The Pilgrim Bears
Remember those days when you tried to impress the person with whom you were dating with your witty remarks and clever anecdotes? Remember how you’d open car doors, use manners and wear pants? Ahh, fun times, fun times.
In those days, I too was trying to sell my future wife a bill of goods. We were already engaged that fateful day, but I still kept to my best behavior at all times. It was especially true the weekend we were visiting my parents. Those moments were always stressful when your fiancee evaluates your parents’ every idiosyncrasy. I thought it best we leave the house and get a little break. We went downtown to shop on Main Street.
Eventually, we found ourselves in a homemade gift shop. While I stared aimlessly out the front windows of the store, The-Wife-To-Be perused the inventory.
“Oh, these are cute,” I heard from behind me. When I turned to look, what I saw was so terrible – so horrible – I could barely stifle my gagging reflex. She held two porcelain bears decked out in Pilgrim outfits. They were the perfect Thanksgiving couple except for one thing: they had DEMON EYES.
She asked what I thought of them. I mumbled something incomprehensible and nodded in an attempt to be supportive. I silently hoped she would move on. Instead, I heard the five worst words: “I’m going to buy them.”
The little old lady running the store carefully wrapped the bears in paper and tucked them into a bag. As I carried the spawns of Satan to the car, the bag got heavier and heavier with the realization the bears would grace our dinner table each Thanksgiving for the rest of my life. Their wicked painted eyes would stare at me over the turkey and taunt me for not putting my foot down. Still, I didn’t want to hurt her feelings and I put them in the trunk.
When we got back to her house I offered to take the bears to the basement and store them until Thanksgiving. I found a dark corner and tucked the bears behind a box hoping they would be forgotten.
Time passed.
Three years later she re-found them. We were cleaning when she discovered them still wrapped in the bag.
“Why on earth did I buy these?” she asked. She turned the bears to show me. Their evil eyes caught mine.
“You thought they were cute,” I replied and took a cautious step back.
“Why didn’t you stop me?”
I took another step back – this time from her. I mumbled something incomprehensible and shook my head. Our marriage would never be the same after that moment: we both knew I failed to protect us from these cutesy demon bears. She stuffed them back into the bag and told me I could get rid of them.
But something else stirred in me – a mischievous need to “get her back”. Get her back for buying them, I guess.
One night close to Thanksgiving, I slipped the bears under her pillow and cackled to myself. I waited until she climbed in bed and reached under the pillows. She felt them underneath and pulled her pillow away to see what the lumps were. A startled scream echoed from the bedroom when she saw their fiendish stare.
I laughed myself to sleep on the couch that night ;-)
I have found a way to surprise my wife with the bears each Thanksgiving since. One year she found each of them buckled into the front seats of her car. Another year they were staring at her from inside the refrigerator when she open the door to get some creamer. She even found them waiting for her in the shower in a creepy Psycho-like moment.
Last year when she was working out of Indianapolis and we still lived in Wisconsin, I shipped the bears to her office. Inside the box was a note: “I know you’re lonely down there by yourself. I thought these guys could keep you company.”
Happy Thanksgiving from us and the demonic Pilgrim Bears!
One Comment
- Dan said: