We’re a One Goldfish Family.

Do you not know this story?

Maybe you should head over here to read all about it.

(Minion is still going strong, and there’s a strangely gleeful flip to his fins today. But I’m not saying it means anything about the loner lifestyle. I’m not.)

She has a birthday. She spends this birthday doing really fun things. She finds herself inundated by happy b-day messages here, there, everywhere and SHE LOVES IT. (Fear not. I am done referring to myself in the third person. This causes instant distress in all my Kids. The 3rd person, not the stopping.)

Writing group happens. Oh, writing group, I love thee. See, sometimes we redefine ourselves as “eating/cooking/moaning at the goodness of it all” group. But other times we WORK. And work is good, remember that? And I have some great direction for revisions.

There’s also the new gig: I get to be a Private Tutor. This is second only to my lifelong goal to be a Tudor. Okay, that is a total lie. I’ve never really wanted to be a Tudor. Just to dress like one. (Tights and Wimples, rah!) I am teaching writing to the two loveliest young men, as part of their homeschooling. And people, let me tell you this: It is Fun. We write. We talk. We eat an apple. We write some more. We read. We write. We laugh. We write again. I know, right? Am I the luckiest? Yes. Yes I am.

Familyness happens. And that is good. I like my family a great deal. They are lovely. And funny. And usually very nice to each other. And — did I mention — I like them? Well, I do.

And then there’s the revision. It’s going to be a big one. That may take forever. But that’s okay. I have as long as I need.
I can do what I need to do to make it what it needs to be. <— Did that sound like song lyrics to you? Well, maybe it should be.

Meeting with friends. Eating soup. Playing. Teaching. Presentations in classrooms. Making maps of the United States (okay, only one). Planning stuff. Visiting the sick and afflicted. Exercising with the company of the 2010 BBC Sense and Sensibility (for which Edward deserves his own post). Slogging through a novel that I should just put down already, as my TBR pile grows. Laundry. Soccer games. Cooking. Cross-country meets. Dishes. Watching leaves change (that happens early up here in the mountaintops, but it sure is lovely — come and see). Talking to my parents on the phone (which I love to pieces, but is also an adventure — repeat after me “speakerphone is an invention of the Devil himself”). Watching Kid 1 get asked to Homecoming (also deserves its own post). See? These are the things that keep us from the computer, right? The things that are life. And I’m liking these things.

***And now, I really must clean out a goldfish bowl. Yes, they’re still alive. Yes, this is 7.5 weeks. Yes, they’re growing on me. ***

It’s about the fish.

I’m here to update the goldfish situation in the Wilhite home. And here’s the update: Minion, the free goldfish that Kid 4 won at the county fair, is the proud owner of a real fishbowl (as opposed to the cool round vase he lived in for his first week here), complete with aquarium rocks, a bamboo plant, and a buddy. Sushi. That’s the goldfish buddy’s name. He’s cute, even in goldfish standards. He has a flowy tail with 4 pieces, as opposed to Minion’s streamlined fins. He’s short and fat, and — you know — that means he’s jolly. Just ask anyone.

After a sketchy first week, Minion started to eat. So, that’s good news. Have I mentioned that goldfish are a little bit disgusting? In so far as it concerns swimming around in one’s waste? We’re learning to deal with that, too. I’ve put my foot down about purchasing any more fish equipment (sort of… but I’m a softie, really) so I don’t see a pump/tank situation arising any time soon. My skills in fishbowl cleaning are now going on my resume. I’m that good. The fish are totally relaxing to watch (I doubt they feel the same about the Wilhites), and we are all doing very well, thank you.

Carry on with your weekend.

And here it is.

Once upon a time, we lived in Oklahoma. No, I am not making that up. We lived there for 51 weeks. And we loved everything, everything about it. Everything. (Except the job.) (And the weather.)

Oklahoma is a lovely, wonderful place. As long as you have air conditioning (check), a zoo pass (check) and a creek in your backyard (check). Oh, and friends with teenage kids so you can leave your small girls and go out to eat (check, again). Lots of eating in Oklahoma.

