#160 - TIME DOESN'T WAIT

When you are the parent of an 8 year old house elf… this is bound to happen to you sooner or later.

As of last night, I became the Momma of three goldfish; prizes that Little Bear proudly brought home from the County Fair.

The heat has been so bad this summer; I was unable to go on our annual outing to the Fair.

I was pretty disappointed yesterday, thinking of the fun that I was missing.

But, if I HAD been at the Fair, we probably would not be enjoying our new scaly additions. I would have put the nix on it, thinking too much about having to tend to another pet.

Instead the surprise was popped on me by having three plastic baggies of fish thrust into my hands when the guys came home.

“Here, Mommy! I’ve named the big one Gulpy!!”

(Yes, I am not the only one in the Cozy Cottage that talks with exclamation points.)

“What am I supposed to put them in?” I asked no one in particular.

We hunted around the house for something worthy of bearing three gasping goldfish.

The best I could come up with was a huge ceramic mixing bowl.

There was a lot of fretting about being able to fit three goldfish in one bowl.
I grabbed a second smaller bowl…

Maybe if I put one in there and two in the other… that would be alright?

Then the water preparation started, with getting the water the right temperature so as not to shock the poor fishes.

Shock?

As if being yanked out of a garbage can full of overcrowded goldfish, thrust into baggies, being hauled around in muggy summer heat by a little kid for hours at the fair, riding in a car, and then being dumped into a mixing bowl is not enough?

So I placed two in one bowl, the third in another. Watched them poke around for a bit, and then realized how filthy the water for the fish in the smaller bowl had been.

Uck!

The fish was swimming in its own poo!

I realized I was totally clueless on how to relocate the now named Gulpie out of the little bowl to keep him from gulping the poop.

In desperation, I used the soup ladle.

(Mental note: Get a NEW soup ladle.)

Finally, we got the fish settled. We spent an hour of staring at them while they surveyed their very plain world on the inside of a mixing bowl.

I wondered how fish think.

Little Bear and I made up pretend conversations between the fish. This turned into a giggle fest.

While laughing outwardly, inside I was desperately praying, “Please. Please don’t let these fish kick the bucket. Oh, and while You’re at it, God, could you keep them from jumping out of that bowl? I don’t want to step on something squishy in the morning.”

As if God doesn’t have more important things to do.

“Can we feed them? Can we feed them?” the merry house elf inquired.

“Not, yet,” I told Little Bear, “I think we need to give them some time to adjust.”

(I was thinking I am the one who needs time to adjust.)

We decided to go learn something about goldfish on the internet.

Wow!

Who knew that there are volumes of material on goldfish?

We surfed through the feeding and the tank maintenance information.

Then my little guy saw spawning listed as a topic.

“Can we breed them?” he asked.

Okay, obviously now we were going to have a teachable moment about the birds, the bees and the mating habits of goldfish.

Did you know they don’t…

Um…

Conjugate?

They don’t need to touch each other to procreate.

The male gets pimples on his gills when he is ready. The female gets round.

The male chases her around, and there is some body slapping. The female releases her eggs onto the leaves of water plants, and then the male goes swimming about leaving milt to fertilize the eggs.

After that, the goldfish parents go back to business as usual.

If the parent fish see their new born babies, they eat them.

Little Bear was fascinated. I was feeling a tad repulsed.

We went back to look at the threesome. I was seeing them in a whole new light.

We have a tendency to credit our pets with human qualities, but as I watched these glistening fishy aliens I realized that these fish certainly are not human.

I thought about Greek mythology, in particular, the character known as Cronus.

Cronus is well known in mythology for eating his children.

Here’s the story.

The ancient Greeks believed that the creation of earth began with Gaea. Being that there was no mate, Gaea created her own child, Uranus.

Mother and son produced many children, twelve who were known as the Titans.

Things got chaotic.

Cronus took control by castrating his father (who died from the injury) and then in order to remain the new ruler, he ate all of his children (the first Olympians).

Well, this really ticked off Cronus’ wife, Rhea, so she rescued the last child.

She secretly fed Cronus a rock. He ate up thinking that the rock was the last child.

This child, Zeus, survived due to Rhea’s ruse.

For some reason I can not recall… Cronus took off and stayed in Italy and Zeus became the big time deity on Mount Olympia.

Cronus got a name change to Saturn and was celebrated on Saturnalia.

You can’t kill Cronus.

He represents Father Time.

Time gives us a sense of order over chaos.

And time eats up our children.

I thought of this while gazing at those child eating pets.

And then I gazed at my son, who is growing so tall. Every day he gets bigger, and wiser.

Time is eating up his childhood.

Time is eating up me.

Time is eating up all of us.

I love the goldfish now.

This morning they were placed into a 15 gallon fish tank hastily purchased to make them comfortable.

They have found a home here at the Cozy Cottage.

I like watching them. As I watch I am reminded that time moves on.

Time stops for no one.

You can not stop time, and you can not destroy time.

Pay attention, because if you don’t…

Time will eat up your children and you like a hungry goldfish.

© 2007, Loretta Kelly, M.S.W.