First my apologies. I don’t blog as often as I would like. On the positive side, our house is lots cleaner than it’s been in years. I have to give some credit to Mary (our new house cleaner) and the financial incentive it is to me that the house be tidy when she arrives so I only pay her to sweep and mop three stories of marble/hardwood floors and clean the five bathrooms. I feel it creates an equivalency to my previous life as far as the amount of work I have to do to maintain my home. Now, because I don’t blog often, I missed writing about our trip to Thailand, moving into our new house, Shon & Juli visiting us in Singapore, the Hyatt family arrival in Singapore from our Fairfax neighborhood and…Ben’s birthday. Ben successfully turned seven. He got a lion dancer costume and Mario Kart. He also believes he got a beta fish, which was foolishly purchased on his birthday, though it was meant to be a family gift.
Now let me elaborate a bit on Angie and fish. I had a pretty decent fish tank in college and the first year we were married. I kept it up, but didn’t really enjoy it or fall in love with the idea of having fish. When we started moving around the country in 2000 I gave the fish away and stored the tank and gear. In time I gave the rest of the stuff away realizing I didn’t care and I had learned that fish didn’t like me anyway.
You see, I had a suicidal fish. There was one particular beta fish that would jump out of the water every time I would try to clean the tank. I was endlessly rescuing the darn thing from the dirty kitchen floor in my apartment. My roommates thought it was terribly sad that he always tried to kill himself. I’m guessing Brian thought it was funny. I thought it was gross. I was the one that had to pick it up and fish are nasty and slimy and ewww! I was not amused and because the fish would be flopping and flipping helplessly all over the floor it always turned into one of those squeamish, squealing girl moments in the apartment while I tried to catch it without actually touching it. I’m quite sure if it hadn’t all gone down thirteen plus years ago I could have written an award winning blog post about the experience with lots of fun embellishments and descriptions. As it is you’ll just have to create your own picture in your mind.
One day I went to clean the tank and the fish was gone. Fish don’t just disappear. I looked in the plants, in the filter, in the cave thing. It wasn’t there. The tank was about 3 or 4 gallons and I had purchased a heater, filtration system and lights in the hood (meaning it had a lid which kept my suicidal fish inside). I kept the whole contraption on top of my entertainment center. Not being able to find the fish baffled me. In disbelief I searched the floor of the entire room, even going behind the entertainment center and checking everywhere it could have possibly gone. Nothing. Finally I just had to let it go. The fish was not going to be found. Six months later we found his skeleton in the front most corner underneath the entertainment center when I got married and moved the entertainment center out. So sad.
Back to today. Brian is allergic to pets with hair so we couldn’t really get any sort of pet beyond a fish. (something we’re both grateful for) We promised a fish for about a year and a half, but the pet store was never convenient and we have no other cause to go there. Then Jacob got to a horrible age and he was so curious that it was a sure bet if we had a fish, he’d pick it up and kill it.
Jacob is much more mature now at the ripe old age of two and a half. Brian and I happened to be walking in the market and saw fish on Ben’s birthday. Without any kids to make the purchase troublesome we bought one. Finally after eighteen months of waiting, Ben and Maddie had a fish!!
We got that fish on April 22, 2011. He died sometime this afternoon on May 11, 2011. Poor guy didn’t even last a month. I heard him flopping around earlier today and, because of my history with fish, even went twice to check that he hadn’t jumped out when I heard him splashing today. Frankly, I had thought he didn’t look really healthy for the last five or six days but had been too lazy or not concerned enough to look up “how to care for a beta fish” online. Now he’s gone. His dried little body was stuck tight to the floor so I had to pop him up like a suction cup releasing its grip on glass. It was so sad.
I called my trusted advisor (Brian) to ask what we ought to do. See, I discovered it as the kids were heading up the stairs to bed and actually laughed that it had happened to me again. They all turned around to see what was so funny an probed and pestered me about it but I wouldn’t tell them the truth. Because, well, it’s not funny. And they won’t appreciate the situation, they will only be devastated by the loss. Brian said it wasn’t right to buy a new one. They need to know that fish die. So we’ll wait.
I wonder who will notice first. I’m guessing Jacob. He loved to pull a stool over to the table and just watch him. He would squeal, “My little fishy eating, Mommy!” Ben and Maddie will probably cry. And then, probably for Family Home Evening, we will all walk to the market and buy a new fish. Creating exactly the situation we wanted to avoid. Three excited kids in the teeny tiny pet shop full of glass tanks and living things that can be injured all fighting with each other about which beta fish to buy.
Maybe we should set up a rotation schedule. Because if nothing else, I’m a realist. It’s gonna happen again. Poor fish. I really did try. Next time I’ll keep the water level much lower so even if they jump, they can’t get out. It was almost full to the top today. Sorry Fishy #1. May you Rest In Peace.
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