I have to confess something. It felt right. It felt wrong. I don't know which feeling to trust. Maybe it's only accurate to say I must feel both at the same time.
I just killed my son's hamster.
She had a tumor that had grown out of control. It had grown into the makings of a horror movie, a large fleshy mass at her side. If she had a mean bone in her body, she would have been scary, but she was so very sweet. My friend Kris wanted me to do something last week. I wanted to bring her to the vet, but it got past that. I didn't want to hear the question, 'Why did you wait so long?' even in my own head. Tuffcake was struggling, to move, to eat. Two days ago, I gave her a lettuce leaf and she took it with some enthusiasm. Tonight, I gave her an asparagus flower, one of her favorites, and she held it for a moment then dropped it.
This was a completely premeditated killing. I woke up this morning knowing that I was going to do something. Anything. One Sunday when I was just twenty, my cat came home with a baby rabbit that she had caught. Somehow, she'd peeled most of the skin off of this poor thing. She was proud of herself. I was in tears. Before I could chicken out, I grabbed a large rock and smashed the bunny's skull. It twitched and was dead. It was awful. I cried all the way to church and well into the services. I'm sure it hurt that bunny a lot even though it was quick. I thought about getting a big rock for Tuffcake, but I knew I couldn't do it that way again.
I looked it up on the Internet. Did you know that if you google 'humane small pet euthanasia' it shows you how you can set it up using vinegar and baking soda to make carbon dioxide? I remembered that in the movie Apollo 13, they had an excess of carbon dioxide building up in the lunar module and the engineers had to use parts the astronauts would have on board to design a square plug to go into a round hole for the filter they had up there.
I switched my evil plan to dry ice and added melancholy music because I understood how to use dry ice and I felt that Tuffcake deserved the higher quality that dry ice and good music would bring to her services. I set up the dry ice to go into a bowl with water, covered it with saran wrap, and then I taped a bundle of flexible straws into the edge. This is the part where I started feeling how creepy the whole thing was. Then I retrieved an extra large bottle that had contained olive oil from the recycling bin. I cut it in half and made it so I could fit it back together. I thought that Tuffcake might like the smell of the bottle. She liked trying different flavors, avocado, kitty kibble, olives, kale, chard, strawberries, cherries, unsalted peanuts in their shell. I hoped she'd like the olive oil smell, but I cleaned it out anyway and dried it well. Being desert creatures, hamsters don't like being wet. Then I filled it with tiny fabric scraps from my quilting basket. I put in sesame treats, yogurt treats, peanuts, a green bean, a carrot, and the other end of the asparagus. I knew she wouldn't eat any of it, but I hoped the smell might make her happy, well, happier. I pulled out a bottle of vinegar and a box of baking soda in case I ran out of dry ice.
I handed Tuffcake the asparagus before I picked her up. I figured it might hurt to touch her, but she just sniffed my fingers. She always seemed comforted by being picked up except the one time Mike tried to pick her up with vinyl gloves on because he was trying to clean her house and she bit him. Mike was really sweet with me today despite the rift that bite had made between him and Tuffcake. I cried in the morning when I told him about my plan and he held me. I cried after we got back with the dry ice and he hugged me some more. I cried again when Mike took Nickie into bed and read to him even though it was my night to read from our book. I cried as I wrapped Tuffcake in pink and green ovals I'd once thought I'd make into a wedding ring quilt. I knew I'd never find a better use for those pieces. I wanted Tuffcake to be wrapped in something nice, not just scraps.
Just then, Nickie got up to go find an action figure he wanted and he asked Mike to get him a drink of water. There I was, running into the laundry room and hiding with Tuffcake wrapped in those quilt pieces, snot threatening to run down my nose, and nothing to say if he caught me. Thankfully, Nick didn't look at the setup I had going on in the living room in too much detail. I stayed quiet. I had half a thought to bring Tuffcake to Nick for a little petting, but I really didn't want him to make any connections between her and that contraption. Mike herded Nick back into his bedroom and I prepared myself for another killing.
I put Tuffcake down into the bottle. She was so sick, she didn't even try to get out. She just sat quietly while I got the lid put on and the straw bundle jammed down into the neck of the bottle. Then I peeled back the saran wrap and dumped in all the dry ice, hoping it was enough. The worst part of the whole thing was when she squeaked and tried to get her nose out to the edge where I had cut the bottle in half. The bottle didn't go back together as tightly as I'd like because of the grips on the sides. Oh, she squeaked. Four times, she squeaked before she settled down. It took five minutes before she stopped moving, but I wasn't convinced yet, so I waited. And I waited some more.
I'm glad about the music I put on because Nickie got up again, this time to go to the bathroom. The dry ice was still bubbling and despite the music, he wanted to know what that noise was. I wasn't about to leave and I gave Mike those 'please help me keep my boy from seeing this' eyes. By that time, Tuffcake hadn't moved in about twenty minutes. Oh, it was almost as awful as those four little squeaks, to hear Nickie chatting to Mike through the bathroom door. He wanted me to write that silly thing about the puppies:
C M Puppies. (Here you say the letters and it sounds like 'See 'em puppies.')
M R N Puppies.
O S M R Puppies.
C M P N?
There are things that make a killing surreal. Reciting kid jokes, even scrambling for a piece of paper to write it down, all the while hoping that your poor anesthetized hamster didn't wake up while you were absent, is one of them. I really wanted to have a proper ceremony, but the contraption and trying to hide it all from Nick make it strange, even creepy. It was hard to try and sound normal while he chatted with me through the door too. I just wanted to be standing there to block the view into the living room.
It sounds strange, even to me, to go to such lengths to shield Nick from all of this. Nickie and I held his last hamster on our laps when she died of old age four years ago. The only thing wrong with the picture then was that we watched television while it happened. Nick knows death in a small way, but I didn't want him to see Tuffcake die, especially this way, especially with the hideous tumor trying to take over her tiny body, especially in a strange contraption that looked an awful lot like the experiments we did when we got dry ice for something. Nick liked doing experiments with dry ice. Throwing a hamster into the mix wasn't a part of that schooling.
Mike finally got Nick to sleep, the dry ice was fizzling out, an hour had passed, and Tuffcake hadn't moved. We decided to tell Nick that Tuffcake had died in the morning. I wrapped Tuffcake in more fabric and put her into a cardboard box so I could bury her in the morning. Prayers and services will follow the burial. After I was finished, I sent a text to my friend, Kris.
"I just killed Nick's hamster. Dry ice has sinister and hopefully humane purposes I'd never imagined."
Her reply came quickly.
"Ohhhhhhh. I'm glad you found a good solution. Sweet dreams Tuffcake."
Yes, sweet dreams Tuffcake. I'm sure there are asparagus flowers in hamster heaven.
Thank you for listening, jb
I just killed my son's hamster.
She had a tumor that had grown out of control. It had grown into the makings of a horror movie, a large fleshy mass at her side. If she had a mean bone in her body, she would have been scary, but she was so very sweet. My friend Kris wanted me to do something last week. I wanted to bring her to the vet, but it got past that. I didn't want to hear the question, 'Why did you wait so long?' even in my own head. Tuffcake was struggling, to move, to eat. Two days ago, I gave her a lettuce leaf and she took it with some enthusiasm. Tonight, I gave her an asparagus flower, one of her favorites, and she held it for a moment then dropped it.
This was a completely premeditated killing. I woke up this morning knowing that I was going to do something. Anything. One Sunday when I was just twenty, my cat came home with a baby rabbit that she had caught. Somehow, she'd peeled most of the skin off of this poor thing. She was proud of herself. I was in tears. Before I could chicken out, I grabbed a large rock and smashed the bunny's skull. It twitched and was dead. It was awful. I cried all the way to church and well into the services. I'm sure it hurt that bunny a lot even though it was quick. I thought about getting a big rock for Tuffcake, but I knew I couldn't do it that way again.
I looked it up on the Internet. Did you know that if you google 'humane small pet euthanasia' it shows you how you can set it up using vinegar and baking soda to make carbon dioxide? I remembered that in the movie Apollo 13, they had an excess of carbon dioxide building up in the lunar module and the engineers had to use parts the astronauts would have on board to design a square plug to go into a round hole for the filter they had up there.
I switched my evil plan to dry ice and added melancholy music because I understood how to use dry ice and I felt that Tuffcake deserved the higher quality that dry ice and good music would bring to her services. I set up the dry ice to go into a bowl with water, covered it with saran wrap, and then I taped a bundle of flexible straws into the edge. This is the part where I started feeling how creepy the whole thing was. Then I retrieved an extra large bottle that had contained olive oil from the recycling bin. I cut it in half and made it so I could fit it back together. I thought that Tuffcake might like the smell of the bottle. She liked trying different flavors, avocado, kitty kibble, olives, kale, chard, strawberries, cherries, unsalted peanuts in their shell. I hoped she'd like the olive oil smell, but I cleaned it out anyway and dried it well. Being desert creatures, hamsters don't like being wet. Then I filled it with tiny fabric scraps from my quilting basket. I put in sesame treats, yogurt treats, peanuts, a green bean, a carrot, and the other end of the asparagus. I knew she wouldn't eat any of it, but I hoped the smell might make her happy, well, happier. I pulled out a bottle of vinegar and a box of baking soda in case I ran out of dry ice.
