On my way back from Andover last week, having taken the scenic route, I passed a crop of poppies that I thought I would return to when the seed pods were ready.

Today, having two hours to spare before visiting my father, I drove out to get them. While I was there, I went for a wander. I’d never been here before, except to drive through on my way between Winchester and Andover.

Since I was a child, I have always loved exploring, so I crossed the road and headed towards a gate. Beyond the gate, to my right, was a field of nearly ripe corn filled with bright red poppies and wild chicory. After admiring the view, and following a long path past an oil extractor and some other industrial area, (a sewage works; as I discovered when looking it up on the map later)I took a million photos until I spotted a way through the hedge and, on impulse, walked through into a small clearing.

When I entered the clearing, which was really only a space in a wooded boundary which may have been the original trackway through the fields leading down into the valley, (it’s still on the os maps from the late 1800s), I felt that familiar feeling of energy that makes me want to exhale forcibly. It’s nearly like I want to manage the energy I am feeling. Sometimes, it is also about transmitting energy, via the breath.

Initially, I didn’t know what I was picking up, or why, so I looked around trying to pinpoint the source. There was a large old beech tree that I had passed on my way through the hedge and I walked back to it. I stood beside the trunk and put my hand on the bark, tuning in. I felt my higher sense perception move upwards and my energy field expanded into a large sphere. At the edge of my field, I saw an elemental woman. She was nearly transparent she was so light and a very pale translucent watery green. Her simple dress was the same colour as she was.

Light, excited and very playful, she beckoned me to follow her, moving out of the clearing and onto the path. She moved along the track as if she was flying, or floating, but she had no wings. She was simply a lighter vibration than me. As light as air. I followed her over the crest of the slight hill and down the track beyond, wondering where we were going. Sometimes I could not see her at all but I could feel her around, pulling me onward.

As I got closer to the bottom, it began to feel very ‘busy’, as though there were lots of people there, but there were only trees and plants and insects. But I thought I heard the sound of rushing water. Then I decided it must only be the wind- in the willows. A sure sign of water. I discovered a plastic map of the area nailed to a post and discovered that there was a river: the River Anton.

The elemental had led me to a river. But why? I knew that I needed to connect with the river and that it had something to do with the tree, so I found a place where I could connect, not knowing exactly what was required of me. I faced the river, looking over the boundary hedge, and felt a cord move from my centre and into the water. My rational mind thought it was to draw the water’s essence in through the tube and into my body (which has happened many times) but instead, the tube went into the river-bed, and extracted something from the sandy floor beneath the water. It went down about two meters.

Next, I saw the elemental woman again, and part of the tube that was in my centre (Tan Tien) was now a three-pin plug. She beckoned me to follow her again and so I powered back up the hill until I came to the beech tree. Once again, I put my hand on the bark, thinking I had to plug the tube into the tree roots.

But nothing happened.

I remained standing and then saw the elemental woman move into my energy field, unplug the plug, and plug it beneath the roots. This was obviously not a job I could do, but her job! I could be a conduit, but she had the right energy to do the rest.

Once the job was complete, gave me a gift of a beech nut, placing it where the plug had been then she moved up into the branches again, waving in gratitude, happy that her tree had received whatever energy infusion it needed.

I think this might be the first time I have ever worked with an elemental of a tree that wasn’t a dryad, although I did once channel a story about a tree elemental who had to find another tree to live in because men were coming to cut his tree down to make way for a road…

Marko Pogacnik talks about the elementals of plants and trees in his book ‘Nature Spirits and Elemental Beings’. In it, he describes how he once did an elemental rescue for a woman in Ljubljana, who was concerned about a very old Linden tree that her family wanted to cut down. On a return visit, he saw that the tree had been pollarded and the tree’s energy was unable to spread out into the branches as it should have done and the faun was struggling to manage it. Marko was able to find another Linden tree to transplant the faun into.

I had been wondering about this as I had only ever worked with Dryads, not with elemental beings who lived in and around trees, but after this experience, I understood a little more. My guides will always give me an experience of something so I understand it, especially if it is to show me something that is the truth.

This lovely elemental spirit was so subtle that I often found myself doubting her existence. At other times when I have seen nature elementals, they have been very clear. But this one was as light as air, nearly invisible, yet her energy was wonderfully joyful and trusting. She could see that I could do exactly what she needed and she did not have any doubt in me at all… even though I was a human.

Another well-learned lesson.