Death in the Family










Pickle, the family rabbit, has died. I found out because Mama emailed me about it. We're going to bury him in the garden tonight, next to Eric, she said. ERIC DIED TOO? I replied. Eric is my auntie's rabbit. She lives across the road from Mama and they used to have rabbit play-dates.



Eric died last month, I was told.



And then the gravity of Mama's words hit me. They were going to bury my beautiful little lion-haired baby in the ground with Verbose Auntie's overweight, smelly, and not to mention AMOROUS beast of a pet. They were going to be together for all eternity.



Mama, I implored back, those rabbits cannot spend the rest of forever together.... Eric was a rapist. 





And it's true. We'd all been in the garden when, as Verbose Auntie put it, Eric's lipstick came out of the tube. Poor Pickle didn't stand a chance. There was rabbit-on-rabbit penetration, and we all sat by and watched it happen on that sunny afternoon. Hell. We might even have enjoyed it.



Good point. Mama emailed back. Once was enough. Once was enough.

Comments

  1. P15 March 2010 at 05:15

    Ah yes, I seem to recall reading about that particular incident. I remember finding it funny and reading it out loud to my friend.

    She was just disturbed.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Laura Jane Williams15 March 2010 at 05:53

    P- Well I'm glad *you* were amused!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jo15 March 2010 at 08:36

    Hahahahahahahahaha. Brilliant Laura.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Single Mother on the Verge15 March 2010 at 14:43

    I'm said for you, having buried two rabbits meself.... but god you're funny! xx

    Lipstick out of the tube...! xx Jesus.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Single Mother on the Verge15 March 2010 at 14:44

    I mean sad, obviously, I have sank a glass of blush, and I can't spell.

    (yes we are back in the 80s, where girls drink vino blush)
    x

    ReplyDelete
  6. Laura Jane Williams15 March 2010 at 14:47

    Jo- Why, thank you! You can come again!

    SMOV- I know, I've not been able to apply my Clinique since without grimacing slightly. And when I say Clinique, I mean Rimmel.

    x

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous15 March 2010 at 14:51

    That Eric was such a pig, but I'm missing Pickle already. My condolences.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Laura Jane Williams15 March 2010 at 14:55

    Ian- Eric was a bit like Lenny in Of Mice and Men. He was big and cumbersome but probably had a heart of bronze, if not silver.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Ducking Great15 March 2010 at 18:12

    LMAO.. Miss having rabbits! They are endlessly entertaining..

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anonymous15 March 2010 at 18:44

    Reading this one, I was going into silent convulsions in the Pray-Harrold computer lab, I was laughing so hard..."lipstick came out of the tube"....what other
    Auntie-isms should we know about?
    ----Lisa from EMU

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous15 March 2010 at 18:50

    Your friend "P" makes me laugh, too
    ("She was just disturbed.") :-)
    ---Lisa from EMU

    ReplyDelete
  12. Laura Jane Williams16 March 2010 at 06:42

    DG- Yeah, they are good for a giggle until it's minus six outside and they need their bedding fricking changing!

    Lisa- My whole family is nuts!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Anonymous16 March 2010 at 10:38

    Hi, Laura--Since you say your whole family is nuts, then please tell us more funny stories about them! (and/or their pets!) If you have any Irish (or even part- Irish) relatives, maybe you can tell us a good story about them in honor of St. Patrick's Day (Wed) :-) For Wed, March 17th:I wish Laura & all blog-comment-posters a very Happy St. Patrick's Day :-) (Everyone's Irish on St. Patty's Day!)
    ---Lisa from EMU

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Everything looks better with my eyes open

An incomplete list of some things I call my 2017 achievements: - saw my first ballet, from the really cheap seats all the way at the back. - cleansed, toned and moisturised every morning, and every night. - bought furniture. - threw a really very good Christmas party. - refused to save the candles for best. - called my mother. - called my father. - interviewed a celebrity. - deleted Facebook. - stopped nannying. - maintained a relationship with the girls I used to nanny - and their mama. - took a month off. - bought £300-worth of sex toys all in one go. - went viral online for falling over. - said out loud that I want a baby. - received a case of wine. - got offered a horse and cart at the entrance to Soho Farmhouse. - went swimming in the ladies pond on the Heath when we had the heatwave. - went home for Easter. - went ginger, and on purpose. - hosted an event about mental health. - did my first lit fest. - took a day trip to Oxford. - saw Titanic at the Royal Albert Hall with a l...
Read more

Above my bed

Image
The metre-and-a-half wide frame has hung empty above my bed since July. I paid a man to hang it. I'd harboured, to begin with, reservations about how my feminism and my employment of somebody else to execute the job dovetailed awkwardly, but after I hit myself in the face with a hammer one night, not understanding the difference between a nail at 45 degrees into a diving wall and a drill with a spiral anchor into a brick wall, I decided the most feminist act would be, in fact, to use my hard-earned feminist money to feministly delegate somebody better qualified to help me out - who yes, just so happened to be a man. I have never looked back.  The room needed something above the bed - that's why I got the frame and had it hung - but I couldn't rush to fill it. It needed to be right. I didn't want a generic Ikea print: they can satisfy the dead area behind the door in the living room because that is a neutral space. Bedrooms - bedrooms must be ...
Read more

Your story is not ready for you to worry about yet

Image
I teach creative writing, and often what happens is that my students repeat my words back to me and I don't understand that it was me who said them first and it's a headfuck. I love teaching. I love communicating knowledge and I love using my skill with words to package information in a way that lands with the other person. I sort of took it upon myself, at the end of last year, to help one of the girls I used to nanny with her 11+ because I could so clearly identify where her boldest missteps were and part of me thought  maybe I am interfering too much  and then her mother cancelled her tutor and asked me to come over instead and you know what? She aced the exam and I know I played a part in that. After, when she called me to tell me how good she felt about what she'd done, I cried. She's working on a novel and she FaceTimed me on Easter Sunday from a walk on the Devon coast to show me some goat poo. That child reminds me to be love. Some people have comme...
Read more