.... and I'm really sad. His name was Fish. I've had him for over a year and he has traveled everywhere with us, in our RV. He's lived in a clear plastic storage jar with stones from Lake Superior and pretty silk plants. When we've been moving I've screwed the lid onto the jar and put him in the sink. When we were parked he lived on the dining table. Whenever we sat there he'd come to the side of the jar and wag his tail and fins happily, and I'd feed him.
The worst of it is, I poisoned him. There were algae growing in his jar, and I transferred him to a new home, a pretty pickle jar. I cleaned the Lake Superior stones and silk plants with a household cleaner containing chlorine bleach, to kill the algae, and rinsed them very, very well, extremely well. I waited until I was sure he had adjusted to his new pickle jar and clean water (I use distilled water for fish and it never hurts them) without adverse effects, two or three days, and then put the stones and plants back in, yesterday. This morning he was sick. Lethargic. I took him out of the jar and put him in clean distilled water. He languished for a while and then appeared to be better, moving around more but still not himself. I aerated his water by dipping some up in a shotglass and pouring it back in to make bubbles, to make more oxygen available to him. I put him into new distilled water every couple hours, hoping that osmosis would transfer the poison out of him (as my eye doctor recommended once when I got something on my contact lenses.) But just as we were starting supper he sank to the bottom of his dish and stopped trying. I am so sad. I liked my fish and he has traveled over 10,000 miles with us. Hardly anyone takes a pet fish with them when they live and travel full-time in an RV. I've never seen anyone else with a fish.
I could cry. And it was just a fish, for petesake.
Just a fish...
10 comments:
Awww..that is sad! :(
i'm sorry to hear of your loss.. a pet even a pet fish can become so much a part of our life.
We have been through this many times with my son's fish(es). It is sad... Don't feel guilty about your loss or think that you did it. He could have just been old or sick.
I say get another one and name him Chesapeake!
Did you eat it? ;-)
Whoops, sorry. I suppose you can't even give him a proper flush in an RV.
I buried him in an Amish cornfield across the road from our camper.
Flatman -- stroke of genius! Chesapeake! Yeah! (What kind of name is Fish, for a fish? For anything?)
I'm sorry to hear about Fish. There's nothing at all wrong with feeling sad that he's gone.
My sister had a fish she named Killer. When she moved out of the house, Killer went into a decline, languishing at the bottom of the tank, barely eating. He would perk up whenever my sister came home to visit. He ignored everyone else.
He finally came to like my mom as much as he had liked my sister and the whole family was sad when Killer finally passed away.
Until I'd seen Killer actually know his favorite humans, I thought most fish were barely more sentient than amoebas. I think differently now. Fish are smarter than we give them credit for.
It sounds like you buried Fish in a nice place. When you get Chesapeake, be sure to take a picture for us!
Thank you, bunnygirl!
There's a cat named Killer that lives not far from us. He comes off the porch to be petted. We love Killer.
Heck, I was SURE I was going to kill those tadpoles/froggies this summer. I was so relieved when we let them go and they could go on to their own natural demises without me having to know about it.
I like flatman's idea best!
Awww Ellie, I'm sorry about Fish. I have four goldfish that live outside in a pond in the summer and move inside into an aquarium in the winter. It's tough not to get attached to something that you take care of, and you took very good care of Fish. Maybe he was just old. I like the idea of a traveling fish, reminds me of the Cat In The Hat. Do you think you will get another one?
Post a Comment