Tag Archives: humor

If bearness ends up being pointless, I guess I will keep being a bear.

I like to believe being a bear has a point and, therefore, my bearness has a point. I am a bear in the forest, and it is nice to think that matters to something or somewhere to some end. Maybe the forest needs me and my bearness. Maybe some other creature needs me and my bearness. Maybe me just needing my bearness to be a bear is enough for my bearness to have a point.

I like to believe that.

But maybe being a bear is not supposed to have a point. No end. No meaning. Maybe I am a bear because I am a bear, that is all there is to it. That is a little scary, but it is also a little nice. If being a bear is truly pointless, it takes a great deal of pressure off of me and all the expectations I impose upon my own bearness. To some degree, bearness being pointless would be a relief.

But if it is, then what? What I am supposed to do with all the bearness I am and have cultivated through many days and nights as a bear? If there is no point to that bearness, then all that being a bear has led to nothing more than me overthinking being a bear. So if that is the case, I suppose I just to keep being a bear.

Is there really any other choice? I suppose I could not be a bear, but if it does not matter whether I am a bear or not a bear, I think I would rather be a bear (at least I have experience in that, whereas I have no experience with not being a bear).

But then if I am a being a bear just because I am a bear, am I not just back to my original question about what being a bear means? If all I can do is be a bear, I will, no matter what, be at least curious about what that means and how I should approach it, even if I end up believing that it is meaningless.

Being a bear should probably not be this confusing.

Either way, I suppose I will just keep being a bear, whatever that means, and I guess I will apply meaning to my bearness where I see fit. Maybe I just have to make my own point when it comes to being a bear.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

I hope it is okay I do not know how to be a perfect bear.

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I think it is possible simply being a thing makes you the best possible version of that thing. Frogs are the best at being frogs because they are frogs, and who would know better than they? Trees are the best possible trees because that is who they are and what they know. So I should, then, be the best version of a bear because I am a bear, and if anybody knows the best way to be a bear, it would be me, correct?

I should be a perfect bear by way of just being a bear. But I do not actually feel that way. Where I am able to easily assume the same of others in the forest, I have a hard time assuming so of me. I do not think I am a perfect bear, and I do not think I am the best version of a bear. I am even usually convinced that I do not know how to correctly be a bear.

I am a bear, but I have no idea if I am being a bear the way I am supposed to be a bear.

I suppose that could be subjective, though. Maybe what defines perfect bearness is impossible to truly determine since there might not be one single right way to be a bear. That is okay, but even when I humor this idea I am still so easily taunted by thoughts of what I am supposed to be doing as a bear. So much so that I am even forced to ask myself: what if I am not even a true bear, whatever that might be? How do I even know I am a bear? And if I am truly the keeper of being a bear, and I can determine whether or not my own bearness is acceptable, why do I not feel like I am capable of doing so? Why can I not simply be a bear and let that being be my best way to be?

I have, in the past, wondered if other creatures suffer the same dilemma, but they do not seem to. Perhaps instead of trying to be what I consider being a bear is, I should be and do what other forest creatures are and do to illuminate their own -nessness. Perhaps instead of cultivating bearness, I need to cultivate the confidence squirrels have as they chaotically bounce from tree limb to tree limb. I need to harness the effortlessness exhibited by birds as they dip and dive in the air.

Maybe to be the best possible version of a bear, I just need to stop obsessing over my own bearness and, instead, ease into bearness. Let bearness happen.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

I cannot but help to stay in the forest.

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The forest is not always an easy place to live in. For every soft, lovely clump of moss there is among the trees, there is some agonizing terror that creeps into your brain or body and tries to remove you from the forest, whether physically or mentally.

As I continue existing in the forest, it feels as though these terrorizing things affect me more frequently and to a greater extent. Because of them, I often find myself overwhelmed and unwelcomed by the forest, like I am some parasite it is trying to destroy. When the wind blows a sharp stick into my nose, how could I not feel like the forest does not want or need me? When every squirrel I see gives me a mocking glare as it hurls menacing chuckling sounds at me, how can I continue to think the forest is not trying to get rid of me? When even my own cave floods with water, ruining my collection of rabbit skeletons and interesting soft things, is it even possible for me to assume that I am wanted among the trees?