So this creek in our backyard was a source of constant adventure. It was a slow-moving, creeping sort of creek, just busy enough to make some noise, but not scary for the small children to explore. (I thought.) There was this huge, flat submerged stone that showed itself during a long, hot summer and became a perfect place to stand and discover wildlife. Which seemed like such a good idea.[1]

But guess what. Go ahead. Guess.

We didn’t have to stand in the creek to discover wildlife. Wildlife occasionally came to us. In the form of ducks. In the spring, when the redbud trees reminded us of all the reasons to live in Oklahoma (see above), ducks began hanging out on our back porch. Six or seven of them. And we’d feed them leftover pancakes. To the point of training them. No kidding. The ducks got so used to our leftover pancakes showing up on the back porch that they’d come knocking if the cakes weren’t there. Really. They’d come right up to the back kitchen door and peck on the glass with their duckish beaks.

“Hello?”

“Breakfast time, isn’t it?”

(Note: Ducks prefer pancakes to bagels. FYI.)

After breakfast, the ducks would get amorous. Oy. I know. Small children, welcome to the Circle of Life. [2]

Fast forward a few weeks, and only the green-headed boy ducks came for breakfast. What happened to the brown ones? the kids wanted to know. Oh, they’re nesting. Babies soon. Won’t that be fun?

Yes. Oh, yes.

Fast forward another couple of weeks. Babies. Oh, the cutest little yellow puffballs you’ve ever, ever seen. They breathed these little chirping sighs that would just make us insane with their cuteness. We’d sit beside the creek on our tri-leveled porch and watch them paddle by. The mamas and the daddies would take turns coming up to the door for breakfast. We delivered, these days. To all seven babies.

Wait. Six babies. And a few fewer adults.

No. Now five babies. And three adults.

Um, four?

Three babies? No adults? What’s going on here?

It really didn’t take that long for us to understand the Circle of Life playing out in our backyard. Some of those huge Oklahoma snakes were snacking on our babies. And possibly their parents. Vengeance was only a matter of time.

Husband, in a Herculean effort of Pet Rescue Bravery, borrowed a pool skimmer from the Gardening Neighbor. And we sat in wait for our remaining babies to float by.

Rather, make that Baby.

One lone baby.

Out came the skimmer. Into the creek went Husband. Into the skimmer went baby duckling[3]. Sort of screaming, I have to admit. It was one of those moments when we have to tell a smaller creature, “this is for your own good — trust me” but we feel bad anyway.

The internet (yes, it was around even then) had told us that baby ducks like cracked corn, wheat, and  oats. Um, okay. So I put some cornmeal, some oatmeal, and some whole wheat flour in a little pan. Then I put some creek water in another pan. Then I put both pans in a box. Then Husband put the baby duck inside, too. And we watched the baby duck whistle and peck and splash around in apparent relief. I can just see it from baby duck viewpoint: Two small human faces, peering over the edge of the box, two larger human faces, above the small ones. All smiling in a manic human manner. Stop looking at me, humans, and bring more cornmeal.

Everyone knows that a baby duck needs a name. So, Husband named our duck. Mabel Huntington. Do not ask me why. I cannot tell you. [4]

Everyone also knows that a baby duck needs a teddy bear. So, Husband bought Mabel a bear.

Wait. We didn’t know that? Well, the marketing department at PetCo saw Husband coming, then. There was a huge sign. Huge. It said, and I quote, “Birds Love To Snuggle!” Below which was a display of dozens of tiny teddy bears. Husband picked the cutest one, by far.

And brought it to Mabel.

Who adored that bear. And I am being so completely sincere. Even though I may have raised my eyebrows way up high in wonder that someone IN THE ADVERTISING PROFESSION could get snookered by an advertisement for something so unnecessary, he was right. Mabel snuggled up to the teddy and sacked out. With his/her fluffy little yellow head in the bear’s lap. Oh, heck. It was the cutest thing you’ve ever seen, duck-and-bearly speaking.

