Blog: Ramblings and Rants

Lately, I’ve been working late into the night for two reasons: First, I’m doing a lot of server work, which is better done during periods of least activity (Midnight to 4 am Pacific Time). Second, I’m working on an instructional DVD for VTC. With the kids still on summer vacation, the middle of the night is the only time I can get a fully quiet house to record.

I’ve been working on WordPress templates and content management restructuring for David Blatner’s and Anne-Marie Concepcion’s InDesignSecrets.com. I got up Wednesday morning expecting to finish my report on the reprogramming and layout revisions, and to deliver the new site to them. Later in the day, I was going to finish off the Quark VS InDesign.com rebrand and put in some work on my new InDesign book.

The day didn’t go as I had planned.

Late Wednesday morning, as I began to check my e-mail and sip my first gallon of coffee, my 10 and 8 year-old step-daughters (psuedononymously, Mojo JoJo and Sassy, respectively) informed that Sassy’s favorite hamster, Muisa, wasn’t acting normally. Sure enough, the extremely affectionate and fairly active Musa was listless, inattentive, and breathing too quickly.

Tinker, another hamster whom the girls had rescued last year from a classmate with a long list of dead pets, had also developed a lesion on her cheek.

We were all dressed and at the vet’s office within the hour.

Between the two hamsters, there were exams, out-patient surgery, fecal smear analyses, subcutaneous fluid injections, lots of prescribed medication, and three hours.

Tinker was doing fine when we got home. The surgery hadn’t even sapped her energy—she was running about just fine.

Muisa, however, sick with some kind of bug that rendered her severely dehydrated in under 24 hours, couldn’t hold up her own head, though she kept trying to run (her favorite activity). While I disassembled, scrubbed, sterilized, and reassembled her mansion of a habitat, Sassy comforted her hamster with conversation and singing.

By 6 o’clock, Muisa was resting in a fresh habitat, burrowed into the soft cotton bedding, Tinker was fed and resting, and I was completely exhausted. I crashed.

Strawberry Blonde woke me around nine. Muisa had died.

Over the last 18 months, we’ve had five hamsters. Muisa was half of the first pair. Her sister had run away to set herself up as queen of the backyard field mice population. For a while, Muisa went with her, but returned later, never to attempt escape again. The next two hamsters were replacements for the runaways (one has since passed away). Tinker was a refugee.

Muisa was the most unique, most affectionate of them all. Most hamsters run in wheels as fast as their little legs will carry them; Muisa always kept her own pace. Her many other unique qualities really enamored her to Strawberry Blonde, Mojo JoJo, and, especially, my 8-year-old, Sassy. The 19-month-old Muisa was Sassy’s best friend. Strawberry Blonde also loved the animal dearly, finding with her a connection and comfort that none of the other hamsters had bestowed.

When the little hamster passed, the girls were at their father’s house for the night. We called and gave him a headsup, but asked that he not break the news. Better to let them enjoy their night. Dad and I will inform them when he brings them home tomorrow morning.

I cared for Muisa, too, but I have to be the strong one. My concern lay mostly with the pain my family endures over the event. I’m the one who took care of the final arrangements, so to speak, and who will dig the hole tomorrow and preside over the funeral my will kids need held. Comforting Strawberry Blonde over the loss broke my heart. It’ll break all over again when I have to tell Sassy in the morning. Nothing can rend a man’s heart like telling a little girl that her best friend died.

For now… I’ve (obviously) gotten back in front of the computer for the first time the girls came into my office with worried faces. I’m wrapping up my report on the InDesignSecrets.com work, but my concentration is shot. Thankfully it’s just a matter of explaining what I did, not actually finding solutions to design or PHP problems.

Tomorrow I’ll try to work, but my household will be in a state of mourning. Tinker may yet pass, too, leaving only a single, standoffish hamster remaining. Whether or not Tinker survives what may have been a cancerous lesion, the weight of Muisa’s death will keep the girls tearful and conflicted most of the day. They’ll waffle all day between wanting and not wanting another hamster. Strawberry Blonde will ache for them from her office out of the house, while I comfort them from my office in the house. My work will wait.