One Polar Bear Shot, Sir.

It was an unusually slow Friday night in the Eskimo Bar. The bartender was cleaning the iced countertops when a frail old woman walked into the bar. Another unusual sight for the Eskimo Bar. She sat at the end of the bar with her hands in her lap and her head down. The bartender wiped the counter down and made his way to her. 

"A shot for your thoughts?" he said with a small laugh. 
"Uh, yes I would like one Polar Bear shot," the woman replied. 

Taken aback by this request, the bartender nodded and retrieved the woman's shot. He slid it the shot in front of her and she picked it up and raised to the ceiling. 
"
To letting go," she said and threw back the drink. Her face scrunched and she began shaking her head. The woman picked up her purse hanging on her seat and fumbled in it for a few moments. She set her purse on the counter and sighed. 

"Sir, I am terribly sorry, but I don't have the money to pay for this," the woman said. 
The bartender sat for a moment and thought about her predicament. Usually, he wouldn't be forgiving of this, but seeing her state he felt she deserved some slack. 

"I will let you off, but on one condition. You tell me your story of what brought you in today," he said. 

The woman smiled and took off her jacket. 

"Well, I better take off my jacket because we will be here awhile," she replied. 
The woman proceeded to tell the story of how she had been fostering a large wolf-like dog she found on the side of the road. She loved this dog as if he were a child. She walked him, fed him and bathed him. Although the dog was sweet and protective of her, the dog was vicious to others. One day the dog broke out of the backyard. He charged around the neighborhood and attacked a man and left him severely injured. As a result, the dog had to be put down, but before putting him down she released him to the woods to find a pack of his own.

"So that is how I ended up here. To take a strong shot of something to let go of the only being that did not remind me how alone I am," she said and looked back down at her hands. 

The bartender now felt even more guilt than before. He sighed and swung the towel over his shower. 

"M'am, I'm sorry about your dog and tell you what. How 'bout every week you stop by for a Polar Bear shot on the house. You can tell me about your week or whatever," he said with a smile. The woman nodded. 

"Thank you, sir. You are very kind and I look forward to it," she said and gripped his hand. 

The end. 

Caption: Wolf by Simon Rae. 

Author's Note: I chose to do The Woman Who Had a Bear as a Foster-Son. I changed the bear to a dog and had her tell her story a bartender. I didn't want to alter the story too much, and I wanted to keep it simple. I wanted to keep the same emotion, but give the old woman a happy ending. Without the dog, she wouldn't have met the bartender. Another thing to note is a Polar Bear shot is one part chocolate liqueur and one part peppermint schnapps, and I felt it fit the Eskimo vibe. 

Bibliography: Eskimo Folk-Tales by Knud Rasmussen with illustrations by native Eskimo artists (1921).