After a few days, we determined that, although we were pretty attached to the duck (and teddy bear) living in a box in our garage, there was probably a better way to raise this sweet thing. So we made some phone calls. To some of the nicest Oklahomans in the state. Finally, a wildlife rescue place agreed to meet Mabel. I drove her there, her box in the front seat of the Honda, kids safely belted into carseats in the back. The nice wildlife people told me that they’d be happy to do any kind of rehabilitation that Mabel might need and then help him/her to find his/her freedom. That many of the rehabbed ducks would choose to make a permanent home in the pond on the premises. I explained that she wasn’t hurt, exactly, just in mortal danger from the snakes and turtles that were making a habit of snacking on baby ducks in our backyard. Then I explained about the teddy bear.

Silence. Lots of it.

Then a slow nod. Riiiiight, lady. The duck loves the bear. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

I walked back to the car, watching over my shoulder as the brown-clad wildlife rescue worker hitched box over hip and walked away, toward Mabel’s future.

(Dramatic Pause Here)

After a few weeks, we took the Kids to the “museum” on the property of the wildlife rescue people. It smelled of taxidermy and dust. Many stuffed snakes. And live ones. But what I most remember was the possum. Oh, holy mercy. It was placed on top of a glass snake cage (which I’m sure has some manner of technical name ending in -arium, but I don’t care) so that it was, as I turned around, face to face with me. The possum reminded me of all the reasons I won’t ever have a possum for a pet. That, my friends, is a frightening creature. It was white with pink beady glass eyes, which, on its own is scary enough. Because it looked like a hugely overgrown lab rat. But the teeth. Oh, the teeth. There were a million of them. A million, at least.  Sharp ones. Its mouth was open, displaying all the fang-ed wonder. I suppressed both the cries and the gag reflex and shepherded my children out of the room.

We found a brown-clad rescue worker, who laughed when we mentioned Mabel the Duck.

“I remember you,” he said.

(Strangely for me, I couldn’t say the same.)

“Folks, when you brought the duck here that day, I wondered if you were crazy, what with you fixin’ to leave the duck with a toy.” (People in Oklahoma love the word “fixin’” — trust me on this one.) “But you were right. That duck still sleeps with the teddy bear snuggled up right next to her.” (She was a her. Apparently.)

Husbandly Vindication.

We asked to see Mabel. He brought her out. She was at least twice the size of the teddy bear now, and brown and awkward and lumpy.

Gorgeous, I mean.

The Kids couldn’t believe this was the same duck. Then the worker showed us the bed. With the teddy bear inside. The bear that Husband had known, KNOWN would make the duck safe and happy. This little bear was loved up. Nips out of his ears, covered in… something aromatic, matted and completely adored. For a guy who doesn’t like animals, my Husband sure knows how to take care of an accidental pet.

—

[1] Did you know that snakes live in Oklahoma? They do. And pretty much every single poisonous snake in the northern hemisphere wants to live in Oklahoma. They’ve never, ever read “Grapes of Wrath” apparently.

[2] I may have been heard to open the door and hiss at those amorous ducks, “Hey, there are little kids around here. Take it under the bleachers, why don’t you?”

[3] Telling it this way, it sounds a lot less… wet than I remember it.

[4] Just kidding. Of course I can tell you. Mabel Huntington lives upstairs from Mr. Kreuger and complains that her pipes don’t bring her heat, or water, or something. Mr. Kreuger is convinced that she’s lying for attention. We (heart) Jimmy Stewart.

Or just take my word for it: I don’t need anything else hairy, smelly, or germy inside my home.

But you know, sometimes things just happen.

The boy wanted a turtle, and his sister bought him one of those science-y things that you drop in a bucket of water and it grows to an unreasonable size. The boy wanted a dog and we bought a stuffed animal that he still sleeps with (shh – he’s seven and doesn’t read blogs, so there’s no reason to tell him that you know about Snuggle Puppy). The boy wanted a fish and he went to the county fair and won one.

