8:50 a.m. - Sunday, Nov. 03, 2002
From Bedbugs to Teddy Bears
I think it�s well known that people who lose one of their five senses often find that their bodies compensate for the loss through an increased sensitivity of the remaining senses. Blind people hear and smell and feel things much more vividly than the rest of us, and so on.

I wonder sometimes if something similar occurs when a mind gets disrupted. As an extreme example, think of those autistic people referred to as savants. Theses are the folks who can�t meet their own daily needs in life, but who have abilities and talents that surpass anything an average �normal� person could accomplish even with years of training. Does the mind get more perceptive or somehow find new areas of the brain and new ways to process information as a way of compensating for the loss of efficiency in more common areas?

I�ve never seen a bedbug, as far as I know. Thank goodness for that. I�ve never seen one, so I don�t really know how crazy they are. My guess is they�re not as crazy by and large as they�ve been labeled. I have to say I�ve never heard of a bedbug any time or anywhere that�s been observed playing perfect sonatas on the piano or breaking a Vegas casino by memorizing the cards in a game of blackjack. No, mostly I think bedbugs are just doing their job in life. Just being who they are; hanging out in bed all day, hoping to snuggle up in the dark to warm naked flesh as often as possible and then dine on the very blood that keeps that flesh warm. That�s crazy if I do it, but it�s just business for the bug. Obviously, we need a new standard for craziness.

Crazy as a fly? Give a fly a choice between a fresh, healthy green salad and a pile of shit and the fly will land on the shit every time. How crazy is that? And it�s not just salad. Cookies or shit? Ice cream or shit? A wonderfully aged Cabernet or shit? Flies are crazy. Definitely. Maybe we would be too if we had to try to navigate our way around all the windshields of life seeing a zillion images of everything.

Moths are cleaner. On the outside they seem much more sane too. Moths live quiet unassuming lives. They wear sensible borrowed sweaters and spend a lot of time indoors. They don�t make much of a mess and no stench at all. And unlike flies, who wage biological warfare on humans wherever they find them, you�ll never see a moth with forty pounds of C-4 strapped around it�s waist, fluttering into a crowded pizza joint. No, moths seem on the surface to be model citizens and pretty good neighbors�.. except for the sweaters. But don�t take moths for granted. The suicide rate for moths is astronomical. It�s pretty obvious that most moths are the very definition of quiet desperation. They live as best they can within the confines laid out for them by the universe, or society, or whatever. But the day comes inexorably for each moth when she sees a flickering candle in the darkness of a warm summer night and she realizes that she must go into that light. It�s really sad to see. One can only hope that these poor creatures do indeed find some level of happiness, or at least a thankful release from the cares and hardships of this world. Moth suicide by candle is a cause of death second only to the mayhem of the automobile radiator, but this is an area of such carnage that we dare not speak of it in polite company.

All of this is just to say that Ann is crazy by any standard. She�s as crazy as any of the above insects, but I think I�d prefer to compare her craziness to the loon. A loon has a lonesome beauty; a grace that few people ever see. Her plaintive call echoes through the gray dawn, across the still dark water of a remote and secluded lake. To call a person loony is, I think, a very high compliment. Ann�s life is dysfunctional. She�s barely able to live alone while caring for the youngest of her four children. Yet like the loon, she displays a grace and beauty that few have ever seen. Sadly, I think few have ever looked.

Ann had known me for only a few weeks, and most of those weeks were only across the internet and by telephone. Like a lunatic, she allowed herself it fall in love with the image of a man I was presenting. She loved the man I was trying to be. And yet she bought for me, a large soft brown teddy bear. When I say large, I mean he takes up one side of my queen-size bed. That was in 1996 that she bought it. I couldn�t imagine why. I laughed about it and set it aside, ridiculing her for buying such a gift. What was she thinking?

But then at night, when I was alone, I found myself holding the unnamed bear. I dressed him in one of my shirts. I smoothed his fur and combed it out of his eyes. And though I would never ever admit it, I sometimes fell asleep hugging his neck. What a disgusting image that must have been; A middle-aged Alaskan man, with his hairy chest and back, long hair and epic mustache snoring alongside his teddy bear.

But you see� and here�s the point of all this�. In her insanity, Ann perceived something that no one else, not even I, could see. I don�t think even she realized it. She gave me other gifts that mystified me. A copy of �Kiss of the Spider Woman�, �The Crying Game�, and a necklace. It was a macho necklace�. A silver sailboat. But a necklace all the same.

I mostly ignored my nameless teddy bear. I ignored it, but somehow it was among the very few items I took with me when I abandoned my life in early 1996, and I�ve managed to hang onto it until today. I could ignore it, but I could never abandon it. Over the last couple of years, I�ve learned that it�s OK to have a teddy bear and it�s OK to play with him, cuddle with him and even love him. I sleep with him every night.

