6/21/09
The fire was starting to die down so I reached into the darkness behind my lawn chair for some more wood. The oak takes a long time to catch but the fire had been going a few hours and the embers of the last log were burning hot. I placed the new log on top. My face burned but it was pleasant in the cold night for a few moments. I sat back.
“Is this where the bears are?” Ralph asked me.
“How the hell should I know? I mean, they’re around. You see all the signs.”
“Don’t feed the bears.”
“So there must be bears.”
“Maybe they’re just being careful.”
“What?”
“Like a precaution.”
“Of course they are. They don’t want you feeding the bears.”
“What I mean to say is, maybe they don’t see bears that often, only once in awhile. Once a year and they just do the warning, just in case. You know like when we prepare for an earthquake.”
“What?”
“Those don’t happen everyday. But bear attacks…”
“Who said anything about bear attacks?”
“The signs…”
“Say don’t feed the fucking bears!”
“Don’t they eat people?”
“Dude, are you saying you thought the sign was saying don’t let yourself be eaten by the bears?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“And they decided to phrase is as ‘don’t feed the bears.’ That’s how they tell you to protect yourself from a deadly predator. ‘Don’t feed the bears.’
“I thought it was a joke.”
“The national park service doesn’t’ make joke signs. What the fuck? Like, Danger: Falling Cock? Like that?
Ralph laughed. “Yeah, like that.”
I watched the unpredictable flickering in the fire pit, and the shadows on the ground. “Any more of that jay left?”
“Nope.”
Nice one.
ReplyDeleteAdapt for stage.