Bear

UPDATED: A Reddit user knew about this one! Apparently from 2003 when two teens died street racing.

This is an old one. A really old one. I know this because I can see it — the little bear is almost falling apart, the flowers are bleached out, and the entire thing is just holding on by a thread — and because while I was shooting a local stopped to see what I was doing.

He didn’t have any detail other than “this one has been here for a really long time” and that people drive too fast on the road we were on. The former I could see, and the latter I knew because I too have driven Alfalfa Market Road a few times on the way to the Crooked River Canyon.

The bear was just so sad looking. His black button eyes seeming to look at the post he hung from pleading “don’t let me go.”

A metal cross was hung with the bear and that was in slightly better shape, still retaining some of its’ color and luster. I suspect before too long it will fall with the bear into the dirt to be buried in snow and stone, the person memorialized forgotten … at least on the side of this road.

Rest in peace, Stephanie and Dani.