Living with unlovable pets

While I was out of town last month, our daughter was given two goldfish from a well-meaning person. The problem was we didn’t have any fish tanks lying around and by the time my husband, Chris, received them in a plastic baggie, it was already after 8pm and he had to work the next day.

Hoping they would survive 24 hours, he purchased a tank and supplies after work, but sadly the fish couldn’t handle the stress.

Lucky for us, our daughter had been picked up by her grandmother and was blissfully unaware that her first pets ever were already belly-up.

After discussing our options, we decided to nix the fish idea and return all of the equipment because we still owned a hamster cage. All we needed was food, bedding, and the animal.

My son had an adorable hamster named Peanut. She was everything we ever could’ve wanted in a rodent-sized critter. She never bit us and she was cute and fat and lovable. Her time on this earth was too short, as is the case with most small animals.

He also once had fish he’d won from the Highlands County fair around the same time. They were a huge pain in the butt. The tank was a cumbersome task to clean and the fish lived a long time considering the fact they came from the fair. I thought they’d never die.

Thinking we’d have another Peanut, I broke the news to my girl about the fish and watched her face crumple up into pre-tear sadness. Then I delivered the good part about her being able to pick out a cuddly hamster and she lit up like Christmas.

We drove to the pet store and searched all the hamster habitats for the right one. When we had a female chosen (I refuse to buy a male for certain anatomical reasons) the associate quickly steered us away from that one because it had a tendency to bite and directed us to the dwarf hamsters.

My sweetheart immediately fell in love with one and we took her home. She named her “Layla” which was kind of cool because she has no idea who Eric Clapton is.

We took Layla out of the cage to pet her being careful to box her in with our legs when she suddenly flattened-out under my knee and scurried down the hall into my daughter’s bedroom.

Thirty-five minutes later, I declared there would be no more petting sessions until I could figure out a better way to contain this animal who could somehow reach the speed of sound on legs that measure about 1 cm in length.

Now I’m afraid to clean the cage or open it to feed her. Layla always looks up at me as if to say, “I know how slow and clumsy you are and I’m just waiting for my next chance. I won’t make the mistake of running down the hall again.”

As if to flaunt her talent, when I peek in on her, she’ll dart up the side of the cage like she’s rocket-propelled. She runs on her wheel so fast that, when she stops, the wheel spins her around 2 or 3 more times and she stays stuck to the inside by centrifugal force alone.

I believe we aren’t a good family for Layla and I wish I didn’t have a cat allergy. Now that I’ve really had time to think about it, the fish weren’t such a bad idea after all.