Fish Are Food, Not Friends

In todays world if I were to tell the public about every experience with animals I had growing up on the farm, my family would probably be apprehended and locked away, or at the very least shunned by the general population. Since we were raised on a farm we have quite a different perspective of animals than most people do. We're always respectful to life, but sometimes things just happen, you know? Like that one time as the weather was finally heating up we found 3 dead chickens in the swamp cooler. Or when we came home from church to find that someone had left the front door open and a bunch of chickens were kicking back on our couches watching the sports channel. Or that other time with Haylee and the frog and the door... yikes. Or that other time when we never solved the mystery of the missing goldfish. My mom found the 2-year old on the counter by the previously occupied tank, but never found the fish. Then there was the time when Sara had that accident with an entire family of ducks, or the new driver Savannah with the dog, or Daniel with the goat. Then those countless times with the homeless baby chicks in a box, the tadpoles in a cup, and the ants and spiders in a mason jar. Then that one time with Mom and the gopher and the hose, and mom and the scorpion, and Mom and the lizard, and Mom and the hyper little dog named Rascal. Then Jared and the hamsters, Sondra and that nasty millipede from South Africa and Tyler and the dove... yech. The more I think about it, the more I realize why I'm not fond of the idea to keep animals as pets. Let them be. They're safer without human interaction. At least from my family, anyway.

Obviously, animals all have a purpose and a place in life. Sometimes their place is to torment me like those pesky mosquitos, flies and goldfish. (Remember when Sondra got her hair all caught up in that insect-covered fly trap?) Sometimes their place is for the use of man. Cows serve a couple different functions. We did have that one cow, Betsy that gave us literally everything she had to offer. 17 years of milk and 17 year-old meat. Chickens are some of the dumbest animals I have ever interacted with, but I do appreciate their product. One time it was harvesting time for the chickens (if you know what I mean) and I was assigned the task of catching them all at dusk and putting them in the chicken coop to be ready for easy catching in the morning. (One time we had a headless rooster that literally kicked a bucket, then died). I caught almost all of them, but there was this one hen who kept jumping up on a small haystack to settle in for the night. I kept trying to corner her but she always jumped up and ran over the top of the stack before I could catch her. Then I'd back off a bit and within minutes she was right back on the same haystack and we'd do our little dance all over again. I must have tried 25 times to catch her. I don't know who was dumber, me or the chicken.

Pigs are strictly for eating, but I suppose I have had a precious little moment with a pig before. It's how I earned my nickname "Fern". I must have been 15 or so when a sow had just finished birthing a litter of pigs. There must have been 8 or 9 of them. It was in the middle of the winter and there was this one little runt that we didn't expect to live because the other little piglets kept pushing it out into the cold and it wasn't big enough to push its way back in. So I decided to take it upon myself to take that little pig in. It was about the size of a tennis shoe, and wiggly as a bored toddler. I guess he was kinda cute, but being not much of an animal person it was hard to let go of my pride to admit it. I washed him and gave him a box to sleep in for the night in my room and made him as comfortable as I could with plenty of towels to cuddle up to, but Wilbur wouldn't have it. He squealed and squealed all night long until I couldn't take it anymore. I finally wrapped him in a towel and let him cuddle up to me in my bed. It worked. The night became peaceful and quiet. I suppose the little girl in me was satisfied and I felt somewhat validated because the little guy loved me like his mother. I ended up keeping him for a couple of weeks I think before we plumped him up enough to get him back outside again. But he did live, and I suppose I was happy about it.

 I haven't figured out the purpose of keeping ducks or geese yet, but we have them. Some of those geese are mean little suckers. I was always afraid of gathering the eggs when we had geese because I was afraid one of them might attack me. I had been chased plenty of times before and seen enough battle wounds on my brothers and nephews to know not to mess with them. We have turkeys too, one we named "Obama". I've never heard of a rogue turkey but because they were similar in size and I'd had enough scares with the geese, I always grouped them in the same "animals to avoid" category. Especially since they're so scary looking.

If I were forced for whatever reason to have any kind of pet, you might could pay me to have a beta fish. They're relatively easy to maintain and they don't make noise, leave their DNA on the couches or leave the premises where they can get snatched up by a predator or animal control. Goldfish, on the other hand, are way too high maintenance, are annoyingly orange, and die if you so much as look at them funny. Last summer my roommate/best cousin Shawna "won" a goldfish from the carnival. She very proudly brought it home and put it in a bowl and there Warrior has lived like a champion up until three days ago. When I heard the news of his death I was a little less than sad; I sipped the rest of my Jamba and skipped merrily on my way. A few days later I was driving myself and my hilarious niece Anna home from Institute. Naturally, the subject turned to goldfish and I proceeded to tell her that if anyone asked me if we could have another goldfish I would tell them no. She thought it was unusually hilarious. When we got home, she collapsed into a giggling fit in the entry way and I couldn't figure out why. Only to turn around to see this:

NOOOOOO!!! What a dirty trick. Yep, that's 50 of them, folks. 50 slimy little replacements for Warrior. These are the culprits of this sick little joke:

Anna, Emily, Abby. How could you do this to me? You know my disdain for goldfish. I just feel bad for those little fishies because when Shawna cleans the bowl she's going to have to use a strainer to get them all out. I'll probably just save her the hassle and sneak them off to that nice little Koi pond at a nearby Sushi restaurant when no one is looking.