This isn't entirely a specific entity or creature but I figured I would post this here to see what others may have experienced. For many people, things you hear and believe as a child may seem normal (like your understanding is everyone feels this way naturally). As an adult, I started asking people those inner thought questions we don't really ask or talk about. Mine has two parts that I want to discuss to see if there is a connection or if anyone else may have the same experiences.
As a child, I would always hear a singular bell from a shrub in my parent's yard. It sounded like a little silver bell jingling. It got louder as I got closer but I could never find the source. In my head as a child, I associated the sound with Christmas and justified it as "oh that's Santa letting me know he is watching me making sure I am being good". I grew up in a very suburban areaoutside of NYC. The shrub was the closest to woods that I could get. If I remember it was an Azalea that bloomed pink flowers every year.
As I got older I stopped hearing the bell. I asked my siblings when I heard it but none of them ever heard it and they thought I was messing around. I didn't talk about it because no one believed me. As an adult, I wonder if it was an ear infection or imbalance. It wasn't a ringing like I get now as an adult, this was a very clear little bell. I thought nothing more of it as the years went on and I moved a lot as an adult, eventually moving to a rural area in the mountains of Maine. I own a house that sits on 6 acresof field and forest and my property is surrounded by 47 acres of dense forest my neighbor owns. Every time I am outside I feel like something in the woods is watching me. This isn't restrictive to my property, this is any hike I go on or any time I am near woods or forest. It's not a fear, just a reassurance that something is watching me within the woods. Almost a comfort. I did some research about forest beings, like Pan and such but I don't feel a specific connection.
I have a thought that whatever is there watching me is on a different plane, I can't physically see them (yet) and perhaps this is the split between other mythical creatures like fairies or bigfoot, gnomes and such. Maybe they can see us and we can't see them because of the different planes of existence or realms? It's just a theory with no real foundation but I feel this all the time. I thought everyone felt this and I started asking people and apparently, this isn't a normal feeling. Some of my newer research is more vested in Native folklore and there are a lot of scary entities involved so I don't think it is something malicious.
I am curious if anyone else has experienced something like the bell ringing or sounds they can't explain and if the sensation that someone is watching them or something is normal to them as well. The bell was always a comfort and I almost feel it evolved as I got older, I am just not sure what it represents. I communicate with the deceased so I have often wondered if it was ancestors but I never get a definitive response, it feels unworldly, or something not human if that makes sense.