Jacob is Gone

It’s a really sad morning here at our house. Little Joshua came running into our bedroom this morning crying because he’d tried to take Jacob, our family’s ferret, out of his cage and something was wrong. Jacob had tried to get out of the cage sometime in the middle of the night and got caught in the door and suffocated. The space was too small for him to escape and I guess he was just determined not to go back in. He did that a lot. He could wiggle out of just about anything, under anything, and between anything.

Some people won’t understand this, but I just wanted to take a moment to honor him here and remember him.  I don’t even like ferrets… I’ve never seen one before that I cared anything for, but this little guy was different from the very first day Hannah brought him home. He was a rescue from the Stanly County Humane Society and when Hannah saw him over the summer she had to bring him home. My first thought was “Great, another pet” but it didn’t last long.

All you had to do was see this little guy in action and you fell in love with him. He played with the humans, the cats, the dogs. Yeah, he even held his own every day playing with my 50 pound dog. Every time I let the dog inside the house, she trots to Jacob’s room to see if he’s in his cage or out and about. If he’s out, she goes looking to play with him. In all the time we had him he never bit anyone, hurt anything, damaged any furniture, or anything else. He was a perfect addition to our little family. We let him out of his cage for entire days, sometimes even all night. He just hung out with the family, laid under the coffee table. He’d even gotten in the habit of trying to follow you into the shower. If you weren’t careful he’d pull back the shower curtain and jump in to wash himself off then tear off through the house like a little madman trying to get the scent of soap off him. He was the coolest little pet I’ve ever had.

He’s gone now and our lives are the worse for it, but our lives are better for having had him as a part of the family, even for only a little while.  He made all of us smile every single day we shared with him.

My Christian beliefs don’t really say much about animals, but I believe that God has plenty of room in all of Heaven’s space for special little friends, so I choose to believe he’s up there entertaining other kids and families and that I’ll see him again one day.

Goodbye little buddy. I’m really really going to miss you.