To my fellow Bigfooters: Don’t stop believin’!

How could you not love a face like that?

OK, I’m gonna come right out with it.

I believe in Bigfoot. Sasquatch. Yeti.

There you go. I said it. Hello, my name is Mark, and I believe in Bigfoot. (All together:  Hello, Mark!)

From the infamous evening back in 1972 when my ill-advised parents took my 6-year-old self, along with my brother and sister, to see “The Legend of Boggy Creek”, I’ve been fascinated by all things Bigfoot. (For the record, I wanted to see “Fantasia,” but was outvoted in the back seat of the station wagon on the way to the theater. For weeks after, I wouldn’t enter a dark room without someone else turning on the light first. Thanks for that, Mom and Dad.)

I’ve got my own proof, mind you. I’m pretty dang sure that me and my buddy, Randy Pennington, (yeah, I know the grammar’s incorrect) spotted a grainy, slightly out-of-focus Bigfoot up in the woods above our farmhouse one time when I was 12. We sprinted the 9 miles all the way back to the house, screaming bloody murder! Okay, it was more like maybe a quarter mile, but we ran the whole way and were really upset.

I was so into Bigfoot as a teenager, I wrote my senior term paper on him. (Or her, if you believe the Gimlin/Patterson footage.) I got an A minus. In my defense, I think the minus was because I was typing on that coated, erasable typing paper and the word “beast” got smeared on Page 3. It looked like “beach.”

Anyway, I can argue for hours in support of the Bigfoot theory, but you can find other, more credible sources for that.

Oh, I admit that I’m one of those people who likes to believe in things. Like Neil Diamond, I’m a believer. For you to affect my disbelief in something, you must prove it to be false, though I don’t require that the same thing be proven true if I think it’s cool enough. Sue me, but I think the world is a lot more interesting and fun when populated by things that defy explanation.  Yes, there are very intelligent PhDs out there who assure us that the Big Three — Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and UFOs — couldn’t possibly exist, and lay out academic, scientific, and other-ific arguments to support their theses, but I’m unmoved by this.

(Now, lean forward, because I’m going to whisper something in my conspiratorial voice.)

Maybe — just maybe — we don’t actually know everything. Maybe mankind isn’t quite as brilliant as it thinks it is.  

Yes, I know that’s crazy-talk, but I’m feeling frisky tonight.

But there’s one thing I do know. There is an enormous contingent of Internet users whose apparent purpose in life is to follow Bigfoot Facebook pages and make negative comments.  Ridiculing online Bigfoot believers is practically a cottage industry, I’ve learned. And I’m talking about some serious ridiculing. Virulent, personal attacks and hateful obscenities.

Just because someone believes in Bigfoot!

But it’s not only that. Hatefulness will rear its ugly head on the Internet anytime a person makes a statement of belief in anything. Optimism is not to be tolerated in today’s world. Allow commenting on a blog page, and let the negativity begin. In my opinion, the single biggest downside of Internet interaction is the total absence of accountability. Protected by a nondescript username and untold distance, these jerks will happily spout things they would never have the guts to say in person. The lack of basic human civility and manners is shocking.

For these reasons alone, I think Bigfoot believers should be held in high esteem. We bring positive energy to a negative world, says I. We are Renaissance men and women who shamelessly wear shirts that proclaim, “Gone squatchin’,” “Bigfoot saw me but nobody believes him,” and “Sasquatch stole my underwear.” We wept at the end of “Harry and the Hendersons.”

Got to get me one of these.

And what’s wrong with this?? The worst-case scenario is no conclusive evidence is ever found, and we die happy with our Bigfoot T-shirts on.  No harm done. The best-case is that we are all vindicated, and scientific proof is revealed that there really is an 8-foot-tall hairy guy minding his own secretive business back in the woods behind that old Phillips 66 station.

And when that happens, I won’t even say “I told you so.”