R.I.P. CAROLYN

Why should death be such a shock to us when a beloved person or pet dies? We understand that it's an inevitable fact but people are still grief-stricken when it happens.

In my case, my bunny, Carolyn, passed away on the morning of August 28th. I knew something was wrong the night before when she refused to eat her pellets. She would usually hop ecstatically around her pen whenever I brought her food bowl into the living room. I set the bowl down and gently massaged her belly, hoping that it would jump-start her digestion. After a restless night, I force-fed her some Gas-X dissolved in warm water in the hope that I could relieve her intestinal pain.

As soon as the office opened, I called the vet. He picked up my ailing bunny on his way to work because I have no form of transportation. He phoned a few hours later with the bad news that Carolyn was already dead when he took her out of the carrier ten minutes after he arrived.

I believe that we have more than a physical aversion to the cessation of life. According to the Bible, we were created to live forever but because Adam and Eve sinned, they and their descendants were condemned to die. Along with humanity, the creation itself was subjected to decay. Whatever your beliefs are, it's still true that our natural instinct is to recoil from the dead.

All my friends and acquaintances know me as "that guy with the rabbits." These long-eared creatures so captivated my heart that I wrote When a Man Loves a Rabbit (Learning and Living With Bunnies), a memoir of my experiences with them as house pets. Please click here and read more about it as well as my Deliverance From Jericho (Six Years in a Blind School) paperback.

For the best information about house rabbits, please click here.