What a lovely afternoon it was, just planning my words as I sat in a barn, scents of hay and goatiness filling my nostrils, the sound of rain pounding on the roof and box fans blowing inside. It felt so pensive and home-like. Its funny to me that home has really become a transient thing, but I know now that it truly is, for me, wherever the barns and animals are.
This morning was not so bright for me. The disclaimer for the following section is this: I am highly sensitive and become easily attached. The following story is sappy and maybe in your eyes childish. But for me, a life without deep love is not one at all, and so I continue to deeply love and thus to get deeply hurt. I must not be afraid of these feelings that so define me, and I am not embarrassed of them.
Now to the story. I came into work today and performed some new and exciting duties, which I will expound on later. After said duties, I went to take care of our parakeets. If you've read my late entries, I speak of a certain wonderful success story in the entry titled "happiness that won't budge." A little parakeet that I named Verde was brought in on the brink of death and was saved unexpectedly. Verde and I had a special bond because of my fear of his death, and his resilience to live. He begun sitting on my finger as I readied the food bowls in the morning, nipping lightly as he awaited his seed. He had an obsession with eating, and I'm not sure he was mentally all there. Today when I came into work, Verde was very lethargic. I got him out to examine him and his little butt was covered in a tarry thick stool. I cleaned him off and put him back in his cage, but he looked really bad, so I got him back out and gave him a dose of pain medication as well as gave him some fluids by mouth. At this point, he started to gasp for air, only slowly taking the water drops. I had my finger under his wings so I could feel that tiny heart still beating. I was holding him against my chest saying, "Stay with me, babe, stay with me" over and over again. I hoped I could keep him roused long enough that his resilience would defeat the reaper who loomed so close. When the tiny heart no longer moved, I didn't want to believe it. I grabbed a stethoscope, a special tiny one, and held it to his rib cage- nothing but the sound of silence. It was then that I started to let tears fall. My boss was out at a meeting, so no one was there that I was trying to be strong for. I let the tears flow as I gingerly wrapped his tiny body and took his remains to later be necropsied. It seems sad that my little guy will be cut open in death this afternoon, but if by doing so we can figure out his diagnosis and thus save other birds from the same fate, it's what must be done. I am very sad for little Verde's loss, though, and still acutely remember the sting in my own heart as his did stop.
It almost feels wrong to write joyous things after such a eulogy, but isn't that how life is? The bitter with the better? So, it is my pleasure to say that though life is always lost, it always springs anew in this circle that we are all a part of. Imagine something about the body size of a Pomeranian. Now, imagine such a thing with legs 3 times as long and ending in hoofs smaller than match boxes. The head of such a creature is no bigger than a softball with tiny little horn beds, floppy long ears, and big eyes. It has a mouth so small it can only suck on one of your fingers and a cry so sweet it will break your heart. It is tri-coloured, black, white, and brown. On its little face are brown coloring that look like big aviation goggles. What I am speaking of is the most darling goat baby ever! He is just two weeks old and he is going to eventually be the breeding male pygmy here at the zoo. However, there is a disease in goats that is terribly hard to get rid of and terribly detrimental to health. We have this baby under the absolute strictest of quarantines right now. He is tucked away at the back of the vet wing, and only authorized people may even see him. We change our shoes before getting in that part of the hospital and must don full quarantine gear as we enter his stall. This morning, I was not about to feed baby goat as a precaution, because I had petting pen this afternoon and wanted absolutely no chance of being contaminated while traveling to other goats. However, my boss was going to be late, and this little goatie is on a very strict feeding schedule where he drinks goat's milk from a bottle 5 times a day, every three hours. So, I had to do the morning feeding. However, as I was to be in the goat pen, I had to fully change clothes into a pair of blue cotton coveralls from the vet wing (janitor style) and then go back to his area where I added an additional hazmat suit, gloves and boots before entering his stall. Per usual, the little guy hopped right up into my lap and started searching my face for a nipple. He tried at my chin, earlobes, and nose, all unsuccessfully, before finding the bottle that I held at my shoulder for him. Once he got a hold of that, though, he was a happy man! He sucked away, only taking brief breaks to show my his jumping skills on a log, do little bucks with his back legs flying, or to pee a tiny little stream. Afterwards, he would leap back into my lap, and start enjoying the warmed milk once again. Needless to say, I am absolutely smitten with the little guy, who does not yet have a name. I insanely look forward to our moments nuzzling while he tries to make noises while drinking or gets really excited and wags his minute tail. It is pretty much impossible to be unhappy within a 24 hour period of being with this guy, and so I'm always happy! When he gets out of strict quarantine and I can take pictures of him, I definitely will! For now, just imagine the most adorable thing you've ever seen!!
In other news, we have a capybara who is very pregnant, and she has been having diarrhea this week. We sent a sample and hope that nothing is wrong with her or her pregnancy. She should be due in about 1 week.
Also today we had to check on a penguin with a reddened eye. The redness was only in the sclera, likely due to an injury by another penguin. We added an eye drop and some pain meds by mouth as I held open the snappy, pointy, black beak. As we were in there finishing his checkup, I heard a loud calling, and I immediately thought, 'Tanga.' However, the donkey-sounding bray was merely the loud call of the black-footed penguins, also known as jackass penguins. This was my first experience with their calls, and boy what an apropo name!
That's about all the new stuff this week! My parents are coming for the weekend and we are going to six flags!! I am super excited!
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