"We are just two lost souls, swimming in a fish bowl....."
- Pink Floyd
A few weeks ago, we welcomed our latest addition to the family. Usually people start by raising plants, then pets before they try their hands at parenting. We have just gone in the opposite direction......having had kids and seeing them none the worse for wear given our parenting skills; we decided to experiment with pets. Before I swelter under the scorching gaze of any of my RSPCA buddies, let me clarify my words. What I meant is our resolution at having no pets at home wavered a little around my girl's eighth birthday; we finally gave in and decided to get her a fish. I also had an evil plan up my sleeves – was planning to use the pet to lure her out of the hazy trances that she slips into under the influence of the TV.
Well, for those out there thinking along the same lines as me that fishes are low maintenance pets, ha ha.......please be prepared for a real eye-opener. I believed getting a fish bowl and a fish would do the job, sadly no......given the expenses I incurred, I might have instead fed the family on fish and chips for the whole month!!! Having had the brainwave strike at me whilst I was away at Melbourne, the poor pet had to survive 4 hours of grueling journey......on a scale of 1-10, both Mr. Red (you don’t need a high IQ score to figure out why he was named that) and I could have marked our experiences as extremely traumatic – especially with me not wanting the poor little fish and my dollars going down the drain.
When Mr. Red finally arrived at his new home, the kids were pretty excited at seeing the newcomer. However I should have known better given their short attention span with any new toy. When the fish and I were soon left staring at each other bereft of other company, the truth hit home.......now I have got an extra mouth to feed and to look after, thanks to the weakening of my resolve. Every morning when I walked in to check the fish bowl, I was worried I might be greeted by an upended Mr. Red. In fish lingo, that’s definitely a no-no…. definitely not the sign for a good day – and it spelt disaster in my world too. You don’t want a dead pet on your hands; try explaining it to a jury of my kids….I would rather face the children of the corn.
However I could not get rid of this definite vibe that there was something wrong with Mr.Red. Maybe I was imagining things, usually given my nerves and paranoia, it is no surprise……however extrapolating my neurotic fears to include shrinking fishes was a first even for me!!!! I seriously thought one day I was going to announce to the kids “Brats, I have shrunk the fish”…….every day I felt he was getting smaller and smaller. It is a syndrome that my family usually suffers at the expense of my culinary skills, but hey the fish wasn’t even sampling my wares and yet, I thought he was rapidly shrinking. And above all, he was getting lethargic as well and hardly swam. I was convinced that Mr.Red was experiencing the blues however I was told that fishes have short term memory…….mmm, despite the studies done on goldfish contradicting this theory, I readily lapped it up to ease my guilt. I obviously did not want him to remember any trauma that I might have unintentionally caused – though I am sure having me staring at him with baleful eyes ( assuming that glass distorts Mr.Red’s perceptions) every time I pass by him must have been really stressful for him.
Finally, a friend at work recommended getting a heater even though he wasn’t a tropical fish – not the friend, Mr. Red I mean……..so there came in another expense. Guess we must have been the only people to buy a tank heater for a fish bowl……and however ridiculous the heater looked jutting out of the bowl, the fish looked happy. He was back to his endless circles………yeah definitely easing a few of the worry creases from my face.
So it has been six weeks since the fish arrived home – I still wonder how he managed to survive this long given our care (or more so the lack of it). I have always been a person with an unbridled enthusiasm for aquariums – watching the fishes have always soothed me; however the enjoyment ratio with this little one is not quite the same – it is quite depressing watching him go around and around listlessly. But still no regrets, the kids are happy and they do remember to feed him always and also occasionally talk to him, contrary to my original assumptions.
Guess that’s all matters in the end.......worrying and carrying about another life, no matter how insignificant it might be or the least fitting into the matrix of your own personal needs. I am at times astounded by the ignominy of the treatment people show their counterparts in today’s world – they label their prejudice , bigotry, lack of empathy or simply bad manners under a lot of headings – religion, culture, race, ethnicity, skin-colour, language, busy life-style and so on. We cannot right all the wrongs in the world in one go, but perhaps we can leave a legacy behind through our own kids by teaching them to practice humanity at any cost. Perhaps this is where pets can be of some real help as well…..they can teach kids to be sensitive and attuned to needs that are not voiced explicitly. I am perhaps overstretching (no doubts there !!!) - from pets this blog has gone to help provide triage for human problems out there........and I have been chastised only recently not to let the blog wander,, but hey, I have got the memory of a fish :) Anyway every journey starts with a few steps.
