Return of Bearduck

The wife has always had a thing for cute:  she is, she's drawn to, she has an eye for cute. Years ago, when I was first courting her, I played along, as gentlemen do, primarily by engaging in extended discussion of cat names and admiring articles of clothing so identified. I won't say this activity was feigned but it was less than wholehearted. Not so my enjoyment of bearduck.

Bearduck, the bear who dressed like a duck.  The improbability of it, the jokes, the novelty, and most fun, the games we'd play in which the little figure would show up in unlikely places.  But one night, enjoying sushi boats, we took the game too far:  we placed Bearduck on an empty boat, watched him sail off towards the kitchen, and then sat and waited for his return.  He never came back.

Sometime after that one of us discovered Bearcluck, the bear who dressed like a chicken, and we've preserved him through all the travels and all the years.  He lost his rooster cap, Talia sewed him a new one.  We cared, but we never loved.  And we never forgot Bearduck, floating away.

Life goes on.  And on and on and here it is, Labor Day 2014, and we're celebrating our one year anniversary in our still-new home and BARn.  I'm on an errand, refilling supplies, and I realize that a package that's been sitting around for a few days is addressed to me so I grab it and open it and there's Bearduck, a bit bigger than I remember him, and wasn't his old outfit footed, but it's Bearduck alright, and I'm awfully pleased to see him.

Now, who sent him back home?  Not a Boston-based sushi chef, that's for sure.  No, no, it was an old friend, and a very special person with a very special mind, a mind so orderly and logical that it was able to recognize, after a hiatus closer to two decades than one, someone else's toy.  It was none other than VeronicaSpock, a lovely woman who does not dress like a Vulcan but who certainly thinks as clearly as one, and who likes for things to be where they belong.