Oh, dear.

He brought me the fish in a zipper snack-sized bag. A big fish for a small bag. I held on to it for an hour and a half, while it leaped around in its plastic vault. Before he ran off to test his stomach’s strength on the freaky carnival rides, I warned him that the little darling in the plastic bag might not last until we got home.

“No problem, Mom. It’s just going to be fun while it lasts.”

Well, okay.

Fast forward FIVE ENTIRE DAYS, and Minion is going strong. Well, except yesterday when he started … listing. To the side. Swimming backward and sort of … listing. Husband, ever the Animal Rescue Agent [1] pulled out the Big Guns: Goldfish Rescue 911. I wish I was making this up, but I’m clearly not that clever. It’s a real site, and he really read every word (I think).

Turns out that Minion was suffering from Lack Of Oxygen. So when I came into the kitchen, I found Husband pumping air through a basketball pump-drinking straw contraption. He had already done the salt-water dip and taken a cutting off a kitchen plant. Then I left for my meeting. When I came home, I found this:

Because, you know, plants give off oxygen until the sun goes down. Then, Carbon Dioxide, which we (fish and human) don’t particularly want to be breathing. So the fish got a “sunlamp” (which usually lives over the piano, so – wait for it – Kids can see their music when they practice). But not today. The lamp belongs to Minion, and with Minion it will stay.

Updates coming your way.

I know. Eyes Peeled. Me, too.

—

[1] Remind me to tell you about Mabel Huntington, the duck. It’s a good story.

The Birds.

Not the freaky-fabulous Hitchcock film (although, if you could kiss a film’s face, we’d have YEARS’ worth of blog fodder). The real birds that live in my neighborhood. There are the ones in my yard — mostly robins and magpies and swallows — and they’re nice (robins for chirpiness and swallows for swoopiness and magpies for general malevolence [1]). And there are the other ones in the ‘hood – like the totally white something-something I saw in my pre-sunrise walk this morning. It was getting amorous with some other little something-something birdie who was a fairly normal mountain birdish gray-brown, and if I had not been in such an understanding mood (love is colorblind and all that) I might have stopped it. It was so lovely, all glowy-white, and didn’t it want its babies to be just the same?

I love that these little birdies wake me up with their singing (except the weird black ones that sound like a backed-up kitchen sink drain), and that they keep it up all day long.

Thanks, birds. I love your guts. I kiss your faces. From here.

—

[1] I’ve been writing a demon magpie into my WorkInProgress. There’s a constant stream of inspiration in my strawberry patch. *Shudder*

That, apparently, is what they call the darkness before the dawn.

This morning, I went to take Kid 1 to her before-class class. At 6:19, I looked out the mudroom window (it’s a habit by now) and saw… nothing. Except the rusty box. Except, I couldn’t really see the door-thingie. It wasn’t properly light yet, so maybe it just wasn’t clear to me. Wait. No. WAIT. The door? Was CLOSED.

“Look. Look at it.” I commanded Kid 1.

She looked. She’s very obedient that way.

“There’s something gray in there.” We said that at the same time. We could see something sort of pacing around. Mind you, we’re forty feet away* from the trap, and the mesh door is CLOSED on the something, and we are realistic girls, and we recognized that what was inside the trap could well be Neighbor Tori’s scary one-eyed cat. But the gray thing inside the trap turned in such a way that we allowed ourselves some small measure of hope. Then it moved again, and no scary one-eyed cat has a tail like that.

By the time I returned from the school drop-off, Husband was home from early basketball, and Kids 3 and 4 were waving happy hands from the mudroom window. I pulled in with a wahoo, and Husband made me pose. Focus on the rodent in the box, not the decided lack of shower and makeup. It was six freaking thirty. Must I remind you?See it in there? Can you? It’s there. That sort of floating white part, mid-cage? That’s its head. It’s kind of cute after all, isn’t it?

And this one is Husband’s idea of comedy.

