We all know the original story of "Goldilocks and the Three Bears".
How Goldilocks entered the Bears' house, ate their food, broke their furniture
and fell asleep. When the Bears got home, she jumped out of the window.
How many of you regular folks have ever heard the "Yuppie Version"
of how this tale ends ? Imagine a Yuppette reading this to her lil'
Yuppies and Yuppettes before they go off to dreamland.
Papa Bear called the police who combed the area with K-9 dogs. Goldilocks had
taken refuge in another woodland cottage not too far away and when police
arrived, she tried to pass herself off as the housekeeper, a Ms. Snow White.
However, the owners of the cottage, seven height-disadvantaged people,
returned from work just then, unmasked her as an impostor and discovered the
real Snow White bound and gagged in a closet. Goldilocks was arrested and
charged with breaking and entering as well as destruction of property.
But in a dramatic turnabout she sued the Bears, claiming she suffered severe
emotional trauma from eating porridge that was "too hot" and had
injured her back in the Bears' dangerously insubstantial furniture. She also
sued the Quaker Oats Company for failing to put warning labels on their oatmeal
boxes and the Rustic Furniture Company for building a weak chair.
Papa Bear called Goldilocks' charges "a sensational fairy tale"
intended to distract from her crimes and disrupt his happy family. However, in
an exclusive interview with National Obscurer magazine, Baby Bear said
that all in the Bear family was not "Just right".
He claimed Papa was over-bearing and abusive. He went on to say Goldilocks
may have been lured to the Bear dwelling by Papa, who was sick of living on
porridge and wanted to get his teeth into something more substantial.
Papa called Baby's story "an improbable fantasy" adding that they'd
obviously allowed Baby to watch too much TV. Meanwhile, an unnamed source close
to Goldilocks implied the Bears' house was not the first placed Goldilocks had
"slept around".
At her trial Goldilocks was acquitted when the jury couldn't agree on whether
she had broken in or was enticed to enter the Bears' bungalow. A disgruntled
prosecutor remarked that several men on the jury "seemed more interested in
Goldilocks' smile and charms, ignoring the evidence."
Indeed, Goldilocks parlayed that sweet smile and her school-girl innocent
good looks into a lucrative contract with No Excuses jeans and a brief
career in the movies. Sadly, after several starring roles, drugs and alcohol
abuse took their toll and the offers dried up.
But after treatment at a rehab clinic she wrote a book, "Goldilocks Comes
Clean" in which she recounted her troubles and explained the incident at
the Bears' house as "a youthful adventure gone wrong".
Her book received considerable publicity and eventually the aging, though
still attractive, Goldilocks went on to publish several best-selling diet and
exercise books, eventually becoming a hostess of a popular afternoon talk show.
The Goldilocks case marked the beginning of a long slide for Baby Bear.
Estranged from his parents, he lived on the streets and joined a street gang,
the Fangs. As part of an initiation rite, Baby attacked the Deere family. But a
passing police car interrupted the assault and in the ensuing melee Baby was
shot with a tranquilizer gun and woke up tagged and behind bars.
Baby found prison life too hard, becoming unpredictable and rambling. Finally
paroled, he ended up a deranged alley-dweller where he froze to death one winter
after being ignored by passers-by who thought he was just hibernating.
Mama Bear divorced Papa two years after the Goldilocks' case, citing
irreconcilable differences and infedility. She moved to Arizona and remarried,
raising two new cubs, volunteered for school groups and local charities.
The only uncomfortable reminder of her previous life occurred when she ran
into Goldilocks at a bookstore where Goldilocks was signing autographs. Despite
embarrassment, they chatted for several minutes, then Goldilocks gave Mama a
copy of her latest book, "Goldilocks and the Three Beans Diet".
Papa Bear believed he had failed his family and became increasingly
withdrawn, a contributing factor to his divorce. An altercation with a hunter
ended with the hunter receiving a gunshot wound to the foot. The hunter sued,
claiming Papa Bear assaulted him. Papa countered that the hunter had been about
to shoot him. But the hunter won a settlement of several hundred thousand
dollars.
Papa couldn't pay, slid into debt and saw his cottage foreclosed by the bank.
He moved to a remote town in Alaska where he was welcomed as somewhat of a
celebrity. He became a salmon fisherman and solid citizen, serving two terms as
mayor and later winning election to the state senate on a law and order
platform.
Along with Goldilocks and Mama Bear, he will receive royalties from the
forthcoming NBC mini-series, "Goldilocks and the Three Bears: An American
Tragedy".
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