I got a second teddy bear; a little beany baby panda bear, when Lynn, my therapist gave me one for Christmas. I can�t remember now. Was it last Xmas or the one before? All I know is that the idea of someone giving me something for no reason triggered tears and that I loved this little guy from the first moment. He sits next to my monitor where I can see him all throughout the day. Once in a great while, he reminds me that the world isn�t strictly black and white like he is. I�m still working on that.

My mama sent me a stuffed animal too. Last year. It was a small skunk� also black and white. And on it�s tummy was a button to push. The skunk would sing �How Sweet It Is to be Loved by You�. I�m an ungrateful child, I guess. I couldn�t get my feelings around a skunk� especially since the card implied that I was her little stinker� and I would have preferred, I guess, to get the message that SHE loved ME. So the skunk suffered an unceremonious and bitter fate. Sorry mom.

Before I left to go to Thailand, I hinted without shame for a teddy bear to take with me. By then, I had lost my inhibitions about the fact that I like them. I didn�t know why exactly. I didn�t know until last night, but I�ll come to that in a minute. I hinted, but the only teddy bears that were offered were bears that were �around�. In other words they had not been gotten especially for me. Ann offered me one that she had around the house. She kind of missed the point that day. I turned it down. Once I got to California, my mama did pretty much the same thing. She has zillions of stuffed animals of every type. I could have chosen any one, but somehow it was important to me that someone go to a store with me in mind and choose for me a teddy bear that they thought would appeal to ME (not them) and give it to me as a symbol of love.

Well, that didn�t happen. So I went to Hallmark and bought myself a cute little teddy bear in a little housecoat that reminded me of a hospital housecoat. He was very cute. And then I saw a larger one.. more expensive, but really soft and darling. As I stood in the aisle trying to decide which of the two I should take with me, it occurred to me that I could have TWO. SO I bought them both. I�m glad I did.

For reasons too lengthy to explain here, my initial recovery from surgery was not a happy time. I was miserable and, for a patient who had her mother and sister as well as a staff of nurses, I was pretty much abandoned. But I kept my two teddy bears with me and spent a lot of time just petting and hugging on them. I had so far avoided giving names to my bears. That seemed just a bit too childish. But in many ways, I was a child again those first few days after the surgery. And so I named the little one �Courage�, because he had helped me have courage in the days and hours before I went into the operating room. And I named the bigger one �Comfort�, because his softness was a comfort to me as I lay on my back on a hard bed, in pain from the tubes and healing wounds in me.

It seems to be part of my own craziness that I can never keep anything. True to form, I gave both Courage and Comfort away to other girls as they faced their own surgeries. I miss them. I have to say I loved them. And I hope they have good homes. To help make up the loss, I bought myself another bear in Thailand. I guess my sister and mother still had not gotten the idea, as they were mystified and amused that I would look at teddy bears. At any rate, getting used to looking out for my self now, I bought a cute white bear for myself. I named him �Wageena�, in honor of Aey, a young assistant on Dr Suporn�s staff who asked me every single day if she could see my vagina (pronounced �wageena�). I love him almost, but not quite as much as Courage and Comfort.

And now�. The reason I�m going on so about teddy bears���.

Ann came over last night. She got me a bear! I guess one of the voices in her head clued her in on the fact that I like teddy bears, but only if they are gotten especially for me. She got me a cute, soft, little girl bear with a pink ribbon around her neck and a flower by her ear. She�s a �pre-owned- bear. Ann isn�t flush just now. She had lost a stitch at the back of her neck (the bear, not Ann), so I spent a few minutes to fix her up. Now she�s as good as new. This makes Ann the first person to give me a teddy bear as a man and again, the first to give me one as a woman. And it was this thought last night that made me realize:

I never had a teddy bear, or any stuffed animal that I remember as a child. Nothing. I remember laying for hours in my crib, hearing my mother going about her business in the next room but know that I mustn�t cry. Knowing that to cry would only make things worse. I re-experienced those feelings during the few days I was helpless in the hospital. Only this time, I did have my bears to keep me company while my mother and sister went about their business behind closed doors in the next room.

How is it I never had a teddy bear as a child? Is it a wonder I learned to see them as silly and foolish? Is it a wonder that I now discover that there is a little comfort sometimes in silliness and foolishness? Did Ann�s craziness tell her this about me?

I don�t know. All I do know is that I now find myself capable of owning and loving certain bits of rag and stuffing. They have got to be special, but I can love �em.

I finally gave the big one a name: Its �Complete�

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