The other day someone noted that I had the tendency to talk to complete strangers. One becomes very aware of one's foibles if they are pointed out to one! She was right. I am fascinated in strangers. So I was waiting in line with a stranger for some copying to be done. We shared the moment with one of those wonderful black dogs with the graying eyebrows who nuzzled one and then the other.

She was having some copying done from a book called Birds by Andrew Zuckerman. I told her about his other book, Creatures. I mentioned the picture of the grizzly standing on hind legs posing on a white background. He must have waited hours for that picture. She told me her bear story in return. She had been gardening at her summer cottage in the fall. She was walking home with her shovel that had a blue handle. (Only an artist would have noted that detail!) Out of the woods shuffled a large black bear. It paused. She paused and lay down the shovel. The bear "merped" and so she "merped" and put her hands behind her back. I had a mother who was a violinist. Hands are important to violinists and artists. The bear investigated the blue handle and then casually stood up on his bag legs. She realized at that moment that he was only her height (Easy to say in retrospect...) and continued 'merping."

Much to her astonishment, he lay down on his back and started grooming himself. And then from up the hill, one of her children called and she looked away. When she looked back, the bear was gone. She still wondered whether it was her imagination or if that had really happened.

So often we are in situations where we have no witnesses and we wonder if it really happened!