When I was 8, my parents and I lived on top of a hill. We lived in a happy neighborhood where everyone knew everyone. When I lived there, a happy couple lived in the flamingo pink house next door. There names where Gerald & Rose. They had been married for more than 60 years and decided to move next door when they retired. Gerald was an ex-cop and Rose was a Preschool teacher. When I was home alone they would take care of me, feed me, and sometimes gave me toys. Gerald owned 2 Collies, They’re names where Mishka and Yishka.

Mishka and Yishka would always, after school, wait for me at the sidewalk in front of our swamp green house. Like clockwork, they would play and hang out at my house every day after school. When Rose came home they would leave and somehow, somewhere would disappear and then re-appear about 5 hours later.

Beside the Flamingo colored house, was another hill that lead to the rich side of town. The hill was always covered in vines. Some grew grapes! If you look very carefully, inside the vines is an old tunnel. The tunnel leads to another hill on Sunset BLVD. Once, I was playing hide and go seek with the 2 dogs (sounds delusional, right) when both of them went out of m vision. I walked around and tripped over a tree root and fell into the tunnel. It felt as if I was falling off a skyscraper that was in space. I fell into the tunnel and blacked out on the floor. I was awoken by the bark of Yishka. “This must be where they hide out”, I thought. I walked around and finally made my way out of the tunnel back home. I opened the grape vines and took Mishka and Yishka home and never talked about it again.

At my house you could see a view that went all the way towards Griffith Park. The view was great and every morning I would wake up, go on the balcony, and look at all of the exhibits. From Lions, to Tigers, to Bears. I like to think that my father looked like a big bear and I was a cub.

For some apparent reason the zoo would always hire the worst zookeepers because every 5 months or so an animal exhibit would escape and cause havoc around town. For instants, the giraffe enclosure escaped and the giraffes would run on the freeways and destroy cars or the time when the chimpanzee enclosure escaped and gave 12 people concussions.

After taking care of Mishka and Yishka, I went to bed. In the middle of my Golden Slumber, my mother woke me up and said “Hey Azul! Another enclosure escaped today!” “Okay,” I responded. “Your dad and I will be gone tomorrow. Gerald and Rose are going to take care of you the rest of tonight until tomorrow after noon,” she said. After that I fell into a deep sleep.

No person was looking for the bear. Everyone was to frighten to go outside to handle it. It walked and walked. The Sound Of Silence stood in front of the bear and it calmly pattered up and down streets to find a new home. At about 3 o’clock in the morning, I was awoken by 2 faint barks and whimpers. I put on some clothes and walked outside. Mishka and Yishka where starring at there tunnel. “ What time is it,” I asked. I pet Mishka. Then Yishka started to whine, and before you knew it The Bear came out of the tunnel.

“What the… ” The bear stared at me with its big red eyes that looked like hell. Before I could finish my sentence the bear was running towards me. Wow that animal ran fast. I jumped over the back fence, Mishka and Yishka followed. The bear bashed through the fence and chased us all around the yard. I closed and locked the door. I picked up the phone and called animal control. “We’re sorry the Animal Control hotlines have been turned off due to the Animal control picnic,” it said. I hung up the phone and ran into the living room. The bear finally bashed the door open. Debris was everywhere. It slowly walked over on all fours. It stood up and put its paw in mid air. Then a loud buzzing noise went in my ear. The bear started to wobble and fell down. BOOM! Right next to me. I looked up. There stood Gerald. He had a taster that eventually knocked out the bear.

My parents and the police came to the scene 30 minutes later. My mother looked at me Just as the bear did.

“What did you do,” My mom yelled.

“A bear broke into the house,” I said “If Gerald wasn’t home Mishka, Yishka, and I would have been brutally killed. My parents stood and thought for a while. My dad picked me up from the grainy culda-sac street curb. We went into the disaster of the house that looked like to Atomic bombs landed directly on the house. We all realized that life can be taken away very easily, and every so on out of the ordinarily.