Me, my dog, and an unwelcome guest

Elijah woke up at his normal 6am this morning.

I got up to feed him, and JB followed soon afterwards. He gave me the choice after E. was done with his bottle: go back to bed or go for a run.

It was a tough decision, but I opted for the run, secretly hoping I could squeeze in a nap sometime during the day as well and get the best of both worlds.

Scrubs was not too happy. He really wished I had chosen the nap. Seven o'clock! Is she kidding?! But no, not joking. We headed out on our normal three mile loop with Scrubs not at all happy with me.

It was halfway into the run that we decided instead of continuing forward, we would return the way we came?

The reason?

A black bear.

I am not joking. I rounded a corner in between housing developments on base. (For those of you who are familiar with Base, it is where you start going down hill after you pass the Fire Department.) Instead of going on the sidewalk, I decided to run on the road. It was a good thing. There, just twenty-five feet or so in front of us, was a black bear, looking right at us. Had I been at the sidewalk, I am not sure I would have seen him as quickly. It would have also made the decision to turn around much more awkward.

For a moment, I was confused. For a moment, I thought that the black bear was fake -- you know, like those fake deer some people put on their lawns. (Why do people put those on their lawns anyway?)

But the fake bear was soon moving, walking toward the sidewalk, definitely aware of us, and definitely intent on investigating who we were. I think it was a younger bear, but I was so freaked out, I really couldn't be sure. Thinking back, I'm still not sure exactly how big it was.

I immediately turned us around and Scrubs and I began jogging back the way we came. I'm not sure if Scrubs saw the bear or not, but I can tell you that there was something in me that new I was safe with Scrubs there. I had no doubt that he would fight that bear to the death if it came down to it.

As we returned the way we came, I decided to veer left and jog by the Fire Department. Surely someone should know if there was a bear on Base. There were a bunch of fire fighters working on their truck, and I asked them if the Base wanted to know if there was bear in the housing areas. "Oh yeah," they said. "That's not good at all." So I told them where I saw the bear, they said they'd take care of it, and I resumed my jog with Scrubs in tow.

When I got home, I told Keith, AD, and JB the story. AD joked that JB was jealous, and he admitted that he was. He would have loved to have seen a black bear on his jog with Scrubs.

Either way, I feel that from now on, I will be just a little more "on guard" when I am running on Base. And I'll have a cool story to tell -- way cooler than any of JB's stories -- for once.