“The Blue Ridge Craft Show?”
“Nope. San Francisco. The parents of the guy who shot me have filed a police brutality and wrongful death lawsuit against Gregg and SFPD.” I flipped the letter onto the coffee table and picked up my drink. “I’m being called back there to testify in a deposition.”
“But that man shot you, so how can they sue Gregg?”
“You don’t need facts to file a lawsuit. Just a money-hungry attorney hoping for a pretrial settlement.”
“Do we have to pay for the trip?”
“Nope. The plaintiffs have to foot the bill.”
“Huh. Does it say when in September?”
“I have the choice of a couple of dates. Why?”
“Well, there’s a teddy bear show in Sonoma in September. That’s just up the road from the city.” Ash gave me a shrewd smile.
“And you’d like the ambulance-chasing lawyer to pay for us to attend?” I took a swallow of margarita. “I love it. Find out the date and I’ll contact them.”
“I will.”
“And that might just give me enough time to design and finish my newest cop bear. We could unveil him in California.”
“You’ve already got an idea for another bear?” Ash gave me an amused and adoring look. “Tell me about him.”
“Deputy Bearny Fife. But God only knows how I’m going to create those bug-eyes.”
“And you’re going to have to learn to needle-sculpt his lips.”
“Needle-sculpting? I’ve never done that before.”
“You’ll learn.”
I chuckled uneasily, because needle-sculpting required far more skill than I thought I possessed. “Oh, Lord, what have I gotten myself into here?”
Ash leaned over to kiss me. “As always, nothing you and I can’t handle together, my love.”
A TEDDY BEAR ARTISAN PROFILE
Barbara Burke
My wife, Joyce, and I have learned an important rule for attending teddy bear shows: If you want a bear made by award-winning artist Barbara Burke, you’d better be at the event before the doors open and be willing to race the other collectors to her table. Her mohair bears usually sell out quickly and with good reason: They are among the sweetest stuffed animals ever created. Sometimes they don’t even make it to the show—recently, while in transit from her home in Massachusetts to a teddy bear show in Florida, she sold several of her furry creations to enchanted fellow travelers.
The curious thing is that up until ten years ago, Barbara Burke didn’t have the slightest interest in making teddy bears, nor was she a collector. She had a degree in fashion retailing and design and devoted most of her time to creating wedding dresses and children’s clothing. But in October 1996, she attended a teddy bear show in Vermont and that changed everything.
“I just suddenly knew that this was what I’d wanted to do all my life,” said Barbara. “I was suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome in both wrists at the time and immediately scheduled two operations to correct the problem. I knew that once I started working on the bears, I just wouldn’t be able to stop.”
By May 1997, Barbara had made enough bears to attend her first show as an exhibitor. Unknown and new to the bear community, she only sold one bear, but was ecstatic. Things have changed quite a bit since then. Barbara is now one of the premier bear artists in the United States and has won a multitude of artist awards, including two Teddy Bear of the Year (TOBY) Industry Choice awards, and one Golden Teddy. However, she maintains a down-to-earth attitude regarding such honors. “I’m pleased and humbled by the awards, but they’re not nearly as important as the pleasure I get from watching someone fall in love with one of my bears,” she said. “That’s the real payoff.”
Barbara’s bear designs come to her in a most intriguing fashion. Typically, she dreams about them and so she keeps a sketchpad and pencil next to her bed to immediately capture the images upon waking. The bears have also come to her in another form of unconsciousness. Earlier this year, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and had to undergo a surgical procedure. As she emerged from the anesthesia, Barbara told the nurse that she wanted a pencil and paper to sketch some bears she met in dreamland. They’ve turned into her newest teddy project.
A self-described “perfectionist,” Barbara dedicates hours to creating each individual stuffed animal and doesn’t consider it finished until the bear has “talked” to her. This happens when she holds the bear as she would an infant and gazes into its face. “The eyes speak to you and it’s almost as if it has a soul,” she explained. As the owner of several of her bears, I understand exactly what she means.
Not surprisingly to the people who know her, Barbara’s breast cancer diagnosis hasn’t slowed her much at all. She still attends shows all over the country and is famous throughout the bear community for the long hours she spends working on her bears in her hotel room on the night before an event. Barbara attributes her success in fighting the illness to her work with teddy bears and interacting with bear artists and collectors. She told me, “You’ve got to have a joyful attitude to make a teddy bear and the hobby attracts some of the nicest people you’d ever want to meet. Above all, I’ve been blessed.”
The only thing I’d add to that is that my wife and I are blessed to call Barbara our friend.
Barbara attends teddy bear shows all over the country. If you’d like to learn more about her schedule, she can be contacted via email at
[email protected]
. And if you decide to go to one of those events, remember: Arrive early and be prepared to race me to her table.
Afterword
Don’t look for Remmelkemp Mill, Massanutten County, or Shefford Gap on a map of Virginia. They exist only in my imagination. However, the other Virginia locations mentioned, such as Port Republic, Barboursville, and Elkton, are real places. The two teddy bear emporiums mentioned in the book are also genuine. Boyds Bear Country is in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and My Friends and Me is in Leesburg, Virginia.
The Michtom, Bruin Manufacturing, and Farnell bears described in the tale are authentic, as are their monetary values given in the story. In addition, the account of how the teddy bear received its name back in 1901 is accurate. Finally, Serieta Harrell, Joanne Mitchell, Masako Yoshijima, and Gary Nett are all real teddy bear artisans. I thank them for making our world a better place.
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