Gerbil Deaths

Ugh.

Shit.

Ugh.

Stampy Longnose, the final  gerbil from  Conor's  birthday died  this morning.  And unfortunately, we  can't  blame the cat.  Conor forgot  to give that  poor, sweet  gerbil  water.   And Dave and I forgot  to  supervise our dear son in the care of  his new  pets. And now  we've  lost  Stampy.

Pet deaths  suck.  Even if they are  rodents.

Anne Lamott  has a great article in Salon today  about the natural co-existence  of anger and guilt.  I  was initially  extremely angry  at Conor for forgetting to  water his one remaining gerbil.  Then I  realized I was feeling incredibly guilty for  not supervising Conor better and not  giving Stampy  water myself.  And then I realized that  I  was  able  to  keep  my gerbils in water, when I was a girl, because of  the huge clear watering bottle that was so prominent in their cage.  The watering bottle  in this cage is  small, blue, and in the back.  There are real human factors errors with it, in addition to  the human errors we  obviously had.

In any case, Conor  is going to have  a new  responsibility, which Dave and I can clearly supervise, of maintaining the water  for  the cats and the dog  for the next 3 weeks.   And then we'll see  if  Santa  will bring a bigger, better,  CLEAR water  bottle  for  the front  of  the gerbils cage.