(Ha. There was no stink. The trap worked like it was supposed to. So far.)

—

So Animal Control has been called. Again. And they eventually called back. And said someone would come and take it all away, “release the critter,” and return the trap. So we could see if we’d catch another one. I just broke out in a cold sweat typing those words. Another one? How many do we have under there, anyway? Now my hair itches.

But, in all, great news today. And here’s the best good thing that came of it. If I had nothing else written** in the past week, at least I got a few thousand words done around this little misadventure we’ve had. That’s what we call The Bright Side, folks. Welcome to it.

—

* That would be an estimate. I’m spacially challenged. Always have been.

** But I did get other words written. Not very good ones, and not very many… in fact I may be writing the world’s worst book. But words are coming. Coming. Coming.

Mine was the moment I realized that I’d been adopted.

By a skunk family.

—

Here’s the deal. We haven’t seen the skunk (as in visual verification of black and white body) since Monday. MONDAY. This is Saturday. And it’s been snowing (I know) – so I can tell you that I haven’t even seen evidence of the rodent for at least two days.

Do you know what this means? I think I do. I think it means ice chips and an epidural. I think someone’s in labor.

Oh, I want to cry.

Because now I have a crisis of humanity to add to my disgust of the skunk situation. Can I capture a nursing mother?

Oh, bless. (My friend Maura used to say that. Isn’t it cute? I’ve never used it before this moment.)

Part of my crisis is spiritual. Is it RIGHT to steal a mama away from her babies? Isn’t that cruel? Evil, even?

But the other part is practical. Won’t they die without her? And won’t that … stink, come July?

My life is forever changed.

(Thanks a lot, Skunk.)

You understand that I can’t talk about it, don’t you?

Thanks.

Was.

Painful.

Here’s how it went down, as well as I can recall it past the memory-altering chemicals I’ve taken to help me forget. (Those chemicals are all derived from butter. This is a G-rated site, remember?)

I called the Animal control peeps at 7:10 in the morning, because remember that over the weekend, their pleasant and polite message told me they’d be in at 7:00? The very  nice police station telephone lady commiserated with me, and told me she’d have them call me as soon as they checked in. Then I drove Kid 1 to school. When I came back home, want to guess who was strolling around my yard, marking territory and snacking on my dandelion greens? Yup. Mama Skunk. I snuck into my garage and closed the door behind me before leaving the car. (Because, duh. I don’t take chances.)

Fast forward five hours or so.

I am not kidding.

I made another call to the AC. The (completely different) lady at the police station telephone desk did not commiserate with me very much. Or at all. In fact, she said, “What is the problem?” and I told her, and she said, “Oh, well, hey. Animal Control doesn’t handle skunks.” Um, what? “Or badgers.” Badgers? Do I sound like a person who needs something else to be afraid of, here?

—

Side note: Once a deer, having presumably been hit by a car on the road not far behind our house, chose to stagger onto the grassy hill in the church parking lot directly behind our house, where it died. Quietly. But still. Right there. And it was warm. Like, summertime warm. I called Animal Control (this was several years ago) and asked them if they’d very sweetly come on over and collect the deceased before it, well, exploded. (Did you know that a deer can explode? It is less than beautiful, as far as Sights and Scents in Nature are concerned.) The AC people told me, well, actually, ma’am, we don’t do that.

—

So, what, I’m wondering, does AC actually DO? Dogs and cats, as it happens. Dogs? And cats? Thank you very much, but I think even I could do dogs and cats if it became necessary. I may have begged at this point. I am sure I didn’t shed a tear, but I was on the verge of saying some impolite words. I went slightly confrontational and told the lady that I needed some help. I could not live with a skunk. She had to help me. To which she said, and I quote: “Nobody’s going to come over to your house and catch a skunk. It would spray. And that would smell.”

And… thank you very much.

After what might have appeared to be a stunned silence on my end of the phone, she said she’d try calling someone (an officer, or maybe not) to see if he’d “rent me a cage.” In which I could catch my own skunk. Because nobody was coming to my house to catch it for me. Because, remember? It would spray. And that would, remember? Smell.

