Suzuki and Ace


December 13, 2008, a Saturday

That's right, I'm blogging to you on Saturday.  Well, you know how crazy the Christmas season can be.  Because I am a bear, I don't have to go shopping, or plan meals, or even eat meals for that matter, and I do have flexibility in my blogging job, and I don't have to worry about the recession or anything.  So I know it sounds like maybe my season should be stress free.  But that would be wrong.  As a bear in my position, I have plenty of stress.  Why do you think I am always writing about meditating and trying to be quiet and all that crap?  We all have our crosses to bear (do you even realize how many puns there are in that little phrase?). 

I am the matriarch of a clan of misfit bears.  The Dutch boys always tease me about how all the bears that somehow end up in my group are either abused or have some wildly fantastic story to tell.  But it's actually true.  They all need a good home for some reason.  How do they find me, you ask?  It cannot be explained.  They just do, they just know they belong here and they find a way.  You see, they are (we are) all survivors and have overcome many hardships. 

Why, just the other day, a bear was delivered to me.  At first glance, he was new and very soft and cuddly, bigger than me and Nicky and Butterfly Bear.  It's my job to figure out who he is, where he came from, and what we can all do to make him feel at home.  His name is Horace, but we call him Ace because he was in desperate need of a nickname of some sort.  He is very, very mild mannered, and not the sharpest tool in the shed as they say.  But kind and accommodating.  He hung out with us for a while, until we figured out who he would enjoy spending time with. 

Meanwhile, Suzuki, our giant frog puppet, was suffering from extreme anxiety.  We usually put a big sled and reindeer up on the balcony each year and Suzuki gets to play Santa.  He puts on the Santa hat and a colorful muffler and flies through the night in the sled heading up into the sky.  I even got to sit with him in the sled sometimes which was thrilling.  But this year, it was decided by the mucky mucks that there would be no sled and reindeer because it junked up a newer, more classy, more elegant version of lights on our lakehouse.  Just like that, our sled ride was gone.  So it was left to me to comfort Suzuki and help try to find him an equally important Christmas job, which as you can imagine, was not easy.  I put him in his Santa hat and promised him that on Christmas Eve, the really important night, we would put the sled out and he would be in it.  Then Ace, who was struggling with trying to watch sports which didn't really seem to be his thing, spotted Suzuki and wanted to sit with him.  At first I thought it was just to keep him company because he seemed so sad, but as soon as I saw them together, I knew they were meant to be.  They both just lit up and settled in and seem so happy.  So you see, even in great disappointment, there can be a brighter purpose.  They are still enjoying each other's company, pass on Suns and Cardinals games, and just exude joy and Christmas spirit.  It makes you think about all that political stuff going on in California that says gay people can't be legally married.  That seems silly, doesn't it?  Love is love. 

Maybe all this stuff about retail sales being down and people not having enough money to spend what they usually do at Christmas will turn out to be a good thing.  Maybe we will get back to realizing that Christmas can be a lot more than presents.  Maybe one small gesture that usually gets lost amidst all the wrapping paper will be noticed and treasured.  Maybe we can think about that great Bing Crosby song about "its' not the things you do at Christmas time, but the Christmas things you do all year through".  

GR