This is what I mean about Dagny

She's always around to honor the dead pets with me.

Hard days

Today isn't the easiest day for my sister, who has to say goodbye to her beloved kitten after 10 years together...I'm thinking of you and of darling Dottie, thinking of when I came with you to pick her out 10 years ago, pregnant with Emma and not yet knowing it, thinking of all of the times I have visited your houses over the years and went sneaking off to look for her under beds or in closets to steal a few pets. She was such a good girl, so adorable with all of her dots...the sleekest cat with the cutest mouthiness when we talked on the phone. She is joining all of our beloved friends today in heaven.

It's also a day of hard news for our family...facing hard ideas but also remembering how much we love each other. I hope my Dad knows how much I love him, how much I respect him, how good he was to me in so many ways. I'm going to keep hoping and praying, and doing as he does - really enjoying life, working hard, and finding the fun in so many different things. I'm so lucky to have learned so many things from him, and even luckier that my children have had the chance (and still do) to learn things from him. Such a guy.

Happy 18th Anniversary, Dad and Nancy!

(And Debbie, if you read this, Happy Birthday to you!)

Thank you

Thank you, so much, to all of you who sent kind messages about Phineas. Thank you for helping me to not feel so crazy, grieving for a rabbit. Thank you for remembering him! - that probably meant the most to me...hearing from the friends I've had as long as I had Phineas, those that remember him in his sprightly days, living in the dining room of our old house!. Somehow I felt so old, remembering adopting him at the age of 25, with no kids, no breast cancer, so much younger...and then looking up and thinking of how different I am now, knowing the woman I am today won't be optimistically adopting a little rabbit. It doesn't bother me to feel so much older when I think of how long I have had these friendships...having people who remember all of these years with me just makes me cherish all of the years I've had so far!

Some notes about the end of an era

• It took me over 3 hours to clean up all of the things I have collected for rabbits over the years - and to reclaim over 75 square feet of my basement. It's sad for me that my "basement will just be a basement without him down there shuffling around"...
• I told Bill it was always a little shameful to me that I was the only 35 year old I knew with a pet rabbit, and a dirty one at that since he never wanted to use his litterbox, especially at the end - but I don't like being more respectable now.
• The kids are quite obviously fine, though they shed the appropriate tears and decorated the grave site in a very cute manner, with rocks and drawings and smiley faces. However, they did ask their father, "Why is Mom still crying? Why is she still sad about Phineas?" after only about an hour of crying! He explained that I had had my rabbit for longer than I had them.
• After thanking Bill for letting me have a rabbit and care for him for all these years, he said a few funny things. 1) "I got a lot of jokes out of that rabbit..." and my favorite, 2) "That's just the cost of doing business with you, honey." He also told me I could get another rabbit immediately when I was hyperventilating with my crying. (not really hyperventilating, but it sounds good)
• There's not going to be another rabbit, really, even though Bill said yes and Julie is placing secret bets. It is so much work for not much snuggling, and it is hard to snuggle if they can't hold their pee (this was particular to Phineas, especially during the last few months). And it is hard to find time to snuggle if you have 3 kids who need it, and an elderly dog, and 2 cats, and a puppy that you don't really want to snuggle yet, but you feel like you must so that she becomes affectionate and happy in your family. It's too much work in general, totally not worth it unless you are completely committed to that individual as I was to that rabbit. I even got 2 companion rabbits for him! And chose guinea pigs instead of a hamster, in case he or Lydia was alone for the last part of life (bigger, better size to be companions).
• Dagny is such a kind, sensitive dog. I brought her with me to dig the grave, and she solemnly sat while I dug. When I held Phineas for the last time and cried, she nosed his little face gently, and then sat closer so that we were touching. She sat solemnly while we buried him, and then came close to me so that I could bury my face in her fur and cry. I took her for 2 long slow walks alone, without the bad Puppy, to thank her.
  

The end of an era

Phineas (late 1997? early 1998? - 4/4/09)

Mrs. Lucken is officially out of the rabbit business...and I don't say this in a cavalier manner (as tears roll down my face). It's been a long, long haul, and almost 11 years of love and adoration for a certain rabbit who came into my life on the first Michigan football Saturday in 1998. As many of you know, I don't care much about football...but it made that 3 mile drive home a much longer endeavor as we lived one block from Michigan Stadium at the time.

I didn't expect to get into the rabbit business, but when a woman came into the veterinarian's office where I was working, with this fellow and his pee-stained feet, I wanted to help her. She couldn't keep him, her landlord wanted him out, she couldn't drive to the Humane Society (and couldn't express herself, either...she had some special needs and probably loved Phineas but I'm not sure how she could care for him.) The offer to help get him to the animal shelter became a lifetime commitment when I saw the way he hopped in our first yard - a few hops here and there and then a leap straight up in the air followed by some furious and silly tearing around. I guess I should say it became at least two lifetime commitments, because I first had to beg my boyfriend to let him live in his dining room. (2= my lifetime commitment to Phineas, and Bill's lifetime commitment to his crazy girlfriend-come-wife.)

When we spontaneously bought a house 2 blocks up the street in Ann Arbor, I told Bill we could not actually move into the house until the rabbit came with us...and the rabbit could not come with us until we got him a friend to live with in the basement. In my mind, a dark basement, alone, was not the same as living in the dining room (in a cage of course), around people and pets (even if one of them ignored him). With no hesitation, he said, "OK, let's go get him a friend", and we loaded up our 10 month old, drove to Pet Supplies Plus, picked out Frances, and moved into 919 Edgewood that night.

