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Never Trust Me With Your Goldfish

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Contributed by: Beverly McClure on 8/13/2008

For the past two weeks I've been cat sitting for my son and his family while they are on vacation. (They took the dog with them.) No problem. The cats are sweet, and we get along fine. I feed them, water them, let them in the house when they want in and put them outside when they want out. They meow their thanks, I scratch their chins, and we go on our separate ways.

Unfortunately, my relationship with the goldfish is quite different. The fish live (or they did live) in a pond in the backyard. A pump pumps fresh water in, providing oxygen for the fish. My son reminded me to check each day to make surethat the water was flowing ok. I checked every morning and evening. Every time I looked, a tiny waterfall was trickling into the pond. The goldfish were happy--trust me. Why wouldn't they be when they were in the cool water under the shade of a tree instead of sweltering under 100 plus temperatures. They had their own private pool, for goodness' sake.

But then ...When I got to the house early Saturday morning, no bubbly sound of running water greeted me.The tiny waterfall no longer was dripping. Four little goldfish floated, belly up in the murky water.

"What happened?" I asked my son, later on the phone. All he could figure was the rain must have kicked a circuit breaker to the pump, which caused it to stop. This was the morning we had the much welcome rainfall. So I had done it again.

I say again, because a couple years ago they had a beautiful Siamese fighting fish, a Betta. They kept it in a fish bowl in the house. Again, i was taking care of their critters while they were on vacation, and I kept that little fish fed. Boy, did I. I thought they said to feed it once a day. So I did. What they actually told me was to feed it once a week. You can guess what happened to the Betta. No details are necessary, but it wasn't a pretty picture.

Now you see why I say, "Never trust me with your goldfish."

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