A New Frand

I went downstairs with the plush polar bear to show the Husky I had a new friend and I didn't need her or her grumpy attitude and touchy fussiness anymore. But she wasn't there in her usual sleeping spot. She was one step ahead of me. The basement was restored to its rightful owner and surely she was there. She was first to demonstrate that didn't need me either.

When I was in grade school my best friend owned a family of snowmen stuffed animals. Even though my friend was a tall and athletic, emotionally he was vulnerable and he was not ashamed to play with his snowmen.

He would press his nose against the snowman's and talk to it in a funny high voice. All the snowmen, (his little brother had one too), had their black button noses pressed in from repeated loving and loving abuse. They would press their thumbs into the nose and leave it inverted, and then cuddle their noses up to it and torture the poor snow person.

This new polar bear friend of mine now reminded me of those childhood snowmen. At once I wanted to preserve my bear's nose as I pressed my own against his, and at the same time I wanted to push my thumbs down on his nose until it would not recover. But no matter what I did to my bear, it would not un-break those snowmen noses that belonged to my friend nor would it transport me back to that childhood.

I just pat its head repeatedly like I did with my landlady's Husky. And the bear she bounced her head in approval.