Happy Trails!!!
Well, for those out there thinking along the same lines as me that fishes are low maintenance pets, ha ha.......please be prepared for a real eye-opener. I believed getting a fish bowl and a fish would do the job, sadly no......given the expenses I incurred, I might have instead fed the family on fish and chips for the whole month!!! Having had the brainwave strike at me whilst I was away at Melbourne, the poor pet had to survive 4 hours of grueling journey......on a scale of 1-10, both Mr. Red (you don’t need a high IQ score to figure out why he was named that) and I could have marked our experiences as extremely traumatic – especially with me not wanting the poor little fish and my dollars going down the drain.
When Mr. Red finally arrived at his new home, the kids were pretty excited at seeing the newcomer. However I should have known better given their short attention span with any new toy. When the fish and I were soon left staring at each other bereft of other company, the truth hit home.......now I have got an extra mouth to feed and to look after, thanks to the weakening of my resolve. Every morning when I walked in to check the fish bowl, I was worried I might be greeted by an upended Mr. Red. In fish lingo, that’s definitely a no-no…. definitely not the sign for a good day – and it spelt disaster in my world too. You don’t want a dead pet on your hands; try explaining it to a jury of my kids….I would rather face the children of the corn.
However I could not get rid of this definite vibe that there was something wrong with Mr.Red. Maybe I was imagining things, usually given my nerves and paranoia, it is no surprise……however extrapolating my neurotic fears to include shrinking fishes was a first even for me!!!! I seriously thought one day I was going to announce to the kids “Brats, I have shrunk the fish”…….every day I felt he was getting smaller and smaller. It is a syndrome that my family usually suffers at the expense of my culinary skills, but hey the fish wasn’t even sampling my wares and yet, I thought he was rapidly shrinking. And above all, he was getting lethargic as well and hardly swam. I was convinced that Mr.Red was experiencing the blues however I was told that fishes have short term memory…….mmm, despite the studies done on goldfish contradicting this theory, I readily lapped it up to ease my guilt. I obviously did not want him to remember any trauma that I might have unintentionally caused – though I am sure having me staring at him with baleful eyes ( assuming that glass distorts Mr.Red’s perceptions) every time I pass by him must have been really stressful for him.
Finally, a friend at work recommended getting a heater even though he wasn’t a tropical fish – not the friend, Mr. Red I mean……..so there came in another expense. Guess we must have been the only people to buy a tank heater for a fish bowl……and however ridiculous the heater looked jutting out of the bowl, the fish looked happy. He was back to his endless circles………yeah definitely easing a few of the worry creases from my face.
So it has been six weeks since the fish arrived home – I still wonder how he managed to survive this long given our care (or more so the lack of it). I have always been a person with an unbridled enthusiasm for aquariums – watching the fishes have always soothed me; however the enjoyment ratio with this little one is not quite the same – it is quite depressing watching him go around and around listlessly. But still no regrets, the kids are happy and they do remember to feed him always and also occasionally talk to him, contrary to my original assumptions.
Guess that’s all matters in the end.......worrying and carrying about another life, no matter how insignificant it might be or the least fitting into the matrix of your own personal needs. I am at times astounded by the ignominy of the treatment people show their counterparts in today’s world – they label their prejudice , bigotry, lack of empathy or simply bad manners under a lot of headings – religion, culture, race, ethnicity, skin-colour, language, busy life-style and so on. We cannot right all the wrongs in the world in one go, but perhaps we can leave a legacy behind through our own kids by teaching them to practice humanity at any cost. Perhaps this is where pets can be of some real help as well…..they can teach kids to be sensitive and attuned to needs that are not voiced explicitly. I am perhaps overstretching (no doubts there !!!) - from pets this blog has gone to help provide triage for human problems out there........and I have been chastised only recently not to let the blog wander,, but hey, I have got the memory of a fish :) Anyway every journey starts with a few steps.
Happy Trails!!!
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