When my sister and I were growing up it was not uncommon for us to do hours of chores each day to help sustain our family's little farm. We did chores regardless of our behavior. This was especially true during summer vacation when we had to help stack at least a dozen cords of wood to dry so in the fall we could throw it in the cellar for the ultimate Tetris game. We'd also have to weed endless rows of every vegetable imaginable sustainable by the New England climate.
Today I shake my head in the produce aisle. When veggies would sprout and start to grow there would be overcrowding and we'd have to 'thin' the rows in order to make room for the plants to mature. These discarded plants that we fed to the cows often looked better than what I sometimes see at the grocery store.
When I get really annoyed with Zachary I say "You know what Grandpa with the Chickens would do when mommy gave him attitude growing up?" Then, I'd proceed to tell him that in addition to being punished, part of being a member of the family meant pitching in and helping out. For my sister and I it meant stacking wood for so long our hands would blister, picking potato bugs off the potato plants with our bare hands, hauling pine brush for entire days leaving leaving our hands sore coated with pitch, and carrying garden snakes down the road and throwing them in the woods away from our property line. (My dad still hates snakes.)
My kids have no idea the labor that goes into their dinner plate - and not just veggies and meat - they don't have any concept how cheese, jams, pickles, applesauce, sausage, or bread are made. I do make them watch Food Network and HGTV with me.
Backing up to the hamsters ... you don't name food. That's a rule. That right is reserved for pets and dairy cows. The hamsters were never named, therefore, they were food. And, for the record, I feel it necessary to say we will never own a rodent (or fellow reptile) larger than Indy, the 5-foot ball python, can eat.
Although snakes didn't bother me growing up, there's a big difference holding a garden snake the width of your finger and a snake the width of your arm. I'm not afraid to admit I was a little bit intimidated when Indy and I were first introduced. JG has had her since she was a baby, back in his early college days.It was January when we decided to let the boys get hamsters as a reward for taking such good care of their goldfish. We ended up with two male dwarf Chinese hamsters. This breed is especially favored because their teeth are about half the length of 'normal' hamsters. (Remember this detail for later.)
Indy had stopped eating in October to hibernate - fast forward to June and she only ate once in that time frame.
Since May, JG and I had joked about feeding the hamsters to Indy. Why? For one, hamsters are nocturnal, we found out. Snakes are too. This is not coincidence. Every night we'd have to take the hamster cage out of the boys' bedroom and put them in the second bathroom. Invariably, one of the kids would wake up in the middle of the night, pee and forget to close the bathroom door. Squeak, squeak, squeak of the wheel. We were getting sick of the kids ignoring their pets and whining when it was time to clean their cage. If I wasn't reminding them daily to feed and water the hamsters they would have died from starvation and dehydration.
We should have predicted the hamster's short longevity when Edward jumped on the top piece of the hamster cage that was lying on the floor as Zachary was cleaning the cage that first Saturday, cracking it. (Remember this too.) We said if we didn't we wouldn't tell the kids and see how many days it took them to figure out what happened.
A Saturday of me asking Zachary to clean the goes by and turns into an entire week. Then another Saturday and Sunday passes, and a Monday and by Tuesday I was annoyed with the smell and growing increasingly worried about Indy.
I see that we only have enough wood chips to clean the hamster's cage one more time. Then it's a $40 investment for another large bag and four more months of commitment to the hamsters. I put Indy in her feeding box and without hesitation she had lunged for Hamster One within a few seconds. I reach in the cage to get Hamster Two, but I can't find it. I disassemble the cage, running my fingers through the nasty shavings and it is no where to be found.
I'm convinced JG fed Hamster Two to Indy before I thought of doing it for real. As I'm disposing of all the hamster evidence JG reveals to me he didn't feed Indy. So, where is Hamster Two? He escaped we're sure thanks to that crack at the top of the cage.
We don't think anything of it until Zachary wakes up to pee an hour later and we hear "I found my other hamster!" followed by "Where's my cage?!?!"
I tell him we'll talk about it in the morning and not to worry I'll catch the other hamster. Luckily he's too tired to argue or to give me the third degree and stumbles off to bed.
Remember the bathroom renovations? Well, both bathrooms are stripped of floors and one-inch holes are in the wall's sheet rock along the baseboard area about six inches apart. The hamster has decided to play a twisted version of 'Wack-A-Mole' with us that's more like 'Catch-a-rat' and no one catches rats better than Indy. After two hours of JG and I trying, I sit on Edward's step stool in front of the sink with Indy on my lap. I'm waiting. I'm ready.
Hamster Two pops out from behind the water heater and attempts to go through one of those holes just inches away from me. The hamster is determined to fit, Indy is busy sniffing the tub, so I reach down and grab him.
He bites me. Hard.
His teeth are stuck in me and I'm screaming to JG that I have the hamster and his teeth are in me. JG is yelling at me to put the hamster down so it stops biting me. I put Hamster Two in the sink. I put Indy in her box. JG puts Hamster Two in the arena. He loses.
The next morning Zachary asks me if we fed the hamsters to Indy. I say yes. He starts carrying on and crying and telling me how mean that was. I put him on pause after a few minutes and said "Zachary, what were your hamsters' names?" Silence for a good ten seconds before "Well, there was the fast one and there was the slow one."
The only thing Edward had to say about it was "I'm telling Daddy on you." Then he laughed.
I rest my case.
Jen, had no idea you missed all that hard labor...lol!
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