Life Is So Unfair

*** continued from previous post ***

Julie, who had been squirming for the last few minutes, either in need of a bathroom or VERY impatient to ask a question, said, "And that does it? I mean the bears go away and don't come back?" She turned to Robert. "Paintballs don't hurt, do they?"

Dale laughed. "Oh, you have no idea how bad they hurt! Believe me, you get shot with one of these," he said, taking an orange ball out of his shirt pocket and handing it to the person on his right for inspection, "you're going to be feeling it for a couple of days. Go ahead and pass that around the room."

Robert nodded in agreement. "We used to go into the woods once a year for a Retreat with the staff. One of the activities was paintball. Believe me when I say that they definitely hurt. They leave quite a bruise."

"And I don't use just paintballs. We use a variety of non-lethal methods. See, we're not trying to hurt the bears. Far from it. But we are trying to harass them to the point where they associate people with minor pain and fear. Bears are highly intelligent as I said. I can't use the same method all the time because they come to understand that whatever it is we're doing isn't going to kill them, only cause a little bit of discomfort which, given enough time, they'll completely ignore. So we mix it up. Maybe paintballs one day. Keesha running around them, nipping at their heels the next. Then we'll shoot sandbags. Or firecrackers. You know, keep it fresh."

"Wow. They really get used to it that fast?" Mom asked.

I was a little surprised that your mom had jumped into the middle like this, she's usually not one for participation. Then I remembered we were talking about animals. If she began asking how much dry dog food you would need to keep a bear alive and did they like left over corn chips?, then I would worry.

"Oh yeah," Dale replied, "I said they were smart creatures. A couple of years ago we were having a problem with a big female. No matter what I did, she would still come back to the same places over and over. But when I showed up I could never find her. Smart girl." He tapped his index finger to his temple. "Turns out that she'd picked up on the fact that we came in white pickups. That's what we'd been driving because that's what the Park supplied, and that's what the staff use all over the park. So a white truck meant something unpleasant to her, but a car, or a truck of a different color? That she would walk right up to. So that summer I found myself down in the town, renting a different car every few days for the next six weeks so she wouldn't know which car was which." He looked around the room to gauge our reaction. "I told you they were smart."

So he gets to play 'Secret Spy' AND shoot bears in the ass? Life is so unfair sometimes. Plus, and I’m just guessing here, he probably gets to stay up late on school nights.

Dale then went on to espouse in a grand fashion on the intelligence of the grizzly bear. Evidently if they had thumbs we would be screwed. Or more screwed. Doesn't matter. I wanted to ask him how they trained the bears for the "Bear Calvary" meme, and started to raise my hand but Mom stopped me before I could get a word out.

Dale pointed to me and asked, "Did you have a question?"

"No he didn't," Mom said, entirely too quickly. It was almost as if she'd just been waiting for something along these lines. That woman is eerie.


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