Death and Mosquitos

[lydy]

One of the things that writers often get wrong in fantasy and science fiction novels is the time and strength and energy it takes to bury someone. To read some authors, a proper grave, six feet deep, is merely a matter of a couple of hours of moderate work. To begin with, digging isn't moderate work, it's bloody hard work. In the second place, a couple hours might buy you a shallow grave if the soil is kind.
Gravedigging is hard work. If it's for a three inch fish, of course, it's not nearly so difficult. Unpleasant, but not a day's hard work.

I've never had to bury a pet on my own, before. The last pet I buried was Ember, and I was still living with Peter, then. He dug a grave about three feet deep, with square sides and a flat bottom. Square sides and a flat bottom are the difference between a hole in the ground and a grave. Lilith I had cremated, and I'm not going to bury the ashes. Ever since Peter and I have broken up, I've regretted leaving Em behind.

I'm terribly squeamish. For sanitary reasons, I put Helena in a plastic bag before I put her in the freezer last night. I hate corpses. I hate dead things. I kept my eyes closed when I dumped her out of the plastic bag and into the cardboard box. The box was considerably larger than it needed to be, but while she was pretty large for an ornamental, freshwater fish, she was awful small in comparison to everything else in our lives. She was a little more than 3" long. Because the box was so large, I had to dig a considerably larger grave than had I simply buried her without a box. I couldn't have managed that, though.

I've never yet run into anything that I had to do that I couldn't manage. Although I am, as I said, incredibly squeamish, whenever it's been truly necessary, I've done what had to be done, be it dealing with vomit or blood or shit or dead fish. I don't buy the argument that being squeamish makes someone hypocritical. Damn right I've no interest in visiting a slaughterhouse, nor any interest in hunting my own meat. Being squeamish isn't a good standard for ethical behavior.

I don't really like digging in the dirt. I'm no kind of gardner. And as I've said, I really don't like dead things. What I hate even more than those things, though, are mosquitos. The mosquitos had just come out when I went to the back yard to dig a grave in the flowerbed. Those suckers seem to be especially voracious, this year. I'm also allergic to mosquitos, and these are the first bites of the season. They're swelling up dramatically. There's a weal on my right knee that looks kind of like somebody took a silver dollar and bit a couple of pieces out of it. It's huge. There are remarkable bumps on both ankles, behind my knees, on both elbows -- what is it that these damn bugs, that they go for the joints? So, at the moment I've fled to my bedroom and my computer desperately trying to distract myself and prevent myself from scratching the bites bloody. Eventually, I will, probably. But it's better if I don't scratch them right away, give them some time for the swelling to go down.

As I sit here, I notice that Julian, my largest blood parrot, appears to be having trouble with his equilibrium, again. He's attacking Helios, pretty much non-stop. However, he's also swimming head down and ends up on his side or upside down far too often for my comfort. I just lost a fish. Maybe I'll take this one into the vet. Helios isn't looking all that healthy, either... I wonder how much of this is projection. Grrr. I'm going to go play some solitaire and ignore everything. Bye.

Comments

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I think you did fine with this difficult task. Most people use the "burial at sea" method, but since that's not for you, you gave your fish an honorable exit.

K. [tried putting ice on the bug bites?]

[lydy.livejournal.com]

Actually, Helena was too large for the toilet to be a possible disposal option. Seems to me anything the size of your fist or larger really ought to be buried rather than discarded. On the other hand, much as I like neon tetras, they're flush fodder.

Pamela said she might plant some flowers on the grave. That would be nice.

Requiem Mass for a Fish

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

I'm going to have to write a pointless story about digging sometime. I was a strange kid, I built an animal cemetery. Instead of digging deep holes though I put rock cairns upon the graves. That worked... mostly. I think if I were ever in a needing a quick grave position I would dig shallow and put lots of bowling ball sized stones upon it. The only really huge hole I dug was a six food deep pit that was originally intended to be a start to an underground fort.

Yep, I'm going to have to write one of my notorious pointless stories about this sometime. Mosquitoes don't seem to care for me that much, I attribute it to the garlic and carrots in my diet. Which is not a scientifically researched answer, but it'll have to do.

Oh and sorry about your fish.

–M

Re: Requiem Mass for a Fish

[lydy.livejournal.com]

I was a strange kid, I built an animal cemetery. Instead of digging deep holes though I put rock cairns upon the graves.

Think of the price of oatmeal. :-)

When I was young, I lived in Upstate New York. There was a meadow on two sides of our lot. After mowing, my friend Christine, who lived next door, would "rescue" the wounded toads and frogs. We had a little animal hospital at the roots of one of the exceptionally fine elm trees. (I think it was still alive we left, but I don't remember for sure. Dutch elm disease was sweeping through the area, and the one closer to our house died the year we left.) Christine and I, well, mostly Christine, would bind up the amputated limbs with little bits of white cloth, catch flies for the patients to eat, and generally lavish love on the toady-frogs. At this great age, I wonder just how much of a favor we did those toady-frogs, but at the time we were sure we were Florence Nightingale and St. Francis Assisi rolled into one.

I don't recall burying any of them. I think they all escaped before they died, if they died. Some probably survived, despite our nursing.

Oh, and hey, if anybody knows Christine Russell, who used to live in Lisbon, NY, next to the preacher's house, had a dad in a wheelchair, a little brother who might have been named Ed, and used to play with Linda King and Lydia Nickerson, I'd love to get back in touch, just to say "Hello." When we moved to Pittsburgh, I completely lost touch.

[pameladean]

Lydy! There's cortisone cream (non-prescription strength) and Neosporin in the medicine cupboard. Either one will dull the itching.

Why am I writing this here? Sheesh.

Pamela

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

Because it's the twenty-first century?

I think mosquitos preferentially attack joints because they're warmer. But I could just be suffering from Male Answer Syndrome.

[nellorat.livejournal.com]

Condolences about Helena. I've usually found some catharsis in the physical effort needed to dig a grave, but I've never buried anything larger than a rabbit. One good realistic depiction of the effort involved in burying a human being (albeit a small one) is in Stephen King's Pet Sematary, which is a good book in many ways about grieving and death in general.

And while I know all about the bill$ as a result, I'd advocate taking your fish to the vet. You could be overly worried, but it also seems all too reasonable that other fish in the tank might be ill after one died. A third option is asking at a store about general purpose antibiotics etc.

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

Mosquitos like me too. I always take a spray bottle of antihistamine with me when I go to Oklahoma. It works pretty well to stop itching though I use it more often than they say too.

MKK

[elisem.livejournal.com]

Condolences on the fish, Lydy, and I hope the mosquito bites quieted right down for you.