Midnight Psychopomp

"Psychopomp" is a Greek word that is often translated as "usher of souls" or "soul conductor." Though the words to describe this work vary, cross-culturally it is one of the jobs a shaman typically might be called to do, by a grieving family in the community she serves. An ethical shamanic practitioner with proper training will only do this work with permission from, and at the request of, the relatives of the person who has died.

I didn't know any of that, at the time this experience happened to me. I wrote this true story almost 20 years ago -- long before I began seeking professional training to become an effective shamanic practitioner. I was still pretty much living in a cave, spiritually -- not at all public about the crazy spirit-world realities (such as the experience I describe in this narrative) which I had been experiencing since the time I was a small child.

When I wrote this story, I was a hard-drinking construction worker. My work buddy and I were "camping" at the job site, as we remodeled a vacant home that was an hour and a half drive from the suburbs where we both lived. My buddy Hollandaise knew the owners of the house, and we got permission to stay there for three and four days at a time, so we could avoid three hours of L.A. traffic back and forth every morning and night. 

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Midnight Psychopomp

by Adam Bosler


I wanted to sleep outside. I wanted this before I learned of the old woman who died in the house just a few short months ago.

January is not the best time to sleep outside on your Thermarest, in your sleeping bag, under the bright Lagoona moon. Freezing cold, some might complain, but not I. Not with a hundred and fifty pounds of body-fat insulation wrapped around my torso.

In the morning I am awakened by the echoing buzzing of the open highway, the only way in or out of this beach canyon. An observant person can notice, after a few days of watching the tiny toy traffic down below, can notice patterns, the same people heading off to the same dead-end jobs up north. “Gotta work somewhere,” they tell themself, as they crank the radio and mash down on the gas pedal. “Livin’ in Laguna ain’t free…”

The sound of a single motorcycle rider reflects back and forth up the sloping sides of the majestic canyon; the rocks, the hills, reverberating like the cone of a trumpet.

It is the rider Hollandaise pointed out to me last night, when we were sitting there shell-shocked from the day’s work, drunk, eating hamburgers outside on the deck.

*******

We listen to the lone rider, racing home from work, mashing his throttle unnecessarily, according to us, up here in the know, at the top of the hill.

We make faces at each other that communicate our disgust for this human being we have never met, but who obviously does not have the expert ridership skills that both Hollandaise and myself believe we possess. We are the Harley-Davidson experts.

“Stupid fucker. Wasting gas.”
“Why the hell would you do that to your bike?”

Tomorrow’s work is a long way off in the future. For now, there are many beers left, and enough vodka for numerous heavy-handed drinks.

*******

The third night it was FREEZING FUCKING COLD!

Much too cold to even be outside, even for a 280-pound polar bear like myself.

After many hours of horrible TV, after the glow of the indirect lighting system had been shut down for the night, after Hollandaise had curled his body around the warm, inhuman box of the flickering television, when there was nothing left to do but find a corner to crawl off to, nothing left to do but try to get some sleep, try to refuel for the next day, try to let my broken body have a few hours of rest…

At that exact moment I find myself standing in an oddly lit, cavernous hallway. A table, too small for the space it occupies, huddles awkwardly at the far end of the hall. I am reminded of some hellish scene from Stephen King’s The Shining… some eerie, freaky twins begging me: “Come play with us, Bozley, Come play with us…”

There is no corner, no forgotten nook in this vast residence that is not haunted, not imbued somehow with the life-energy of the woman who sealed herself inside this cliff-side home, up here above humanity, above the civilized world.

Perched on the tiny table at the end of the hallway, a statue of a soaring eagle reveals this woman’s spirit animal, her guide. You could say the eagle is how she tried to picture herself, what she wanted to be, how she wanted to live, metaphorically. I do not always make the distinction between these “two worlds,” the physical and the metaphorical. For me, they often feel like “one world.”

*******

Jesus, I am so tired. I have to get some sleep. I find myself drawn to the old woman’s art-studio room. There is one space open on the floor, and I just barely fit, wedged between several giant paintings of psychologically damaged clowns.

There is a strange and ancient potbelly stove sitting unexplainably in the center of the room. In a certain light, one might confuse the wood-burning stove for a large witch’s cauldron. It sits next to a pile of rocks, a wind-break trying to be disguised as a fireplace mantle.

From my perspective laying down here on the ground, I can see the eagle gliding, flying high above. The old woman is the eagle, and the eagle is the old woman.

She is never coming home, she is never returning, she tells me. (This communication is all done telepathically.) She isn’t sure where to fly off to exactly, so she’s been circling and stretching her wings. And she’s not really sure if she’s ready to leave. She’s biding her time.

I smile at her, tell her everything’s fine down here. I give her the reassurance she seems to want, the permission to fly off into the open sky. I send her a mental image of what the Other World looks like. I try to show her how much more immense the sky will be, how much more freedom she will have, to soar.

Tentatively, with great caution, she changes the angle of her wings. I watch as she catches an upward jet-stream of warm air, and begins to slowly rise higher in the sky. 

I soon realize I am being pulled along with her, and it is specifically her attention directed down at me that is pulling me up. She is scared to go alone, and is somehow taking me with her.

I motion with my neck, with a nod of my head, toward the expanse of sky and eternity that opens up above us. I try to get her to turn away from me, to focus on soaring. I feel my soul being unwound from my physical body. That old, familiar feeling. But this is not the time or place for astral travels. Not here, not in this witch’s castle. Not tonight.

And yet, I have never been one to turn back when the Other World is within shouting distance.

Far up above me, I hear the happy screech of the old-woman eagle as she begins to realize the vast expanse of her new life. I am drawn to her cries of freedom. I cannot turn away as the two of us continue soaring higher, farther. We are circling each other, rising up into the endless sky, flying out into the universe.

I look down at my arms, which have somehow been transformed into feathery wings. My only thought is, “Wow, I’ve never been an eagle before…”

Now I know what I’m supposed to do. I can’t just show her the postcards and expect her to find the place on her own. I gotta take her there.

*******

In the morning I am still feeling somewhat removed from my surroundings. Hollandaise asks me how I slept.

“Well, apart from the multiple out-of-body experiences…” That is the most explanation I can muster.

Then he tells me, “You know, that room you slept in, it's where the old lady died. Her daughter found her body in there.”

*******

We have a long day of very strenuous work ahead of us. I am not paid to spend all night guiding lost souls to the after-life. I’m paid to rip out drywall and two-by-fours with my bear claws, and my crowbar.




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