In defense of the Mapa Bear

description above that whoever started the rumor that bear fathers were cool got it seriously damned wrong. Who ever mucked it up first, they’ve since gotten a big boost from the entertainment industry. Beginning in the 19th century with “The Story of the Three Bears” and taken to an apogee with Baloo in Disney’s “The Jungle Book,” we humans have foolishly been led to believe that male bears can be domesticated and downright jolly.

Enculturated into believing the Goldilocks myth, I imagined myself as an ursine wonder, snugglin’ and rasslin’ with my boys and showing them the wild ways of bearhood. Big “Papa Bear” rambling about while his cubs tumble along behind him, eating and climbing all over him as he lays in the sun and digests.

I don’t hesitate to lift my cubs swiftly onto my shoulders while we walk, and I even let them sit on my head while we’re piled on the chaise watching TV. I treasure this intimacy and physicality and am particularly proud when I take them on “adventures” to explore the city’s curiosities. This is my range. And I am sharing it with my cubkids and showing them the ropes.

BUT!! Male bears don’t do that! They mate and leave and go wandering around eating until they do it again. There’s no nurturing. No playfulness. No guidance. God knows they’re not protective. Face it, Papa Bear’s a bum! So what am I supposed to do? What is my spirit animal? I certainly can’temulate human behavior, so where does that leave me?

According to the special Father’s Day posts on numerous science and nature blogs, there are some pretty good models of fatherhood to be found in the animal kingdom. Frogs and toads, the giant water bug, the arowana — all these guys are brooders, carrying the eggs of their young on their backs or holding their offspring in their mouths for protection.

In the oceans, the lumpsucker and the seahorse are pretty committed. Hell, the seahorse father actually gets pregnant! In the avian world, both the jacana and rhea are essentially single fathers. They make the nest, care for the eggs, raise the young, etc. The moms in this case are off cavorting in the interest of species propagation.

The marmoset? The emperor penguin? All great dads, but, I would argue, seriously lacking in stature and the rough-and-tumble, go-anywhere, take-on-theworld charge that I believe is so essential to the “Papa Bear” ethos. A proud “Papa Marmoset”? Doesn’t have the ring.

Then it occurred to me. Mama bears are actually the ones who do most of the stuff that I value: teach their young, protect them, feed them, raise them up good, play with them. They actually parent. Mama bears are there. Mama bears care.

Of course, I would never deign to presume I had the fortitude or patience to ever claim the rights or suffering of motherhood. But in this post-gender, non-normative world in which we have begun to find ourselves, I am willing to accept that I identify more strongly with the feminine in the ursine world. Perhaps, though my expression may be cisgender, I am, in practice, non-binary. Perhaps I feel more akin to the proud “Mama Bear.”

So what is my spirit animal, in whose company can I proudly stand in all my zoomorphic glory?

To answer this, I offer you the “Mapa Bear”: proud, fierce, loyal, roaming, nurturing, playful, rumbling and wild. All the best of what Mama brings, coupled with that swashbuckling bravado that only Daddy possesses. I am a proud Mapa Bear! And, as such, I will continue to spit and scratch and claw and nuzzle and coo and grunt and growl and bristle and kill and even die for my boys. I will care for them. I will be there for them. I will protect them. And as long as my neck can withstand the weight, I will let them sit on my head as we pile on the chaise and watch TV.

God protect those who dare get between the Mapa Bear and hir cubs!