybe it is something, yeah, and I've thought of it both ways, because it's like, if you're thinking about it in the sense of like a deeper meaning and a message, those messages are kind of the same kind of like we're talking about, right. So it's either like you're forced to do the cannibalism type of thing and then maybe keep possessing're brought to have all of these like powers and like this healing, and then you get too greedy about it and you turn it to the dark side. So it's like, are these two things always deep in us? That like are just kind of festering like the? The evil is just deep in there and it could be brought out, it could be tempted out by these types of temptations?
Speaker 1:I don't know I think we're gonna also can I? Can I tease something a little bit?
Speaker 1:sure and I I hope I gave you enough information when I was telling you about this thing. I'm teasing that it would make sense, but I I think we're gonna have a really unique discussion in the next couple months. We're waiting for timelines to meet up, okay, where we you and I we've talked about ufos, aliens, cryptids, all these things right where, and we, you and I have hit on the fact a lot of recently, like bigfoot and what we call aliens might have a relation, and we're talking about how these things might have relation. I think we're about to have a really unique conversation about magic with a k and some other things, um, how they're interrelated, and I think so. So much of the high strange we experience on this planet could be more interrelated with each other than we originally give it credit for I do think that you and I have recently leaned into that theory already.
Speaker 1:Which is so funny that this conversation we're going to have popped up super randomly at the time where you and I are going through this transformation and thought I'm excited, yeah, and that's all I'll say on that. Sorry guys, another, we're teasing a lot this year, but we are working on some shit.
Speaker 2:My final little question in this part of the discussion and then let's move on is after doing this, research me and then after you hearing some of this, are you more afraid of these two things or less afraid than you were before we started? I will say I'm actually before I answered that maybe afraid is not the right word, but I'll know.
Speaker 1:I'll answer that, I think. Before I say that, though, is I think you actually gave me a little bit more clarity on the wendy boys than I had, uh, on what the differences are. I think I'm the flesh pedestrians really creep me out there. There's just something so unsettling about the whole thing and thinking I've experienced it more than once where that truly scares me. I think maybe the Wendy boy I'm a little less of. Okay, I can say is, as we've gone through the journey we have for the past couple of years, is I have a lot more respect for them, both the culture they come from and themselves, than I ever would have had had we not gotten into some of this research.
Speaker 2:Yes. So what I would say is that I am less afraid or bothered by the subject matter of them. I still don't want to speak their you know true forms or true names, because I don't want to call that upon myself, but I'm less bothered by both of them. I do still think that they're terrifying things and everyone experienced one. That's what, that's not what I'm saying, but I do think that, like you just said, the respect of it and really understanding, like, where it comes from, yeah, and really just being true to yourself and knowing that I am not going to partake in these types of things, I'm going to respect nature, respect these tribes, respect these spiritualities, and it's not my business, and I think that can be said about, like, whether you and if you're listening to this, let's be Respect these tribes, respect these spiritualities and it's not my business, and I think that can be said about, like, whether you and if you're listening to this, let's be honest you believe in all this kind of shit.
Speaker 1:But whether you believe in high strain shit or not, right, anything you see as a threat, the more you can educate yourself about the threat, the less power it holds over you.
Speaker 2:Knowledge is power.
Speaker 1:What was the other thing you said? Wisdom before weapons. Also, make sure you print out Kara's little handy dandy survival cheat sheet. I think you know what we said on the last episode, that we might put it on Patreon. I think let's just put it on all the socials.
Speaker 2:Everyone deserves some safety. Well then, moving forward, I have a field guide on how to survive a skinwalker encounter.
Speaker 1:Okay, perfect, all Moving forward. I have a field guide on how to survive a skinwalker encounter. Okay, perfect, all right, I didn't even mean to segue you that perfectly, gosh Segu.
Speaker 2:You know, people really think that the word is segu.
Speaker 1:So to segue, Honestly, I love you so much but knowing your pronunciation of things, I wouldn't be surprised if you said that one.
