Gertie the guinneapig: 2007-2011

My mother used to always say that in order to truly feel at home somewhere, you need to spend a full year there and go through all the different seasons and holidays in your new location. She was right, you know. In order to really "know" a house, a neighborhood, and a town, you need to experience it on a bright sunny day as well as a week of endless rain, a freezing morning, and when everything seems to be in bloom. You need to celebrate your birthday there, open Christmas presents, and hunt for Easter eggs. Only when you've done all of that, will you truly be able to remember that place as a real "home".

As of yesterday, however, I think I can add one more milestone that will cement any location as a place to remember: the death of a pet. Although I never quite thought about it that way, I can still to this day, tell you where all of my childhood pets are buried, which town, which house, and which spot in the backyard. I may not remember the house number, or where my best friend used to live, but I can tell you that Snoopy the rabbit is buried under a half-dead bush in the backyard by the hedge, and that Sigi the guinneapig was buried next to the shed with a pretty rock marking the spot. And, unfortunately, I can now also add our awesome pig with a 'tude, Gertie to that list. Gertie, you see, was buried under my mother's day rosebush in the front yard yesterday (since burying her in the backyard would mean that the dogs would definitely dig her up, and that's one experience I can do without).

Although I've been the proud owner of lots of guinneapigs, Gertie was special. We bought Gertie when the reality of "this is your home now" hit me about four years ago on a Tuesday night in September. We had moved into our house a little over a month before, I had been working at my then new, now current, job for about two weeks, and our life was beginning to look pretty settled. After two months of living like nomads, saying goodbye to dear friends, and, more importantly, giving away my guinneapig Cali (they don't do well on ten-hour plane rides), this should have felt like a big sigh of relief. But instead, knowing that "this was it", the place where I was to feel at home for at least a number of years, freaked me out beyond belief. Here? The bible belt? The place where you can't cuss in public or buy alcohol on Sunday? Really?

So husband-dear, once again displaying the main reason I love that man so much, he understood. And listened. And when I, between possibly overly dramatic sobs, hiccuped, "And I had to give Cali away!", he asked, "Well, we can go and buy a new guinneapig, you know?"
The tears ceased immediately, "We can?'"
"Sure. Why not. The kids would love it."
And so off we went to PetSmart, on a Tuesday evening. And picked the guinneapig that someone had returned, because I have a soft spot for animals no one else wants.

Thus began our life with Gertie the guinneapig. She lived in a large cage in the corner of our kitchen, ate lots and lots of vegetables, and became best friends with Shelby. She loved running outside along the fence, and had the most obnoxious, tangled hair ever.

And yesterday morning, it came to an end.
I'm not sure why, Gertie wasn't sick, she'd been eating like it was going out of style, and I'd played with her only the day before. But when I came into the kitchen, remembered I had to feed her before I left, and then noticed that she didn't move when I rattled her box of food, I knew something wasn't right. And it wasn't. Gertie, as they like to say down here, had passed on.

I'd love to tell you I was very pragmatic about it, realized she'd lived a good, full, four years, and gave her a decent burial, but, unfortunately, I can't. I wanted to do all those things, but first of all, I started to cry. And then I realized I simply couldn't touch my dead guinneapig. But then I also realized I couldn't just leave her in her cage, dead, as I wouldn't be home until at least 10 that night, and it would hardly be fair to just let husband-dear find when he got home. And then when I couldn't reach husband-dear because he was in a meeting, I really didn't know what to do.
So much for being a liberated woman.

Thank goodness, I got a hold of husband-dear, cried on his shoulder, and he told me he would be fine burying Gertie when he got home from work. And he did.

So there it is, the end of the Gertie era. The first four years have passed..now let's go for the second four?! (oh, dear mother of Mary and all her angels, no!).