Trailer Tales: in which we meet a new friend

He was the road scraper and he carried a half empty bottle of Jagermeister. He introduced himself as Todd. He had a gruff voice, a beard worthy of Al Borland, and a strong handshake. Then he said, "I was hoping you'd come home. I wanted to tell you there's a bear around here. And it's BIG. Did you see the big pile of shit by the shop?" I said yes I had. Todd said we had to go take a closer look at it. It wasn't just a normal pile of shit; this was a big bear we were waging war against.

On our walk to the see the shit, Todd offered me a swig of the Jager, but I was slightly afeared and said, "Nay, thank you." We arrived at the shitpile none too soon, after Todd had said 'shit' no less that 10 times, and 'fuck' on the greater side of 7.5. Todd kindly pointed out that the bear also wizzed right next to where it defecated. This bear, this beast of burden, was one cocky son of a gun.  Then Todd scared the shit out of me. He told me this bear was huge; it knew what is was doing when it peed and pooed there, and it WILL kill me if I let it have the chance. He asked if I had a gun. I said yes and revealed what kind. Todd roared, "THAT AIN'T GONNA DO IT! If you come upon it, shoot it in the shoulders and run like hell."

And here's the crazy part. Todd threw his hat on the ground, and underneath the ballcap was a beautiful mane. It was thick, fully covering his scalp, and had a silver glow of wisdom. It stood up on end and blew slightly in the evening breeze. I was stunned, more stunned than I had been when minutes before, Todd revealed a more genteel side as he named the mountain flowers that were in bloom. The lovely locks were completely unexpected as all I had been able to see this whole time was his nappy beard, which I wrongly assumed continued up and around the lower half of his head. Unconcerned with my gaping mouth, Todd went on to explain that he knows bears because he lived with them in Alaska. They've had a few chats, Todd and the bears. When he said he was part bear, afterall, I just simply nodded. Then I spat on the ground.

As he started to drive back into the woods, I hollered, "Which part?" Todd grinned and said, "The beard."