Right.

Bad word.

Is anyone else getting an image of me, looking like She-Ra, Princess of Power, lifting a caged skunk into the back of my almost-new Honda Pilot? Just wondering.

So I did a little waiting, and a very nice man called. He said I could come on over to the Animal Control office at four o’clock and “lease” a trap, and someone would show me how to use it. And that the trap was built so a skunk, once inside, couldn’t lift its tail to spray. As if that were some kind of sufficient help. I said, “Sir. I have to tell you, this is more than I think I can handle. I am afraid of this thing. I don’t know if I can go out and set a trap for it. And what if I do it wrong? It will be angry. I know it.”

He sighed.

And said, “See you at four o’clock.” And – this part will matter in a minute – gave me the address.

This is a skunk story, not a Very Busy Afternoon story, so I’ll spare you the details of everything I had to do to get to the next important point of the story: I put a big black trash bag in my car and drove toward 635 West Airport Road.

Ha! Ha ha! Ha, ha, ha-ha-ha! That was obviously the AC people’s idea of a little joke, because Airport Road ends at number 535. I kid you not. The road stops, and there is a warehouse squatting there, right in front of my car.

I called the police desk lady once more. And said, “Oh, I’m sorry, but I am having a little trouble finding the shelter, because there is no more road here.” (I refrained form saying any of the multitude of bad words in my head.) She said that I needed to drive off the road onto the gravel track, and follow it around the curve until I found a building. Oh, of COURSE. And then she said, “Who are you?” And I told her. Then she asked me to hold on, because she had to radio over to the AC guy to let him know I was still coming. Because (due to the total lack of roadway) it was now 4:04. I thanked her again. Because, hello? That is who I am.

I stuttered along the gravel track, bouncing and dodging large holes, until I saw a small industrial cinderblock building. There was an “open” sign in the window. Joy. I picked up my checkbook (remember checkbooks?) and my plastic trash bag and walked inside. Where the smell almost knocked me over. The smell of old, and rank, and filth and illness and many, many dogs. All of whom wanted to greet me through the solid, windowless wall separating us. I had to use my Big Voice to be heard by the girl behind the counter. (She didn’t seem bothered by the smell, by the way. I think it was the major hurdle for getting a job there. “Does that smell bother you?” “What smell?” “You’re hired.”)

She had me fill out paperwork and leave a $35 deposit, which will be returned to me if I get the cage back to them within the next ten days. I asked her, what if I don’t catch it within ten days? Do I become the proud owner of an empty skunk cage? She looked surprised, as if nobody had ever asked her that question before. I took that as a good sign. She also assured me that when I catch the little guy, I can just call the office and someone will come pick up the caged skunk. I wept with relief. Then I asked how to bait it. Again, she looked surprised, as if nobody had ever asked her that question before, either. I stopped taking that as a good sign and started wondering if she had actually been interviewed for her job at all. “We could google it,” she said. TRANSLATION: Lady, you can google it when you get out of here.

She fiddled around with the cage until she figured out how to work it, and then handed it to me. All 30 by 18 by 12 inches of rusty metal. With a grated end. For peering at my prize, no doubt. Which, if all goes well, will be the TAIL END OF A SKUNK.

I ran outside to my car. I breathed. A lot of good air. I brought the cage home, listening to the metal creak and slam as I dodged the man-sized potholes in the gravel road. I googled “bait skunk trap” and found a multitude of disgusting suggestions. I opted for the tuna-peanut butter-berry combination.

Which has not worked as of this moment. (Yes. I just went to the window and checked again.) But I don’t know whether to blame the skunkless state of the trap on the bait choice, or on the five new inches of snow on the lawn.

The thing obviously has some kind of skunky brain if it knows that the right thing to do on a late April day with five inches of snow (and counting) is cut your losses and stay in bed all day.

I’ll keep you all informed as to the latest developments. Don’t worry. As if there was any avoiding it now.