Bear with no name.

by Karen Jones
(Morecambe, Lancs, England)

So this is my bear and strangely, although I have had him from the day of my birth, I have never given him a name!I know that he was given to me second hand and I am 51 years old. The thing I love about him most is his smell of wood - this is the stuffing in his head and as a comfort I would smell his head rather than cuddle him. He has a hole in his ear - most probably where he had a tag and it is from the ear hole that as a small child, I carried him around with my finger hooked through the hole. He has a pretty grumpy look - no doubt having been dressed in doll's clothes and baby dresses - I'm not a doll lover- their faces upset me - so he would be dressed up in doll's clothes and travelled around in my pram and I have memories of rocking him in a crib. He had a squeaker but I don't remember it ever working. Unfortunately, he has a rogue spring just inside his fur at the tummy - although not sharp probably why he's not cuddled as much as he could have been.

He measures at about 30cm long. His fur has mostly gone now and the material underneath is brown and pretty rough.What fur is left (mostly on the back legs and base of the back) islight brown/golden colour His arms and paws reach to the top of his legs (thighs) and his paws are almost pointed. His paws at the front are pretty worn but feel softer a bit like velvet. His legs are quite chunky and velvet feet pads at the bottom.His head is as big, if not bigger than his body - his eyes are orange and he has a sewn nose. When I turn him over, he has a very pointed raised back at the top.Unfortunately, he has a gaping hole in the middle of his belly, where you can see his spring squeaker. There are two hard card disks in between a thin round spring. The squeaker part has gone. Behind the bigger disk in his middle is soft stuffing which is really soft stuffing - kapok?and more wood strands. I can't tell what his arms and legs are stuffed with - they feel softer.There would have been two sets of two stitches either side of each of the foot and arm paws. Poor bear - he's been through the wars and once upon a time, if there were any, he could have been treated at the teddy and dolls hospital.He has accompanied me through my whole life and is always close, through childhood, college life, married life and children. A very special, much loved companion.

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