A Child's Rite of Passage...

As many of us know, parenting is a wonderful thing. And we also know that it is not always easy.

So it was this morning on our way out the door to endure The Pre-Dawn Run that we noticed something odd. Maisy, The Playmaker's Sister's hamster of nearly three years, was awake and nestled in the corner of her cage. (Truth be told, Maisy is actually a boy. But when he came home from the pet store, The Playmaker's Sister quickly decided that he was a she.) Being nocturnal, it was a bit unusual for her to be awake at 5 AM. Even stranger, however, was the fact that she was just sitting there. Anytime she's awake, she is either eating, drinking, running on her wheel or climbing the cage. We quickly looked at her and convinced ourselves she was fine. However, when we had finished The Run, she was still as we had left her. We then knew she was not well. So we did what most husbands do in these situations. We woke up The Misses and filled her in. She came down and confirmed our worst fears. We decided that she would take Maisy to the vet and if the doctor confirmed our diagnosis, we would have Maisy put to sleep. We did not want her to suffer. Even more important, we did not want The Playmaker's Sister to watch her suffer. Not wanting to send a sobbing child to school, we held off on giving our daughter the news. (The misses called a little while ago to say that Maisy was in Pet Heaven.)

So at some point this afternoon after school, we will sit down with Our Daughter and give her the news. Tears will fall. And fall quickly. There will tons of them. When The Fish died last summer, The Playmaker's Sister cried and was somber for a few hours. This time, the pain will be more traumatic. More pronounced. And, undoubtedly, much more enduring.

In the overall scheme of things, this is a relatively minor loss. However, to a 10 year old this will be huge.

As such, it will huge for her parents.