Bigfoot has been part of my life since I was a little girl. My first memories of watching television consist of two things: Sesame Street and the Patterson film. I was five when I first saw the Patterson film on TV, and it is so firmly impressed in my psyche that I can even picture the pajamas I was wearing when I watched it. My parents probably didn’t exhibit the best judgment on that one (but who am I to say, both my kids have seen it, too). And I’m pretty sure they regretted it later, especially when I made my daddy cut down the Bigfoot-shaped tree outside my bedroom window!
Later, we moved to a small town, into a housing addition at the edge of the country. Neighborhood legend claimed a monster lived back in the woods beyond the barbed wire at the end of our dead-end street. I would lie awake at night listening for him, but only heard trains and coyotes. There were a few times when I ventured into the wilderness, well as wilderness as my Girl Scout leader would allow. At night I kept my eyes tightly shut so I wouldn’t see Bigfoot’s shadow on my tent wall.
I’ve always insisted that curtains and blinds be closed after dark, “so Bigfoot doesn’t see me.” Although why I’m being so solicitous of Bigfoot’s sensibilities doesn’t make a lot of sense. But neither does my fear/fascination with him.
My peers have always had a lot of fun at my expense because of this Sasquatch-a-phobia. Several of the boys from my church youth group made a short Bigfoot mockumentary on a group trip to the Kiamichi mountains that I had to miss. Whenever we would see a large, hairy man driving by, my ex-friend and I would shriek, “It’s Bigfoot!” Let’s hope none of them ever heard our display of extreme immaturity.
After the Patterson film came out, Bigfoot enjoyed a brief flurry of pop culture attention. Then he largely faded into the background once again. Harry and The Hendersons tried to revive wide-spread interest in Sasquatch but, alas, it was a very stupid movie.
The past five years or so have been a veritable renaissance in all things Bigfoot. Once relegated by the media to northern California and the Pacific Northwest, sightings of Bigfoot and all his smelly cousins are being reported in every state except Hawaii. He goes by different names: skunk ape, Fouke monster, grass man, and let’s not forget his Tibetan cousin, Yeti.
Monster-hunting shows are always looking for Bigfoot, one was even set here in Oklahoma (in those same Kiamichi Mountains!). You can now buy Bigfoot greeting cards, Christmas ornaments, and toys. And don’t forget that Yeti has been a part of Christmas ever since Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer came out! In fact, there are so many cool Abominable Snowman and Bigfoot-themed Christmas items, that I will be having myself a Yeti Little Christmas for 2010. Anyone who wants to receive our Sasquatch Christmas cards needs to let me know early.
Anyway, after all these years fearing Bigfoot, it’s time I address that fear, and him, directly:
Dear Bigfoot,
Look, I know you’re shy, a lot of big guys are self-conscious of their size. There’s no reason to be ashamed. Maybe it’s the language barrier, or the smell. It’s nothing a bar of soap can’t handle, and an ape named KoKo learned sign language and you are lots smarter than that dame. Perhaps it has something to do with all that bad press in the 70′s.
The Legend of Boggy Creek didn’t cast you in the best light, and don’t even get me started on Creature From Black Lake! But I think your nadir had to be your dubious appearance on The Six Million Dollar Man. Talk about your dark-night-of-the-soul, that had to hurt.
I know there was a half-hearted attempt in the 80′s to cast you as a gentle giant, all vegan and crap. But nobody bought it, it’s just not reasonable to suppose you got that big just eating twigs and berries.
If you haven’t been keeping up with your press (maybe you need a better agent), let me tell you it’s on the upswing right now. Frank Peretti wrote a book called Monster, he even made you the Big Hero. (Side note to Frank Peretti–if you want to disprove Darwinian evolutionary theory, making your hero gigantopithecus, not the best idea. Seriously, Frank, if my buddy Sasquatch is so adapted to his environment that he is virtually undetectable, then he pretty much proves that whole survival of the fittest thing.) There are all these TV shows about you; you’re even selling beef jerky these days. And then there’s that whole Official Olympics Mascot-thing!
I think now is the time to go public. You couldn’t ask for a better time, look how well your buddies, the cavemen, are doing!
Anyway, when you’re ready, just let me know. I’ll try not to freak out.
Signed, Burning Prairie.