Speaker 2:That is not me All right, starting over Field guide, field guide how to survive a skinwalker encounter drawn from legend, shadow and centuries of caution. Number one trust your gut If you feel like something is watching you or the forest suddenly goes silent. Listen to your instincts. Skinwalkers often arrive unannounced, but your body will feel their presence before your eyes ever do. The air gets heavier, your skin prickles, your stomach knots when your soul recoils before your senses catch up. Leave quickly, okay. Number two never wander alone at night. Number two never wander alone at night. Skinwalkers prey on the ice. I probably shouldn't have cried in the woods. Them deers were not deers.
Speaker 1:It wasn't night, it was. Oh, was it dark? Yeah, idiot, idiot.
Speaker 2:Idiot Number two never wander alone at night. They prey on the isolated and unaware. Always stay in a group, especially near forests, deserts or reservations, where these beings are said to roam. Don't chase strange sounds. Don't follow voices calling your name.
Speaker 1:Never Sorry. That is just like the number one, and this one.
Speaker 2:Zachary needs to get better at Never whistle in the dark at night. It's an invitation, mister. Let me whistle in a haunted asylum at night. When did I do that? You did that at Eloise. You started whistling in the hallway. We were walking and I said I swear to God.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, I did, I will kill you.
Speaker 2:Number three.
Speaker 1:We were inside. They can't come in man-made objects. We went over that.
Speaker 2:It doesn't matter. Other spirits and entities are drawn by it. It's a known fact. You don't whistle at night. They could have just been standing outside waiting for us to leave the building.
Speaker 1:I'm trying so hard not to whistle right now.
Speaker 2:Number three Watch the animals. If an animal seems off too, still staring too long, moving oddly and glowing eyes or in uncanny silence, do not approach. Flush pedestrians can take the shape of wolves, foxes, owls, coyotes, even your beloved pet. It wears the shape of what you trust, delilah.
Speaker 1:On that note, I also don't usually believe all those videos you see on social media Ooh, I caught a skinwalker, ooh, I caught this or that. There's this one. I know exactly what it is. The goat no, it's the dog. The goat at the door is one. I know which one you're talking about, but then there's a dog that, as it, goes behind a light post completely changes and I have watched that so many times to see where the cut is or what.
Speaker 1:I can't figure it out. That one, to me, is one of the most horrifying videos.
Speaker 2:Have you seen the dog, though? That's literally at the back door like it's waiting to be let in, but his actual dog is on the couch next to him.
Speaker 1:Yes, I feel like I've seen all three of those on the same cut. I'm done.
Speaker 2:All right. Number four protective measures. While you can't kill a flesh pedestrian easily, you can keep it at bay. Burn sage, cedar and sweetgrass sacred plants known for spiritual protection. Use ash circles for temporary rewards. Wear blessed tokens or medicine bags made by trusted healers. Stay near strong fires.
Speaker 2:Flesh pedestrians prefer shadow and silence. Five avoid speaking the name. Talking openly about flesh pedestrians, especially at night fuck our lives. We're at night is considered dangerous in Navajo culture. Naming them invites them in.
Speaker 2:The wind listens the dark remembers. Number six Chilling, I know. Number six what not to do. Don't stare into their eyes. They take control of your mind. Don't try to fight one alone. Unless you are protected spiritually, you're already at disadvantage. Don't take souvenirs from cursed places. Protected spiritually, you're already at disadvantage. Don't take souvenirs from cursed places. Bones, feathers or strange artifacts may be traps. Seven when it's too late, if one has chosen, you tell somebody who can help a medicine person, a spiritual guide or an elder. Hold your ground but never engage it in anger. Speak prayers and burn sacred herbs and, if you can, leave the area and don't return. Final words Flesh pedestrians aren't just stories. They're warnings passed down through generations. Whether you believe or not, respect the tales. The desert doesn't lie, and neither do the old ones To survive the night. Honor the light and never forget you're not alone out there.
