Costumes are fun, especially at Halloween. When we were children, I remember lengthy discussions about what we were going to be that year. I don’t know why we bothered. In our house, we were always clowns. Because there were four of us, Mother kept recycling the same costumes. I have always liked to dress up---at any time. I recall suggesting to my own little family that we acquire bear costumes for our summer trips to the Sierras. Other motorists might have enjoyed seeing a car move down the highway with Daddy and Mama Bear in the front seat, their cubs in the back.
We have a friend, George, who has never gotten over the pleasure of make-believe. For any occasion, and especially for Halloween, he dons costumes to amuse the children in his family. Over the years he has been many things—Miss Piggy, a bee, a lion, a striking viking, Energizer Bunny, a turkey. Even a broken building after that terrible earthquake. His favorite is a gorilla suit which he once wore crossing the Bay Bridge. The toll-taker feigned boredom.
George recently visited friends at Tahoe who were still gasping over an uninvited visitor who had just left. The host said that he had looked across the table at his two small grandchildren and saw their eyes open wide. He followed the direction of their gaze. There in the kitchen was a bear, standing on his hind legs and dipping into the bowl of fruit which the family was to have for dessert.
His heart almost stopped, but a moment later he remembered. George was due to arrive at about that time and had undoubtedly decided to give the children a pre-Halloween surprise. But then the bear dropped to all fours and turned in his direction. It was not George.
As calmly as he could, he whispered to the children to go upstairs and stay there. For once, they obeyed.
He quietly approached the bear and motioned to it to leave. The bear obliged and retraced its steps down the hallway and out the front door. When the host slammed the door, the bear must have realized it had been hoodwinked. With delicious odors wafting from the kitchen, it banged and pounded on the door, then tore off the outside screen. It walked around the house, hitting windows, but it fortunately was unable to operate the sliding glass doors. After pacing back and forth on the porch, it sat on a chaise to wait the human inhabitants out.
Everyone was shaken by the experience. The forest rangers came and baited a trap for what they considered to be a friendly bear, the most dangerous of all.
If our friend George had chosen that day to amuse the children, I wonder what that bear would have thought to enter a house and see a gorilla or Miss Piggy sitting at the table. I also wonder what George will be this Halloween.
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