I visit alot with the grim reaper these days. Yesterday Blaze, the baby Fire Ball Python, drowned in his water bowl. He was doing well, and his organs were all in perfect shape, other than the fact that he was dead and rigor mortis was starting.
Of all the things I've worried about lately, a healthy snake drownng in a water bowl was not up on the list. Is this the cosmic slap upside the head that says "quit worrying-you'll never worry about it all no matter how hard you try?"
Ok, I don't honestly think that the cosmos takes the time to align to show me what I need to know. I do think that I should reflect on things that DO happen to learn from them. The cosmos provides the fertile proving ground for our experiments in life, but it's up to us to provide the intent.
I've never liked the notion that "God has a plan for you"...even as a child I raised the question "what if I don't like the plan?" Lately I've remembered some of my childhood questions, and you know what, they were pretty good questions after all.
I revisited my intent to come back here-and dang it, I still think it's a good idea. Back to my birthplace-if I can be ME on 49th street, I can probably be me anywhere in the world. And that seems like a valuable skill to work on, even if it is somewhat self centered. (just a little).
Like a zillion other people, I love the Metallica tune "Unforgiven". Google it, it's worth a listen and franky, I don't want to lose my thought long enough to link to it. Nothing like Heavy Metal to lay on a big dose of guilt because someone didn't let you live your life the way you wanted to. Waaah waaah waaaah. Now that the boys have all had counseling and rehab, they just aren't as angry as they used to be.....better for them, but a loss for angst ridden, angry art forms.
So, what have I learned? It's definitely easier to face one unexpected death than mutiple slow deaths (speaking strictly of snakes here). I've reaffirmed my beliefs that we are each captains of our own vessels and that we cannot possible conceive of everything that might happen.
I did my first snake necropsy. $$$ Hundreds of dollars worth of dead snake-and yes, it looked just like chicken. Now you know.
5 comments:
oh boy, not a great sight to wake up to was it. Do snakes often have trouble getting out of their water bowls?
good question - why worry? I wish I truly knew the answer to that one....
It happens, I usually keep low water levels, but he was doing pretty well and didn't seem to be a goof. He probably crawled in, got chilled and didn't have sense enough to crawl back out.
The breeder is going to replace him-because he knows me and knows that I take good care of my animals. Plus, I'm a dream customer-I buy high end snakes but I don't want to sell any babies-so I'm all cash in and no competition....LOL.
I actually did an experiment-bought some captive hatched babies to raise them up so see what it would be like, I did finally part with 2 of the males, but I didn't like it and won't be doing THAT again. I lost 2 of that clutch, and that was actually less traumatic than selling the babies.
I'm just not cut out for the business side of animals.
That's fascinating to me that he'd drown in his water bowl. It makes sense that perhaps he got chilled. Poor little guy. Sorry for your loss.
I'm working on that worrying thing too. I really (mostly) believe that things are playing out just the way they're supposed to. We still have choices to "steer" things, but part of me feels we're all where we should be, having the experiences we're supposed to have. I may feel differently tomorrow!
OMG, an sutopsy?! I feel bad for you and you know how true that is when you know how I feel about snakes.
'the only two things you can rely on are death and change!' read that somewhere once and it's a mantra of mine now.
i hate unexpected pain, i prefer what i know and can rely on.
but hey ho, that's all we have -the unexpected. i love the fact that you love your snakes so much and that you have tattoos and two ollies in your life, go figure!
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