I guess we are on to lifetime commitment #3, because Phineas and Frances were so cute together. (Phineas had been neutered for $12 - anesthesia cost, and sutures - by my friend and veterinarian at Ypsilanti Animal Clinic, so baby rabbits wasn't a concern). Frances sadly had some sort of bacterial infection which eventually paralyzed her (but a couple years and 2 hours down the line), but Phineas stood by her side, literally, to help her hop around and get her food. And as she deteriorated, he was always there as well. Frances taught me a lot about rabbits - how much they can respond to human kindness, how much rabbits like companionship and can be empathetic to each other - and I was heartbroken for Phineas that he had lost his pal.

On to lifetime commitment #4...I packed up 4 year old Emma, and 5 year old Phineas, and we were off to pick out a friend - this time at a rabbit rescue. I had loved Lydia's white paws when I saw her on the sanctuary's website, but it was Phineas and Lydia who really chose each other (with Emma's 4 year old input). Despite an early altercation (Lydia freaked out in the yard and broke Phineas' ear - my fault for putting her in a stressful situation too soon, with someone to take out her misery on), they became snuggling buddies for the next 5.5 years until we lost her suddenly 8 months and 2 days ago.

By this time, Phineas was 10 years old...at least (as he was an adult when he made his entrance in my life). I felt sorry, but 10 years of cleaning rabbit cages through 3 pregnancies, chemotherapy and surgeries, making nice rabbit areas in 5 separate houses (in the last move, I was driving 3 kids, 1 dog, 2 cats, and 2 rabbits in my minivan over to our house - poor rabbits were tossed and turned as I frantically followed the carpet cleaner, who thought we weren't home and was driving away...), had made me tired of the rabbit business. Mrs. Lucken has always loved Phineas, though...and had prepared for the life with one rabbit by securing a pair of guinea pigs who became Phinny's friends and companions. What kind of rabbit shares his cage and food gladly with two spunky little guinea pigs? But then again, what kind of cat gently licks her rabbit friend on the head when she sees him (Annie), and what kind of dog guards her rabbit friend from other dogs who don't know this is our family member (Phineas and Lydia were in a cage in the yard one time, and a neighbor dog was trying to figure out a way into the cage until Dagny tried to bite him several times).

And now I am crying again, because what a bunny, and what a silly life. I know it sound stupid, because he was just a bunny, and I really got so tired of trying to make his life as good as it could possibly be. I do have to say that I never gave up, though...and I did really love him. And I am so thankful, too, because somehow, I knew that he might not be around much longer (as I did with Frances, and even with Lydia). So Thursday night he had a bath and a long cuddle with me on the couch...and Friday I visited him about 10 extra times for pets and to try to get him to drink some water or eat his favorite treats. I even told Nathan that Phineas was probably going to need to leave his old body behind and go to heaven soon (to get a new body that worked so much better). "Who will drive him?" "Well, he won't have a body, so he can just go. He'll get a new one when he gets there, and the old one we will put in a hole because he doesn't need it anymore." Nathan told this to Bill last night, and he was ready to see Phineas today and say goodbye to the old body. Katie came down with tears and kisses and goodbyes yesterday too...and Emma was given fair warning also (I'm sure she visited, as she has become a good caretaker of these little pets).

And this morning, he was gone.

After all of these years, thousands of feedings, hundreds of cleanings, baths, vet visits, all the money spent at Pet Supplies Plus, nail clippings, hours chasing rabbits in the yard after fun fresh air time (with so many nice helpers along the way - sisters, friends, kids, friends of kids), introductions and goodbyes, Mrs. Lucken is out of the rabbit business. It was not a very easy road, and not always a very rewarding one...but why am I so miserable? Just a bunny, but also a lifestyle...and a lifetime commitment that I am so sad to have over.

MY BIRTHDAY GIRL!!!!!!!!!

Can I just say, that life with my girl Katie has always been nothing short of an adventure in parenting. She is a sparkly, complex little girl - a smart, emotional, strong-but-also-kind, fiery-but-also-sensitive, introverted AND extroverted girl. She's a middle child who easily could have been an only child - she likes her quiet time, she likes her friends, she likes the spotlight (and some of these things are just so impossible to have as much as she might like, sandwiched in between her big sister and her younger brother). A lesser personality could be lost between the accomplishments of the older sister and the beguiling smiles of the cute younger brother...but not Katie!

Anyway, Katie is so many things, I will never get it right in describing her in one post (especially as I have her cake to frost, her birthday dinner to make, and her presents to wrap). Let's just leave it that parenting this complex girl has been one of the most rewarding adventures of my life. I'm so lucky to have her - trying to understand this girl and to be the best Mom I can be for her has made me a better person.

Happy 7th Birthday to my Baby Kates! And Happy Birthday to Daddy's Little.

Love this picture

Yes, we are in LOVE with spring around here...maybe too much in love! But I was going through some pictures of our winter adventures for K's Young Authors book, and found this totally radical picture. From our trip to Bayfield, you can see the date on the pic.

Advice to self - more crazy nature walks with kids. Look at their faces! (We do a lot of these, but apparently we need a lot more.)