With a certain blogger's birfday drawing near (PS3 or Red Bull BC One tickets please, Birfday Santa), I am inclined to look backwards on my life. Note: Do not try looking backwards while also walking forwards. You may unknowingly run into oncoming traffic, a lamppost, or worse, an exgirlfriend...you know, the one with the herp. OCK WORD.As far as reminiscing goes, I tend to view my life in the form of a cartoon. My first day at school takes the shape of a Tiny Toons episode. My first crush is an episode of Care Bears (my Care Bear "stare" has never been more inappropriate). My first time playing basketball morphs into ProStars with MJ, Gretsky, and Bo Jackson. My first encounter with a little person: David the Gnome. And the list goes on.When thinking about my first black friends (of whom I carry pictures to prove to people I'm not a racist), one particular cartoon jumps from my memory banks: C-Bear and Jamal. It features a gullible young boy Jamal and his smooth talking, sunglass-wearing, fuzzy wuzzy teddy bear C-Bear, voiced by real life teddy bear Tone Loc. You may remember him for his visionary and seminal rap hit, aptly titled Wild Thing.I was gonna say this was my favorite cartoon growing up until IMDB dutifully informed me that it aired in 1996, when I was already 13 years old. Based on this trajectory, that means I hit puberty when I was 24. That sounds about right.Unlike other cartoons that featured token characters coded as black (read: Panthro from Thundercats, Jazz from Transformers), C-Bear and Jamal put the black family upfront and had plenty of non-white, non-black, non-animal characters to boot. The show also taught me about peer pressure, social problems, and re-enforced the notion that taking the advice of a talking bear is actually the wise thing to do. Ha, and they laughed at me in high school for walking around with a Teddy Ruxpin doll. Those fools.So when in doubt, trust C-Bear even though he may sound like he's been smoking herb and slapping around hookers. Yogi, Baloo (naked or pilot version), Berenstein, Gummi, or Care are also bearable substitutes. You'll bearly notice the difference. Bears are our moral compass and best friends, but only as long as they have the ability to talk. If however they only speak in roars, I recommend a different cartoon, one that taught me about Latinos: Speedy Gonzalez. Better make quick and "Andale! Andale! Arriba! Arriba!"
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