I have convinced myself, time and time again, that the forest is no place for me, a bear. I have even cautiously approached the idea of finding a new home, if a place outside of the forest even exists. I have never ventured far enough to know if one does exist, however. Something always keeps me here, keeps me among the trees.

It is the soft, lovely clump of moss that keeps me. Not that single thing in particular, of course, but things similar in disposition. The interesting things. The lovely things. The kind things. How there is always fresh water in the river. The amazing manner in which ants create their homes. The surprising passivity of spiders. The moments absent of deer. The flowers. The trees. The soft dirt. The taste of rabbit skeletons.

There are so many good things in the forest.

Also, there is me. As much as the forest sometimes seems like it wants to chew on me and eat me and then regurgitate me out of itself, I am, ultimately and truly, part of the forest. And the forest is part of me, part of who I am and how I understand everything, including my own bearness.

So for now, I will keep being the forest, even when the forest does not seem interested in my being. I believe I have earned that at least.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

What if I cannot continue to be a better bear?

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As I continue being a bear, I have generally become better at various bear related skills and activities than I once was. I am a better climber of trees than I once was. I am a better eater of forest floor leaves than I once was. I am a better understander of squirrels than I once was (though they certainly still confuse me to no end).

I am, generally, a better overall bear than I once was. Or, at least, I feel like I am a better overall bear than I once was. I take pride in that fact. My bearness has grown. It has gotten better. It is better prepared for other potential bear related problems. I am a better bear. I do not often get to reflect on the growth of my bearness and any positive changes it has undergone over my time being a bear (which is all of my time), so doing so is actually quite nice.

But then, of course, I am forced to consider the downsides of continually being a better bear. The main downside: is there a time or place when or where I stop being a better bear? Does my continual better bear being stop bettering eventually?

I do not know. I do not want to hit a wall of bearness. I want to continue feeling like I am progressing toward some kind of bearness goal, even if something like that does not really exist or is only imposed by me.

Of course, when I begin to think of this bearness wall, I wonder if I even need to keep getting better at being a bear. Perhaps the skill level I currently possess in activities like swimming or smelling things or not getting locked in a dumpster is adequate and there is no need for further advancement. How much better can I really get at not being locked in a dumpster anyway? There is not too much involved with that skill, and what little is involved with it is comprised mostly of luck. Even more difficult skills like climbing or swimming pose that issue. Do I really need to get better at shifting my body about in the river? Nobody seems impressed by it, and it does not help me beyond a minor confidence boost, so why bother?

I do not like to be so dismissive, though. Even if being able to stand on my two back legs is not the most useful skill to hone (though being able to use my front two paws for carrying things would be lovely), I still like the idea of trying to get better at it. And even if I cannot get better at it, I like the idea of trying. Even if the growth of my bearness gets stuck, I still like to think I can do something about it.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

More bearku.

1 Reply

Forest can be dark,
an angry and scary place.
Being a bear helps.

***

New dumpster findings:
baby raccoon with sharp teeth.
Please stop biting me.

***

Sometimes I worry:
Will the sun choose to eat me?
How can I stop it?

***

There are many trees.
Do they know one another
or like each other?

***

If I fall over
and no one sees me do it
I still fell over.

***

I cannot nap here
There are ants building their homes
I am not monster

***

The deer is quite rude
He lives across the river
He should never leave

***

I ate many sticks
My belly is not happy
I still ate some more

***

The way my paws smell
Makes me quite happy indeed
I will not wash them

***

Oops, I fell over
At least I did not get hurt
This bench is sad, though

***

How does the moon feel
about its name, the moon?
Does it even know?

***

I can hear the wind
and I like the way it sounds.
I hope it hears me.

***

What is it like, bee,
to be so small and to fly?
I hope it is nice.

***

I rolled down a hill
spinning and spinning until
I just stopped spinning.

***

A leaf hit my face.
It was wet and very cold,
waking me from sleep.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

A brief list of things that have made me happy recently.