I handed Tuffcake the asparagus before I picked her up. I figured it might hurt to touch her, but she just sniffed my fingers. She always seemed comforted by being picked up except the one time Mike tried to pick her up with vinyl gloves on because he was trying to clean her house and she bit him. Mike was really sweet with me today despite the rift that bite had made between him and Tuffcake. I cried in the morning when I told him about my plan and he held me. I cried after we got back with the dry ice and he hugged me some more. I cried again when Mike took Nickie into bed and read to him even though it was my night to read from our book. I cried as I wrapped Tuffcake in pink and green ovals I'd once thought I'd make into a wedding ring quilt. I knew I'd never find a better use for those pieces. I wanted Tuffcake to be wrapped in something nice, not just scraps.
Just then, Nickie got up to go find an action figure he wanted and he asked Mike to get him a drink of water. There I was, running into the laundry room and hiding with Tuffcake wrapped in those quilt pieces, snot threatening to run down my nose, and nothing to say if he caught me. Thankfully, Nick didn't look at the setup I had going on in the living room in too much detail. I stayed quiet. I had half a thought to bring Tuffcake to Nick for a little petting, but I really didn't want him to make any connections between her and that contraption. Mike herded Nick back into his bedroom and I prepared myself for another killing.
I put Tuffcake down into the bottle. She was so sick, she didn't even try to get out. She just sat quietly while I got the lid put on and the straw bundle jammed down into the neck of the bottle. Then I peeled back the saran wrap and dumped in all the dry ice, hoping it was enough. The worst part of the whole thing was when she squeaked and tried to get her nose out to the edge where I had cut the bottle in half. The bottle didn't go back together as tightly as I'd like because of the grips on the sides. Oh, she squeaked. Four times, she squeaked before she settled down. It took five minutes before she stopped moving, but I wasn't convinced yet, so I waited. And I waited some more.
I'm glad about the music I put on because Nickie got up again, this time to go to the bathroom. The dry ice was still bubbling and despite the music, he wanted to know what that noise was. I wasn't about to leave and I gave Mike those 'please help me keep my boy from seeing this' eyes. By that time, Tuffcake hadn't moved in about twenty minutes. Oh, it was almost as awful as those four little squeaks, to hear Nickie chatting to Mike through the bathroom door. He wanted me to write that silly thing about the puppies:
C M Puppies. (Here you say the letters and it sounds like 'See 'em puppies.')
M R N Puppies.
O S M R Puppies.
C M P N?
There are things that make a killing surreal. Reciting kid jokes, even scrambling for a piece of paper to write it down, all the while hoping that your poor anesthetized hamster didn't wake up while you were absent, is one of them. I really wanted to have a proper ceremony, but the contraption and trying to hide it all from Nick make it strange, even creepy. It was hard to try and sound normal while he chatted with me through the door too. I just wanted to be standing there to block the view into the living room.
It sounds strange, even to me, to go to such lengths to shield Nick from all of this. Nickie and I held his last hamster on our laps when she died of old age four years ago. The only thing wrong with the picture then was that we watched television while it happened. Nick knows death in a small way, but I didn't want him to see Tuffcake die, especially this way, especially with the hideous tumor trying to take over her tiny body, especially in a strange contraption that looked an awful lot like the experiments we did when we got dry ice for something. Nick liked doing experiments with dry ice. Throwing a hamster into the mix wasn't a part of that schooling.
Mike finally got Nick to sleep, the dry ice was fizzling out, an hour had passed, and Tuffcake hadn't moved. We decided to tell Nick that Tuffcake had died in the morning. I wrapped Tuffcake in more fabric and put her into a cardboard box so I could bury her in the morning. Prayers and services will follow the burial. After I was finished, I sent a text to my friend, Kris.
"I just killed Nick's hamster. Dry ice has sinister and hopefully humane purposes I'd never imagined."
Her reply came quickly.
"Ohhhhhhh. I'm glad you found a good solution. Sweet dreams Tuffcake."
Yes, sweet dreams Tuffcake. I'm sure there are asparagus flowers in hamster heaven.
Thank you for listening, jb
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