This morning, DH discovered that my daughter's fish has went on to that great big swimming pond in the sky. Rosie Rainbow, who was with us for almost a year, was stuck lifelessly to the bottom of the filter. We have not told our daughter yet, but I think she knows. She had an odd, sad look on her face. We tried to claim that little Rosie Rainbow was just sleeping or resting, but my little girl is no fool. She knows. She's just waiting for us to confirm it. We just could not send her off to school upset.
Not that she should get upset with a fish. It's quite replaceable. It's not a dog or a cat. Can you tell I'm not really a fish fan? I have two fish in a large tank in my living room that I'm just WAITING FOR THEM TO DIE so I can move the tank out of that room. Those two fish (named Wizard and Tin Man...guess the movie!) have been taking up space in my newly refurnished living room for over about 6 years now! And they just won't DIE!!
Rosie Rainbow, on the other hand, was my daughter's first pet. True, we have dogs, cat, turtles, fish...but Rosie Rainbow was all HERS. She went to the fish store to pick her out with DH, while I stayed behind avoiding that store at all cost because I have an irrational fear of Fish/Aquarium stores. I think it goes back to when my own pet fish chose to jump out of his bowl when I was about eight years old. I didn't know he had jumped out. I was bare foot. While looking for the little sucker, I stepped back and SQUISH. I shudder at that memory.
I thought of quickly flushing Rosie Rainbow to her sewery grave. Oh, who am I kidding? I thought of telling DH to flush Rosie Rainbow to her sewery grave, but then I remembered that scene from Poltergeist. The one where little Carol Ann's dead pet bird, Tweety, is being hovered over the toilet. Mom is trying to avoid telling Carol Ann that her beloved Tweety is gone but gets caught by Carol Ann. That is the first very disturbing scene in a movie that has scared the crap out of me for years!!! (But I still watch it every Halloween season!).
Just the thought of flushing a dead bird down the toilet. Is that even POSSIBLE?? I'm curious to know...has anyone ever flushed a dead bird? Doesn't it clog the toilet? Make a mess? Flooding and yellow feathers everywhere on the bathroom floor? I don't exactly understand the mechanisms of how a toilet works and really, who does or cares except for plumbers and my father. But does a toilet have enough power and strength to whisk the carcass of a canary through the pipes and out to the ocean or where ever it is that our "stuff" goes?
And since Carol Ann caught mom, I didn't want my daughter to catch DH going behind her back and traumatize her. I mean, look at all the crazy stuff that starting happening after Carol Ann discovered her mom trying to flush her bird. I do NOT need to see my daughter going for a ride on the seat of her pants across the kitchen floor!!!
Do we bury a pet? We had already buried one pet last August. Our old cat, Weazel, had gone to take a cat-nap and he never woke up. We discovered him around 9:30 at night. I had him before I had DH. I called my Dad crying and asking just what do you do with a dead cat at 9:30 at night? He actually had the nerve to tell me that we should just wrap him in a Hefty bag and put him to the curb with our other garbage. I think dear old dad was just getting back at me for all the times I said I was going to do that to him when he expires. After crying some more, my dad came back to his senses and suggest to bury him in our yard. He was even helpful enough to give us the dimensions of how deep and how wide Weazel grave should be. Even a pet's death is technical to Dad.
I specifically told DH I wanted Weazel on the side of our house. There is no room to ever have to build something there. Again, remember Poltergeist? They bury Tweety in the yard and a couple of weeks later they start to put in a pool and poor Tweety's grave is disturbed and desecrated by bulldozers! I did not want to chance that with my Weazel. We have no space for a inground pool in our yard, but I can dream.
It took hours for DH to dig a grave. We did not know that our yard sits on top of some sort of bedrock. He tried all over to get a hole deep enough so our dogs would not smell him and try to dig him up. It was nearing midnight and DH was out there, in the hot August night, sweating and covered with dirt with a shovel and a pick and our yard lights BLARING for all the neighbors to see.
He looked like a scene out of a horror movie. The most famous horror movie involving a dead pet. A dead cat to be exact. Stephen King's Pet Sematary. A great story of a magical Pet Sematary where people would bury their pets so that they would come back to life. Only they never came back quite "right". This movie also introduced the creepiest toddler ever!
After DH laid Weazel to rest, I must have asked him a hundred times "Are you sure he's dead?" I just did not want to see him sitting on my back steps in the morning after clawing his way out. No way. No how. I loved that cat, but Stephen King had scarred me for life when it comes to burying your pets so close to home.
And now Rosie Rainbow. She is still attached to the filter. I suppose we will let our daughter make her final decision. It's only right. She was the one that picked her out from a wall of bored fish in bowls. She was the one that named her the most creative name I ever heard of for a fish. She can decide if Rosie Rainbow should be flushed or buried in our own Pet Sematary. Ooooh, there's a creepy idea for a movie! A buried FISH that comes back from the dead! All you remakers of movies, take note! What a scene that would be!!!
Rest in peace, Rosie Rainbow. You were a pretty little fish. Red with purple and blue on your feathery, frilly, fins. You were a Betta Fish. A Siamese Fighting Fish. Or, as this Movie Junkie always called you a Rumble Fish.
In honor of Rosie Rainbow's passing, I am recommending the movie Rumble Fish starring a very young Matt Dillon, Diane Lane, and Mickey Rourke pre-boxing/botox/plastic surgery days. Those of us who are S.E. Hinton fans remember the story of Rumble Fish fondly and can't look at a Betta Fish/Siamese Fighting Fish without calling them the most perfect name for them. Rumble Fish.
No comments:
Post a Comment