Speaker 1:God, again these feel like it's taken straight out of Game of Thrones.
Speaker 2:All right, I do. I know we're getting close. I didn't think this was going to be that long, but we had such a great discussion.
Speaker 1:Sorry, I know I talked around these. No, it's okay, we love it.
Speaker 2:I do have an encounter.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:To wrap us up, and this one is from personal dash, paloma eight seven zero three. I am 25, male, I live in Utah and I am curious if any of you have seen anything like this before. I'm pretty sure I saw a windy boy or a flesh pedestrian. I know it sounds strange or crazy. I don't really believe in those things and I'm regularly skeptical when it comes to the paranormal. What happened to me is when I was 17 and in high school and living with my parents. My house at the time was in a very small town. The backyard faced open empty fields and mountains for miles before you reached another civilization at all. My best friend lived next door and shared this field as our backyard in a way. I have to explain that his house sat, how his house sat. He wrote that wrong built on a different street that ended in a field with a small cul-de-sac, I think there was supposed to be more houses built down his street to be expanded to a town, but that clearly never happened. So his driveway was basically in the cul-de-sac, even though no other houses were built there. This matters later in the story.
Speaker 2:I used to stay the night at my friend's house a lot in high school because I didn't have the best relationship with my parents. Every once in a while we would wake up to hear dragging and weird gargling sound from the back porch. His room was a basement room with the window well to the back porch. It would happen maybe a couple times a month, but whenever we would gather the courage to check, nothing would be back there. This happened for years. Ew, gargling is disgusting. One night haunts my friend and I to this day.
Speaker 2:My friend was getting ready to move and we stayed up all night playing games and watching movies. We decided to go on a music drive just to vibe. So he hopped in his truck with high beams and swung out the driveway, turning them towards the fields to use the roundabout. The light illuminated this thing. It looked like a person, but it wasn't. It was naked on all fours, abnormally large, particularly its limbs. That seemed to fold under itself in an unnatural way. Its pale skin clung to it like it had been scratched on, stretched onto it. Sorry, but the part that still sends shivers down my spine is its face, its jaw hung open to this gasping black maw like a snake unhinging its jaw to eat which. This is way more a flash pedestrian than yeah wendy. Its black eyes glistened in the light as it looked at us, but just as it turned to see us it quickly scurried backwards, almost like it was on rewind, into the brush of the field. That is the most disturbing shit on rewind.
Speaker 1:The mental image that comes to mind. Did you ever see Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth? No, the creature at the buffet with the eyes that looks like Mitch McConnell sort of, but with skin hanging.
Speaker 2:My friend and I were pale as ghosts. We both looked at each other like did we just see that too? Did you just see that too? We were shaken. Let's just say we tried to have a good rest of the night, but we couldn't believe what we saw. We ended up just sitting there in his basement with guns ready and waiting to hear the gargling and dragging again, but we never did. Sorry, that's not too climactic, but it's the truth. I now don't live in that town anymore. There are times when I visit there, though the empty field still feels like it's watching and waiting. Even though I can't see it, I can still feel like it's out there, Alright. Do you have anything to add to that story? Your face is just disgust. Even though I can't see it, I can still feel like it's out there, All right. Do you have anything to add?
Speaker 1:to that story. Your face is just disgust. No, I think that is a perfect story. To sum up how terrifying these things that we're talking about are so we're just going to recrap really quickly Recrap.
Speaker 2:From last week. Recrap. We're going to just recrap this crap, okay, so we're going gonna give a very quick comparison, okay, okay. So wendy boy origin cursed by cannibalism. Flesh pedestrian is you know, chose evil through ritual. Uh, the nature basically of the wendy boy monster cursed or spirit, flesh pedestrian is human witch with dark powers. Form Wendy boy is the gaunt, monstrous like beastly thing. Flesh pedestrian shifts between animal and human. Behavior of the Wendy boy feeds on flesh, mindless hunger, flesh pedestrian manipulation, deceives, curses. And then the symbolism of our wendy boy is, you know, greed, starvation, uh, colonial trauma, flesh pedestrian betrayal and then spiritual corruption okay, I'm not gonna open this up for a whole nother discussion, I'm just gonna leave you a few seconds on this.
