pets

Fiona and Moma, her grandmother, walked out of the pet store carrying more than they had walked in with.

We have had our first major Fish Incident of Great Alarm. It seems the filter I was using has an output vent that is just the same size as a fish body. I was using my laptop (to play a special April Fool’s Day treat of Game Neverending!). Fiona asked me something so I went into her room to look for whatever it was and I noticed the fish.

I noticed two of the fish. They were sitting quietly at the bottom of the tank under a plant, looking as alarmed and unhappy as goldfish can look. Which means, very still and very close together. I looked around the tank and didn’t see the third fish. Where was it? And there, I finally saw, was a flurry of tail fins sticking obscenely out of the filter and waving about wildly. Stumbling to put down my laptop, I went over to the tank and tried to think. Pulling it out by the tail didn’t seem manageable; they are just dainty little things, these fish. So I turned off the filter but the fish was still stuck. My mechanical mind told me, well, if it couldn’t get itself out when the water flow was pushing it out, it won’t be able to get itself out without the water flow helping it. I asked my mechanical mind what I should do next but it just shrugged. So I took the filter, poised it fish-downward and gave it a little shake. The fish popped with a flurry. It didn’t look so good. It had a few bald spots where it’s scales had scraped off and it was swimming around drunken monkey style. The other fish had come over to investigate and one of them was helpfully pushing the hurt fish from underneath.

I called Fiona over and told her what had happened, that one of the fish was stuck and I helped free it but now it was hurt. I explained that it might die. She took the news with grim calm and declared something like, “Poor fish.” Then we played a waiting game. Every time I passed the fish tank I took a look: one, two… where’s three? Ah, three. It has been three days and the fish seems like it will make it. It spends its time floating above the wispy fern plant. This morning Johnny summed it up, “I don’t think the fish is going to die, I think it just got stupid.” And it does seem a little dimmer than its tank mates; sometimes it will be floating aimlessly and then it suddenly seems to remember how to swim.

We have entered the age of Having Pets. We are starting off slow, with interchangeable goldfish but I see fuzzy animals off in the future. So far, the fish are entertaining and Fiona is happy with them. Their names are: curtain, umbrella and flower. We had all the tank stuff from previous pets so we only needed to buy food, a couple of plants and the fish. It’s nice to have pets again! Even if they aren’t very interactive.