Mama bear

The other night, before I left you sleeping in the bed you had been in since Sunday, I talked to you the way your friends who stopped by talked to you--as if you could hear everything, as if you might respond later somehow. I had been missing you responding to me at all, though.

"Maybe we can talk in my dreams," I said.

As it turned out I fell asleep fine that night next to my friend, but woke up with worry that kept me mostly awake for hours, listening to the birds and the day creeping in, thinking about you going away. I was in and out until I finally got up. Somewhere in my half awake half asleep stage I was riding a bike, and I passed a bear. It was a big deal, as I never see bears in regular life. Maybe I was biking in a city or the suburbs--down a big main street and there was the bear. Sometimes I feel like there is a message in animals I see--both in waking and in sleeping life--so later in the day looked up on-line what bears meant. Among other things I found this:

"...They are devoted mothers, raising and protecting their young from danger, teaching them to forage for food and fish in streams and providing them with all that they need until they are able to care for themselves properly. Mother Bears will fiercely protect her offspring from any harm or threat of harm..."