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Hello, I am a bear. Here is a brief list of things that have made me quite happy recently:

Sticks
Water
When I can see the moon and the sun at the same time and they are not fighting as I would otherwise expect
Naming trees
Taking back the names I have given trees because I am not sure if they already have names, and it seems rude to simply assume
A very tall bird I saw
The sky not getting any closer or farther away but instead just staying right where it has always been
Not knowing how many frogs there are (what a mystery that will remain)
Having a good idea of how many of me there are (just the one, I believe)
(but what if there is another one of me somewhere?)
(and I don’t know that one of me?)
(and that me is just walking about the forest, looking for a version of himself)
(and we are just wandering the forest, not finding what we think we need to find and also not knowing if we even can find what we think we need to find)
(oh no, this list has gotten sad, this is a very upsetting idea)
(I need to refocus this list and share another thing that made me happy recently)
Mud
(that was not very good as I like mud, but I have not had any happy experiences with mud recently)
More sticks
(I am still stuck on this possible wandering version of me who is aimlessly trudging throughout the forest, hoping to get even the slightest glimpse of me, the other bear that this bear might be, this is so upsetting to me)
Some berries I ate
(maybe if I leave some berries near my cave they will attract the other bear, giving this bear a sign that I am another bear waiting to meet him or maybe he will simply eat them and walk away)
The smell of my paws
Sleeping

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

A bird dropped a stick on me. Why?

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The sky is known for dropping two things on a regular basis: leaves and rain. Those two things fall from some unknown aspect of the sky, an invisible, seemingly random agent of the clouds above with the help of the chaos of the wind.

So when things other than rain and leaves fall onto my head from on high, I know it is most likely not by way of the sky or the wind. The usual culprit is a squirrel. Squirrels love to throw things at me. I am not sure why, but they do it frequently enough that my thought process of things dropping on to my head works on a simple flow chart. Was it a leaf or rain? Probably the sky. Something else entirely? Probably a squirrel.

With so much experience in the ways of things being thrown at me from high above, I have generally held the belief that there is no way something new can happen in those terms. To my surprise, there was at least one more thing that could happen to me when it comes to stuff falling on my head: a bird.

I saw a bird drop a stick on me. I must be specific here. I saw this bird drop a stick on me. It was not as though a stick hit me and then I looked up and saw a bird and assumed. I saw this bird. It was as though the bird delivering the stick directly to my head. It hit the mark, too. The stick hit my ears and bounced off my fluffy fur, hitting the forest floor with the slightest of thuds.

Why?

Why did this bird drop a stick on me? It has been something I have been trying to figure out ever since. Was it really just delivering the stick to me? Did the bird see that I had dropped this stick somewhere and just wanted me to have it back? I did not recognize the stick, but I suppose it was possible.

Did the bird intend to hurt me? Was the stick a pointy painful projectile meant to do harm?

Was my head a future nesting place for the bird? Are more sticks to come?

There is no way to know, and there might not ever be a way to know. This is the truly hard part of this strange occurrence. There are no answers. There are no reasons. I suppose that happens a lot in the forest. Random, strange things happen frequently, and those who have the things happen to them are left to put the mystery together only to realize it is essentially impossible.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

Every place is scary or too mean.

1 Reply

I worry that I hide myself from the greater expanses of the forest too much. I spend a great deal of time in my cave or near the river I like or by the dumpsters I frequent or in the most familiar patches of grass and dirt I know. Rarely do I traverse beyond my known routine, and when I do, it is usually because of an enticing smell or a terrifying sound or an interesting looking rock.

Generally, I am okay with my regular outings, but when I do worry about my routines, I worry about if I am missing out on something. I worry that there are grand, engaging experiences throughout the forest that I miss simply because I am too scared or comfortable to reach them. Experiences missed simply by virtue of proximity (or lack thereof). The forest does not do much to inform me about the possibilities of these events and experiences. There is no master forest schedule that I am aware of (though I have certainly entertained the idea of squirrels having and/or knowing of such a thing and actively hiding it from me for no reason beyond meaningless spite on their part).

When the worry outgrows my desire for comfort and safety, though, I begin to think about how or why I do not search new, exciting things.

And then it all comes back.

Every awful experience I have ever had that happened because of my leaving my routine.

