I had a 24-hour pet rat when I was about eight years’ old, a vivid memory to this day, given to me by a little boy I knew in the neighborhood. When he showed me I immediately fell in love with that sweet little thing. I toddled off home carrying it in a small cage, very excited to tell mother about my new pet, that it was a gift and then proudly, I didn't have to spend any of my pocket money (all three-pence of it). Mum took a good long look, smiled and said something like, how nice dear.
The next day, on my return home from school, my new pet was nowhere to be seen. Mum, looking serious as she sat me down, explained with great sympathy, that it missed its mummy badly, and its mummy missed her child. They were very sad and she felt they should be reunited immediately. Then she said to me, I would miss you and you would miss me, right? Sadly, I agreed and I went out in the back garden to seek comfort from my pet rabbits.
Mum was used to me bringing things home. Worms were really interesting, and frogs. I drew a line with spiders after playing in a long, narrow gully on open land a month before. At great speed, I ran through thousands of tiny hatchlings on thousands of tiny webs floating on the air at face level. My friends ran off screaming in all directions. Mum heard me screaming from the next street over and spent a long time clearing them off my face and out of my hair. Why mother's go gray, I think I've heard that somewhere before. Mum was a good egg. She didn’t grow up with animals but when she married Dad, they came with the territory. We already had a dog, Skipper, a cat, Binky, a budgerigar, Kim, and lots of rabbits named after Dad’s western shows. There was Cheyenne, Sugarfoot, Maverick, Rowdy and Miss Kitty to name a few.
As for my newly departed pet, I found out several years later from my sister, that Mum marched up to my friend's home, and gave the little rat-child back to its mother, my friend’s mother that is. She apparently was not happy to get it back.
I wrote this story for our son, and I am very sorry I didn’t buy you a pet rat. We did, however, have Bridgette who was our sweet dog-fur-baby, and Big Al, (I don’t know where son got that name from). Big Al was a turtle rechristened Big Alice by son when she laid an egg. I called her Popsy on the quiet.
And coincidentally a mouse fell into a bucket in the garage found by son. With great pride he announced he had a pet. A few hours later on his return from school, I told him that his mummy missed it too. (I released it into the hills behind our house and asked it nicely not to come back.) Son was around the same age as I was when I had my 24-hour pet rat. He also was not very happy mouse-ling went home, but he understood. That's when we went to the pet store and bought Big Al/Big Alice/Popsy. Bridgette arrived a couple of years later. They were with us for many years and will never be forgotten. They brought us a lot of joy, many smiles, and even more tales I'll tell one day.
And that's the end of the story of my 24-hour pet rat.
