The other day, I was working on a walking trail along the roadside when an old man pulled over and walked up to me. He introduced himself as Cedric and then began to tell me a story about the most hated tree in the Texas Hill Country, sometimes called the Devil's Tree.
The story went like this.
Back in the early 1940s, Cedric’s grandfather was part of a group of men known as the Cedar Choppers. They went all over the Hill Country, making lots of money by chopping down majestic old-growth cedar (mountain cedar). The trees were sold to companies that made railroad ties, utility poles and fence posts. Cedar logs were highly sought after back then because they were rot resistant.
One day, Cedric's grandfather was hired by a rancher to build a fence made of cedar posts and barbed wire. Since the area on the ranch was inaccessible by car, he rode his trusty old horse named Dixie. Now Dixie moved at a snail's pace, but she got to the destination without a hitch. When his grandfather strung his last strand of barbed wire, he noticed a forest of majestic old-growth cedar, the likes of which he’d never seen before. He said it was like being in a cathedral. Dollar signs popped into his head as he thought of how much money he could make by harvesting the unlimited number of trees.
Knowing the rancher never visited this part of his property, Cedric's grandfather walked over to old Dixie, removed the double-sided ax head that many Cedar Choppers carried, and headed to his first tree. He exclaimed how it must have been well over one hundred years old, just like others. He also saw scattered amounts of new shrubby cedars. With his ax in hand, he began to chop, chop, chop. Chop, chop, chop. Then he noticed the wildlife got eerily quiet. Around him, titmice, cardinals and robins flew away while the white-tail deer scampered off. It was as if everyone knew something bad was about to happen. He shrugged and continued to chop, chop, chop.
Suddenly on the hilltop, he saw a shadowy figure that resembled a Longhorn steer staring at him. The beast began to stomp one hoof in the dirt. Every time he did, the earth underneath Cedric's grandfather shook like an earthquake. Then the beast charged toward him! His flight-or-fight instinct kicked into gear as he shot off, leaving his ax behind. Jumping on old Dixie, who always moved at a snail's pace, the pair took off at lightning speed. As they rode away like the wind, the shrubby cedars grabbed and clawed at him. Were they trying to drag him off his horse?
The air also changed as old Dixie galloped away. The sunny summer day suddenly turned dark with what he thought was fog. But it was cedar pollens so thick that he could barely see. In a flash, his eyes burned red and swelled nearly shut. His sinuses and throat swelled, too, and his body ached like that of the most terrible flu he'd ever experienced. He had to trust old Dixie to get him out of there. He could almost feel the beast breathing down his neck when all of a sudden he felt his trusted old Dixie fly over a barbed-wire fence. At the same time, she kicked toward the beast.
As soon as they landed on the other side of the fence, the nightmare ended in a heartbeat. In seconds, the sun was shining and what seemed to be the cedar fever from hell disappeared. Looking back at the ancient cedar forest, Cedric's grandfather saw that a thick layer of cedar pollens had blanketed the area. After gathering his composure and feeling a little brave, he and old Dixie inched up to the fence. The man gasped at what he saw. Where old Dixie had jumped, the barbed-wire fence and two cedar fence posts laid prone on the ground. Two of Dixie's horseshoes were embedded into the tops of the posts.
Even more spine-tingling was what he saw entangled in the barbed wire – a cedar stump shaped exactly like the beast’s head. A Native American friend later told him that he’d probably seen a shapeshifter. According to their folklore, shapeshifters can take any form, such as a wolf, an owl, deer, a hawk or, yes, even a cedar tree turned Longhorn. No matter what form they take on, all shapeshifters fearlessly defend their natural habitat from those who try to destroy it. According to other legends, the horseshoes' iron stops otherwordly entities from crossing a threshold.
After a few weeks had gone by, Cedric’s grandfather couldn't keep what had happened a secret. So he told a few trusted friends. News of his encounter quickly spread throughout the Cedar Chopper community. After having enough of their snide comments and laughter, he decided to end to it. One Sunday after church, he led a group of Cedar Choppers to the exact spot where it had happened. As they gathered around and looked down, right in front of their eyes were the two broken fence posts with the horseshoes – one stuck right in the upper part of each post, just like Cedric had described. As they gathered a little closer, they all turned white as ghosts when they saw what was tangled up in the barbed-wire fencing – the head of the Longhorn beast that he had told them about. Superstitious to the core and fearing the beast might return for its head, the men gathered up the posts, horseshoes, barbed wire and, oh, yes, the head. Then they hid everything away in an old cedar barn and locked the doors securely. Each solemnly vowed they’d never ever tell a single soul what they’d found.
So, dear reader, perhaps now you're wondering how those hidden-away items came to be in our yard? Well, one day Cedric called and told me that he’d decided to sell the old family homestead where he’d been raised. He wanted to live closer to his grandkids. Knowing the new owners would want to see what was in the old cedar barn, he thought the time had come to open it. Yep, the items where still there. Not wanting to offer the items to his children due to his own superstitions, he decided to find a way to save the memory of his grandfather’s otherworldly experience. Since I was the only one he’d ever told the story to, Cedric offered everything to me. I accepted but with some hesitation. I mean, it's just a story, right?
Of course, it's not. What started my journey in dreaming up this tall tale was when I found an old dried-out mountain cedar stump in a brush pile on our rural property. It looked like the head of a Longhorn so I brought it home.
"Hey, Sheryl," I exclaimed to my wife. "Look what I found for you on the property today."