The time I got locked in a dumpster and then some humans sprayed stinging mist at me and tipped the dumpster over so I rolled out? That happened because I tried a new dumpster, one I had never been to but had an incredibly smell to it I wanted to investigate. Blinded by the awful mist, I ran through the forest wildly until I eventually hit a tree and napped until the sun was up.

Or how about the time I tried to enjoy the offerings of a human lake? The water ended up burning my eyes, and the humans who lived near the lake sprayed more awful mist at me (you can guess what I did afterward).

Then there is the long, flat black rock. I have followed it far beyond my cave before to end up finding nothing new or of interest. Just more forest and smashed raccoons. A sad, difficult rock that seems to exist only to crush unsuspecting forest creatures. It was a sight I could have lived without experiencing.

There have been good times found far and beyond my cave, though. I once found a very cool and fish abundant part of the river I go to. I followed it upstream until I was able to see more fish through the water than I had ever seen. I jumped in. The water so cooler than I had ever remembered the river being. The fish were so plentiful that even my slow, uncoordinated paws were able to catch them. It was nice. And I would not have experienced it without going outside of my comfortable routine. Are the plentiful fish worth the potential of stinging mist, though? I do not know, but for now, I suppose I will go where my bearness leads me, whether it be the comfort of my cave or some new, terrifying adventure.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

I fell into a hole I dug.

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Digging is one of the more fun activities anybody can do in the forest. If you have movable limbs that are harder than soft soil, you can dig, and you should dig. The rush of cool soil lining the creases of fur between toes makes digging worth the effort and energy.

I learned recently, though, that reckless digging can have some harsh consequences.

I have no idea when I dug the hole that swallowed me whole. It must have been me, however. There is no other creature in the forest who can dig as big of a hole as I can (as you might be able to guess, I tried to blame the deer across the river, but his hooves are more likely to be used to judge me rather a fun activity like digging). I found the hole through a simple walk in the forest. I was staring up at the sky, admiring the clouds and the sun and the tops of trees, and then it got quite dark suddenly. Before I could figure out why, I was in a hole.

At first, I growled at the soil around me. Surely it was the soil’s fault, the fault of the forest, the fault of everything around me. I growled at the darkened sky, blaming its erratic and senseless change. I growled at everything I thought could be held accountable in even the slightest manner.

Then I growled at myself. It was then I realized who could have dug a hole so large and so randomly. It was my fault. It was my fault that this hole in the forest had tried to eat me, I practically fed myself to it with my irresponsible digging. There was no reason to take out my anger on the forest. The forest had not done anything. I wanted it to have done something. It would have been easier if the forest had done something wrong to me, but it had not. It was just me.

Once I got back on my paws, I shuffled out of the hole and got back to the safety of the forest floor. It was bright again. I shook off the dust from my fur and continued walking, heading to nowhere in particular but filled with a want to do better, whatever that meant for me, a bear.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.

The bear I might become.

1 Reply

I am not sure what kind of bear I am supposed to be (I do not even know if I am supposed to be a bear, really, but that is another topic all together). That worries me occasionally as I have noted before: what if I am doing bearness wrong? There is another issue that grows from that moldy idea resting in my bear mind: what kind of bear am I supposed to become?

Not doing bearness right in the current moment is fixable, I suppose, but that fixing is very dependent on my knowing what kind of bear I want to be. When I think about that, I usually do not have an answer. I am a bear. And I want to be a bear. That should be good enough, but I still feel a strange push from myself to define my bearness, my being a bear. I feel a need to know what kind of bear I am and what kind of bear I want to become.

When I think of the kind of bear I have been, it does not help matters. Most of my past bearness is me being okay with being a bear and that is all. I liked being a bear because I was a bear. There was no need to categorize my bearness.

I am a bear, so I am a bear.

At least, that is how it used to be.

As I continue being a bear, however, that need to define and categorize and further understand my being a bear grows. And its growth always brings frustration because I have no answers that satisfy the need. I am a bear is all I have on the topic, and I believe I will be a bear is all I can predict about the topic. I hope the bear I am is the kind of bear I need to be later.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? The newest adventure is all about safety!

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.