National Adult Literacy Database

September 17, 2001

The following story comes to us from Vancouver, BC. The author, Bonnie Sloat, has various interests. She likes soccer, and her boyfriend is a coach for a team; she helps bring the equipment to the game and also keep track of the fees. Bonnie also likes to write short stories, she likes to knit, read stories and write reports on interesting information. She is a member of the Board of Directors for Literacy BC as a Learner at large. She has been on the board for three years now and she really likes it. Bonnie has a small family of three boys and one girl, plus three grandchildren - a girl and two boys. The reason she's gone back to school is to become a more skilled writer. She hopes one day to become an author.

Short Story

by Bonnie Sloat

I moved my small family, to Golden BC. We lived in a trailer park called Hospital Creek. We lived right beside Hospital Creek. ( The way the Creek received its name, was in the olden days there was a hospital put at the top of the creek to treat the wounded and sick. Hence the name Hospital Creek was given to the unnamed creek.)

On a hot and sunny day my two youngest sons decided that they were going on a picnic in the woods nearby. They packed up their lunches and left the house. I was busy tidying up after them, when all of a sudden there was this death scream from my eldest boy, "Mom!" "Mom!" "A bear, a bear," what a fearful scream coming from my son I have never heard in my life and I will never forget the screams for as long as I live. It still sends shills down my spine when I think about it today. I went to the front room window and looked out, to my dismay this was the largest bear I had ever seen in my life up close that is. In front of her were her two youngsters, frolicking in the water. She stood on her hind legs and roared a terrible roar, that went through my body as well. All of a sudden my thoughts were of my two babies in the woods, directly in line with the bear and her young. I called to my eldest son, to come to the house. "I then directed him to go get the two younger boys and bring them home." I, said to my oldest boy, "Would you please leave by the back door, that way the bear won't see you as she is busy at the front of the house." To my peace of mind the oldest boy brought the two younger boys home safely. This was one of many stories relating to bears in the wilderness. I guess when you move out of the city this is to be expected.

The second encounter with a bear was a little different. We lived next door to a French speaking family who understood little English. The women of the household decided to through away a whole fish into her garbage can. The garbage dump was right above the trailer park. Bears liked to gather there it didn't take long for a bear to get a whiff of the salmon smell. We had a Siamese cat. When the bear was outside at the garbage can, the cat started to growl at the bear. The bear then opened the garbage lid and made off with the fish in his mouth. The next day around noon hour all of a sudden there was this bear back for seconds only in the daylight this time. The lady next door had her baby outside playing. I was trying to get her attention to warn her of the bear on the grounds. She finally got the message a took her baby to safety. We called the Game Warden about the bear, "He told us he would be here shortly." The bear was becoming a danger to the children in the park. Someone had to do something. My husband had a gun. Just to scare the bear away he went outside and fired on shot over the bear's head. The bear then reared and came towards him. He fired again this time at the ground and some rocks and pieces of wood struck the bear and scared him away. The bear then took off into the wooded area on the other side of the trailer park. The Game Warden finally showed up two hours later. We asked him what took so long, "He said he had some family from the coast who had never seen a bear up close so he had to wait for their arrival." We told him what had happened he then left in search of the bear.

Then shortly after that I moved my small family back down to the coast. That was enough of the wilderness for me.