A Truly Devoted Friend
For Christmas, my sons bought me 'Ted'; the bear from last year's Mark Wahlberg movie. He has a classic teddy shape but an unconventionally rude verbal repertoire when you squeeze his paw:
"Hey Johnny, want a beer?"
"What would I like to do to her?"
And several other rude sayings.
The film 'Ted' develops into a love story where Ted finds himself to be a spare part in a relationship between a man and a woman. In Hollywood fashion, of course, it all works out and they all live together happily in the end. Real life is not like that.
My Ted is now sat with two other teddies and a big threadbare panda I had as a kid. They are the remnants of a teddy collection that I had before I got married, before my wife forced their eviction. I had not actually collected teddies as such but I once bought one for a girlfriend who dumped me before I could deliver him. He sat next to my old panda, the last of my childhood, and when the next girl came along and asked why I had a couple of teddies in my room, all I could think to say was that I collected them. She bought me one, as did the next girlfriend and the one after until I had a menagerie of stuffed bears.
For a while, I successfully passed them off as being a genuine collection since there were some quality bears; Steif, etc. But my wife immediately saw through that flimsy excuse and I had to send them away; it was her or the bears. With the bears went many happy memories of previous lovers, of innocent toys held lovingly by naked girls. I don't suppose a teddy bear is supposed to evoke such sentiments but memory association is a personal thing.
The thing about teddies, though, is that they are true friends. They don't judge or criticise, go off with other boys or tell you they don't love you anymore. These are sentiments that I passed to my sons in a more innocent way.
"Teddy will be here with you all night, my son, and I am only next door."
A teddy is a real friend. This is the opening stanza of a poem I wrote as a kid:
"He's as old as me, my teddy,
A truly devoted friend.
Never moaning or complaining,
And always an ear to lend."
I should have stuck with the bears.
"Hey Johnny, want a beer?"
"What would I like to do to her?"
And several other rude sayings.
The film 'Ted' develops into a love story where Ted finds himself to be a spare part in a relationship between a man and a woman. In Hollywood fashion, of course, it all works out and they all live together happily in the end. Real life is not like that.
My Ted is now sat with two other teddies and a big threadbare panda I had as a kid. They are the remnants of a teddy collection that I had before I got married, before my wife forced their eviction. I had not actually collected teddies as such but I once bought one for a girlfriend who dumped me before I could deliver him. He sat next to my old panda, the last of my childhood, and when the next girl came along and asked why I had a couple of teddies in my room, all I could think to say was that I collected them. She bought me one, as did the next girlfriend and the one after until I had a menagerie of stuffed bears.
For a while, I successfully passed them off as being a genuine collection since there were some quality bears; Steif, etc. But my wife immediately saw through that flimsy excuse and I had to send them away; it was her or the bears. With the bears went many happy memories of previous lovers, of innocent toys held lovingly by naked girls. I don't suppose a teddy bear is supposed to evoke such sentiments but memory association is a personal thing.
The thing about teddies, though, is that they are true friends. They don't judge or criticise, go off with other boys or tell you they don't love you anymore. These are sentiments that I passed to my sons in a more innocent way.
"Teddy will be here with you all night, my son, and I am only next door."
A teddy is a real friend. This is the opening stanza of a poem I wrote as a kid:
"He's as old as me, my teddy,
A truly devoted friend.
Never moaning or complaining,
And always an ear to lend."
I should have stuck with the bears.
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