It Was the Bear's Fault

     "This is the bear's fault," I thought as I drove home Monday night, after dark and through snow.

    I had left home in a light and intermittent snowfall in plenty of time to have snow tires put on my car and then to do a few quick errands before heading home. I should have been home well before dark. But when I got back in the car after the final errand and saw that the "low tire" signal had come on, I headed right back to Les Schwab.

    The receptionist thought it was just a matter of turning the light off and called someone right away. The store was busy. It was a long wait. Finally a technician came in, squatted in front of my chair, and said, sympathetically, "One of your tires has a slash in it. We would think it had been done with a knife except that it's on the inside of the tire."

    "Ah," I thought. "The bear."

    Last spring I left my snow tires on the inside of the car port (roof but no sides), leaning against one of the posts. One day last summer I was puzzled to find one of those tires outside the car port, leaning against the same pole. The other three tires were still propped against the pole on the inside of the car port. There was no shredded plastic. Very mysterious.

    The only thing I could figure was that a bear had moved it, though I couldn't understand why he would do that. Now, faced with more substantial evidence, I envisioned the scene again. Curious about the bright yellow something that was my tire inside the plastic bag, he must have picked it up, slashing the tire with a claw as he lifted it to his nose. Then, deciding it wasn't edible, he pivoted and dropped it. It happened to land upright, leaning against the pole. The last piece of evidence was a slight rip in the plastic I had noticed when I put the tire in the car. Just a small hole. Just big enough for a claw.

    I had to buy two new tires, of course, because these days, if you ruin one tire you have to buy its mate, too. 

    I made it home through the dark and the snow, stopping halfway up the hill to clear the road of branches dragged down by the snow, using the headlights for light, but I was still grumbling at the bear. We get along pretty well, in general, but this time I think he owes me about $300 for the tires.