Blog 661 – 06.12.2017
Three Bears – Marilyn, Ben, And Me

It is the job of writers to paint pictures with words. There are three pictures that I would like to paint for you this morning if I may. The pictures are very vivid in my memory. Let us see if I can paint them well enough to make them as real to you.

First picture is of the beautiful and vivacious Marilyn Monroe wearing a lovely and tight white knit sweater standing in front of a ferocious looking, standing, and quite stuffed grizzly bear. The picture was sent me by someone who knows how much I love pictures of the lovely MM and how it was she more than any other woman who awaken in me sexual thoughts when I was but a lad of eleven. She, Marilyn Monroe is typical to me of all the lovely and sexy girls and women in the world. And that bear who looks like he is about to eat her up is typical too of the fury of desire that can bring such pleasure into our lives and just as quickly and completely destroy our lives if left unchecked by our higher natures.

Second picture in my mind was taken some years ago in the basement of the Natural History Museum, in Houston, Texas, in front of a huge and equally terrifying grizzly with his mouth opened wide and arms raised, claws bared, and ready to strike, and a much younger version of my self, just thirty years of age, holding my young and handsome blond son, Ben, on my shoulders. Ben is smiling, not at all afraid, for he knows he is loved. He is reaching up, one of his hands, touching the tip of one of the bears claws. The museum staff would have asked us to leave had they seen this but it made a great picture – A loving father holding his fearless son up to touch a bear that would never be able to hurt him.

Third picture took place on a wonderful work assignment that I had in Kenai, Alaska for two summer months in 2012. While there I flew twice to Anchorage from Kenai for Operator Qualification Evaluations. In the little airport in Kenai was a large standing stuffed grizzly much like the one in the two above pictures. I took a selfie with the bear over my shoulder hoping it would look alive and fearsome and I brave and nonchalant. Well, the bear looks cool. I attach the picture for your consideration. Shortly after this picture was taken my beloved daughter, Emily, was diagnosed with liver cancer that had metastasized from her adrenal glan. She died quickly after the tumor was biopsied and confirmed cancerous. In eighteen days I will again begin daily to post an episode each day in month of Emily (More widely known as July) from the book I wrote about Emily called, “Emily – The Little Girl Who Sang Her Song To Anyone Who Came Alone.”

I actual saw a mama bear and two cubs closer than I meant to while working at a man camp on the Kenai inlet. Bears are marvelous and wonderful creatures much like us. They love their children, love to fish, and have a tremendous appetite. Appetites are meant to move us to seek fulfillment. But beware for as a bear’s appetite unchecked can get him killed so can ours. Enjoy all those feasts of salmon, nuts and berries and yes, Yogi, even a picnic basket or two but remember life is so much more that satisfying our appetites. After all even a bears needs a nap from time to time.

Your friend and fellow traveler,
David White