Mirror, Mirror       Nobody knew why Ivan wouldn't come in to eat. His voracious appetite had pulled him through the guillotine door for twenty years of zoo life.  But there he stood, just outside the door, staring through everything, into infinity.  This nine-hundred-and- fifty-pound polar bear had never missed a day of eating.  Food was his life.  I threw him a mackerel and it landed still inside the night quarters just four feet from his face.  He continued staring into space.     "Come on, Ivan.  I want to go home," I pleaded.     No amount of coaxing made any difference whatso- ever.  I didn't have the authority to leave him out- side, so I ran to get Al Franklin, my senior keeper. Al had worked with Ivan for a lot longer than I had and might have known a trick to bring him in.     Al tried all the same things that I had tried but with no more success than I had achieved.     "Did you ever drop a door on Ivan?" he asked.     "No, Al.  I never have,"  I answered.  We had a good friendship and there was no reason to believe he would doubt my word.     Al didn't have the authority to leave Ivan on exhibit overnight.  So he called Ed, the principal keeper, who did have the authority.  Ed's first question was, "Did anybody drop a door on Ivan?" and Al assured him that neither he nor i had do so.  Ed felt that Ivan should be locked on exhibit without food till morning and hunger would be our best bet to bring him in.     Morning came all too soon and we resumed our  efforts to bring in the bear.  Still no success.  The problem his obstinance was creating was that we  could not clean his outdoor quarters unless we  could lock him inside.  The zoo's architect had placed the drain valve to Ivan's large swimming pool inside the exhibit with the most dangerous bear in the zoo.     Ivan was also the messiest bear in the zoo.  It was summertime and by the end of the second day his pool was becoming light green with free-floating algae.  The third day the algae began to settle on the sides of the pool and the exhibit began to smell musky and sulphurous.       We would have  tranquilized him but there was a  terrific chance that he would stumble into his pool  and drown.  Actually, there were some of us who thought that we would be willing to take that chance.     After a week had passed, you could smell Ivan's exhibit as soon as you entered the aquatics section. Every supervisor in the zoo began suggestings things we had already tried and asked whether I had dropped the door on Ivan's head.  I suspected that someone had done that in the past, causing Ivan to fear going near the door for a period of time.  But I couldn't think of anything I had done that might have caused this strange behavior on Ivan's part.     One week stretched into two, then three.  Ivan hadn't eaten for twenty-one days, but we made sure that he had fresh water daily by direcing the stream from a high pressure hose near his massive head.  The weather was uncomfortably hot and Ivan was glad for a good cooling off.  We had no idea how long it would be before we won the battle of wills, because fat polar bears are capable of going incredible periods of time without food if they have access to water.     On the twenty-second day, Al Franklin found me by the sea lion exhibit and asked me if I would help him.  He told me he had an idea that just might work.  I had long since become skeptical. but I was amazed that there was a new idea to try.     Al said, "Follow me to the men's room at the chief's shack and I'll show you my idea."  I couldn't begin to imagine what there could be in the men's room that might lure Ivan into his night quarters.  But my curiosity was at an all- time high.     Al led me in the men's room and proudly pointed to the four-by-five-foot mirror mounted over the two porcelain washbasins.  I knew I was missing something because for the life of me nothing about the mirror struck me as having the capacity for catching a nine-hundred-and-fifty-pound polar bear. I began to wonder if I was missing a philosophical approach like "the answer is inside ourselves" or something like that.  Ivan was not a vain bear, and a mirror would not service his needs at all.  Why, he didn't even own a comb.     "Okay, Al, I'm sure this is going to be good, but I just can't see it.  How is thee mirror going to help us?"     "Ivan has killed two other polar bears, right?" he said.       "Right."     "So the way I've got it figured, he hates others bears.  If we prop this mirror up just behind his bars on the outside, he;ll look in and think he's seeing another bear.  It will make him madder than fire and he'll run in to kill it.  Anyway, that's my theory."     "It's worth a try," I said, as we began unscrewing the mounts that held the mirror to the wall.  We carried the mirror into the back of the bear grotto and leaned it into position so that when we opened the guillotine door Ivan would be staring at his own reflection.     Al stepped asisde so that Ivan would see nothing but a bear in the dim light of the night quarters.  I lifted the door and peered cautiously at our stubborn nightmare.  He was instantly aroused by the bear in the mirror and moaned quietly.  He rocked back and forth and then charged the bear in the mirror aggressively.  As soon as he cleared the door I dropped it into place.  Al had found the answer.  We got a lot of good laughs because of the unorthodox nature of the capture, but everyone admired Al for his original thinking.     One of the ways man is different from the animals is that he realizes he is looking at his own reflection.  He has self-realization.  We may see an enemy in the mirror, but then enemy may be us.  There have been times in my life when looking in the mirror was very painful because of how I was living my life.  It is strange when you find yourself avoiding your own gaze because you feel you can't respect the person you have become.  Look at what : James1  : 21-25 has to say.     Therefore put away all filthiness and rank growth of wickedness and recieve with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.  But he doers of the word, and not heares only, deciving yourselves.  For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who observes his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was kike.  But he who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer that forgets but a doer that acts, he shall be blessed in his doing.     Find a mirror.  Look deep into your own eyes and say, Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting............Psalm 139:  23-24       Now do what God tells you.  There is Peace and Joy there.     Author ~ Gary Richmond.