Speaker 1:Maybe we get them so confused sometimes because if the deceit and uh, manipulation and everything is so much of the flesh pedestrian, I wonder if sometimes they front as the other.
Speaker 2:Oh well, I do have. I can print this little comparison too, so that you can like have it we need the comparisons, we need the survival guides.
Speaker 1:Everyone, keep this with you. We're going to slowly, throughout these episodes, start to build you what a cryptid survival kit that we teased years ago we could, and it could kind of be like our grimoire of every like there we go oh my god what if we came up?
Speaker 2:with an oddity shop like grimoire and like uh guides and like safety things okay, you know what?
Speaker 1:that's our call to action on this episode. If you have stories, we'll take them, but our biggest thing you could do from us is let us know if you would be interested in like the Oddity Shop survival guide grimoire. Oh yes, I love that idea.
Speaker 2:This would be so fun. It's going to take a lot of work, it's okay.
Speaker 1:Once we finish the 15 other projects and surprises that we have going, we could start on that one.
Speaker 2:Okay, if you guys would actually want that, then let us know, because otherwise I'm not going to waste my time.
Speaker 1:I'll make it for you and I, but I'm not going to make it good, all right.
Speaker 2:All right, so I will leave us with an incantation to hopefully cleanse us from last week this week craziness.
Speaker 1:Perfect.
Speaker 2:I'm going to go be completely honest. This week, craziness Perfect. I'm going to go be completely honest. I couldn't find an incantation that would like make like I couldn't find one for both of these things, so chat collectively with everything that I research. I put all my research in and then it just made magic straight from chat.
Speaker 1:GPT here we go. I was so against them taking over the world, but you know it is what it is. Lean inT here we go.
Speaker 2:I was so against them taking over the world, but you know it is what it is Lean in baby.
Speaker 2:Here we go, spirits of the land, hear me now. I stand beneath the sky, feet in the soil, with smoke of cedar, sage and pine. I call to the ancestors, those who walk in light. Wendigo of hunger, pass me by. Skinwalker of shadow, be unbound. The space is sealed with breath of flame, with truth in heart and no fear in name. You hold no power where strength is born. You cannot hide where vision is sworn by the howl of the wolf, by the cry of the crow, by fire's edge and moonlight's glow. Be gone, be gone and trouble no more.
Speaker 1:the circle is strong, this spirit is whole okay, first of all, that was amazing second I don't care if it just partly came from chat gpt, because you and I both know that the biggest power of magic is not the words you're saying, but the, the intention behind it. So I'm sorry that we have mentioned both these things by name so many times but at least you have a little protection incantation. So I would say, rewind that, turn your speakers either outside of your headphones or all the way up and play it one more time, just to protect yourself, because we don't need any shit on our hands.
Speaker 2:No, and you should redo it, because when you redo it, pause before, take a deep breath, really put your intentions into it like you're really believing it, let it replay and it'll be a perfectly smooth, a great incantation for everybody. First of, all great job, dude maybe I'll record it again once, just to just send everybody. Okay, well, thank you guys for tuning in for the second episode of this.
Speaker 1:Two weeks of utter horror. Yeah, horror.
Speaker 2:Terrifyingness. I'm going to keep it short. Oh, what should this emoji be? Hmm, well, I guess you could do. Let's just do like a wolf, a bear, like an animal, because it shifts okay, um, we love you so much. Thank you so much for being here through all of this horrifyingness. Uh, yeah, that's really all I have for you, aside from creepy real yad balls goodbye, I hope, with the dogman.
Speaker 1:Cut the elevation, closed in the shadows. Cut the elevation. Outro Music.
