Opal the hamster has died. It was my daughter's miniature, Chinese hamster. This thing was cute. Little kid book cute. Tiny and adorable.
My daughter loved that hamster. Cleaned its cage dutifully, played with it and begged for elaborate, plastic living quarters for her.
Recently, she had escaped her cage somehow. My son discovered her in his room, and we closed it off. The three of us scrambling after it in every corner proved futile, even after it dashed under a bookcase and we had to remove all the books, as it can dash so quickly away.
A few times I managed to get close enough to grab it with my hands, but my instinct was to scream! So was my daughter's! My son had the intelligence to see that these screaming females would never capture Opal, so he threw a piece of clothing over it to net her.
We had an end of the year school party and my daughter's best friend said she knew all about hamsters. It turned out that she put it into our dog's face several times, as well as other rough treatment.
All this week it seemed Opal deteriorated until my daughter said she was biting her and then not moving any more. Indeed, Opal had died.
We created a funeral for her. Gathered her in fresh cotton bedding and placed her into an immortal chamber of a plastic cup. My daughter placed food for the journey before we sealed it with plastic wrap. My daughter had scoured the yard for the perfect place to bury Opal. We sat there, viewing the body, and telling stories and memories about her. My daughter cried, and begged that we immediately go to Petco to get a replacement. But I said we have to grieve first. It's best not to rush out and cover up your grief with a replacement Opal. Although I said, that Opal isn't really dead. She's just changing forms. Because nothing ever dies. Just the body dies. Opal's probably going to show up as the next hamster we get! Because life is like that. It's always changing shapes and forms and playing peek-a-boo with us. Sometimes it shows up as a flower, and it dies, and then a tree, and it dies. Or a father, and he dies, or a cat, and it dies (our latest became a coyote snack it seems,) or a hamster and it dies to become something else. It's all eternal from a deep sea beneath it all. And our images show up here on the surface of creation.
We sat on the front lawn under the shade of an oak tree, and placed young lavender wands near Opal's coffin. This is the viewing, I said. For three days you can sit here with Opal. And then we will bury her. (and then go get another hamster.)
As she cried and viewed Opal, I held her and told her a story. I told her the story of the children of wax, from Africa. How parents wanted children and they got children, but in the form of wax. They couldn't go outside during the day or they would melt. But one boy insisted and melted. They grieved at night, gathered him up into a little ball of wax, and placed it in a tree. The next morning, a singing bird was in the ball of wax's place. They knew it was their brother.
I leave her alone for a while. She can still cry all she wants, I tell her. Later we are going to make an art piece to remember Opal. One with a picture my daughter took of Opal in her little house. (it's darn cute.) So that she can say goodbye to Opal the hamster and pass through her grief.