Educating Bigfoot, Part Ii

...The bigfoot poked out again the next day with the little one not that far behind, came lunch time Julio put out apples, before each he would stop and make the sign. He did this for days, an entire week, each day the two creatures came for the snack, then one day he kept the fruit in the bag, the beasts got anxious for what they now lacked. The older sasquatch was agitated, but Julio just made the sign with his hands, the beast hooted and growled, still upset, though the little one seemed to understand. He tried his best to mimic the motion, so Julio tossed an apple to him, the mother then noticed, she did the same, so he gave one to her with a grin. From that day onwards, when on his lunch break, he’d make a sign and point at an object, the creatures learned fast, and got their rewards, even seemed eager for what they’d learn next. For many weeks this pattern repeated, until one day Julio ran out of spruce, the crews would come soon with trailer and truck to pick up the trunks and put them to use. Julio figured that the job was done, so he went home to rest up for a bit, didn’t think he’d see a sasquatch again, until one night when his dog threw a fit. He walked to the back door, where the dog barked, determined to see what caused all the fuss, in his backyard he saw shaggy, black forms, in disbelief he shook his head, awe-struck. The two bigfoots had followed him on back, and they signed for him to come talk to them, with a shrug he went out, signed to them ‘hello,’ and like that the friendship started again. It’s even said that they learned some syntax, and pronouns, the younger one claimed a name; that the juvenile outpaced the mother, the plasticity of youth in his brain. For twenty years they lived near Julio, until the female passed on from old age, two years later cancer took the logger, no one knowing the breakthroughs he’d made. Now I know that this tale must come as a shock, most didn’t think sasquatches could exist, but now that you speak of who gets credit I had to come forwards and insist That all remember the lonely logger, that you put his name on the walls. Julio Jones taught my mother to sign, that’s how I can even talk to you at all.