Walking with Bears

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We were afraid to take them out if we both weren't there. So in the evening she and I and the two of them would stroll around the block. There were landmarks to keep them focused and rituals. Around the first corner were apartments that opened on the sidewalk but had a little stoop with a few steps on each side and a railing. These became the kissing stairs where they could hop up and give us a kiss between the rails. (Years and years later, in a mall with one of them and both of us, a woman came over and exclaimed "The Kissing Stairs" - she had lived in the apartment.) Around the next corner there were stones to hop from one to the other. And then places where dogs lived and a little tree to climb a little further and then a family's yard with a high fence that only I could see into. I think I made up stories about what was going on beyond the fence they couldn't see over.

I came home early from work one day and discovered the Nanny walking around the block with them by herself. We decided that if she could do it, we, the parents, could certainly do it. Then came walks to the beach and hikes in the mountains later. It was a little scary to walk over to the beach and find the National Guard and their trucks at the Venice Circle (during the Rodney King Riots) We went a separate time, after the riots, when I encountered a bunch of kids running toward the police, and I turned the bears homeward to find that the beach had been closed because a fight between the police and the gangs. We used to walk over every Sunday morning for muffins and juice at a little outdoor cafe.

The Post Office and the little neighborhood video store became places of play. The video store guy finally gave us or sold us cheap his copy of Cinderella because it was one of the bears' favorites.

I learned at the park to stand back from the two of them, so I could focus my eyes to two different directions at the same time, which is not easy to learn. Friends thought I was walleyed.