I was not up to doing last night’s post due to the fact that we lost my buddy Noir, my pet rabbit who thought he was my puppy, when we returned from San Diego, after a horrendous flight, which was no fault of Breeze airlines.  We arrived, hot, tired, sweaty, and ready to rest.  Did a little unpacking, spent some time with the bunnies, who all appeared fine and actually happy to see us, or their greens for the evening.  We get ready to relax and I notice that buddy boy is not breathing all that well and is actually frothing at the mouth while making a clicking noise with his teeth.  Of course, I freaked, picked him up, screamed for my wife to drive, and off we went to the Emergency Vet’s, where they know us or should by now.

As my wife drove, I held him close and stroked his fur and kept telling him he would be fine, right up till we arrived.  The staff took him back immediately to place him into an oxygen tent, which did appear to have an immediate effect.  We were waiting only about 30 minutes, when they finally able to talk to us and let us into the back to see him, and he was no longer frothing at the mouth, nor was he clicking his teeth, he was looking good.

We came home, sans Noir, and went to bed expecting we had gotten him there in time.  I even received a call around 2am saying Noir was doing well, he had what appeared to be an upper respiratory infection, x-rays looked good with no indication of GI Stasis, and they would call in the morning to discuss next steps.  Thirty minutes later, they called to say he had suddenly gone into cardiac arrest, just out of the blue, and passed, with the revive attempt a failure.

Just thinking about it still makes me tear up.

Next few days sucked, yadda, yadda.  But the worst was yet to come.  We went and picked up his body and brought it back so his bond Orson (she/her) could recognize that he was dead and would not look for him anymore.  We place the, well, body bag, on the floor and while the wife and I are bawling our eyes out, Orson comes up, sniffs, licks his fur, lays down beside Noir for a second and then she walks off, stomps real loud, and sits with her back to his body.

We are going to bury his body in the back yard after we have it cleared up a bit, you know, maybe start our own pet cemetery.

Well, that was his death, this is his life:

We picked up a tiny black lop-eared rabbit around 7 year’s ago past last St. Patrick’s day.  He chose us as he was the one to come up to my hand to be petted in the rabbit pen.  He fit comfortably in the palm of my hand.  Very smart, so damn easy to litter train, I should have worked on training him to do other things.  He would follow me every where I allowed him to go, he was always making sure he was near me when he could do so.  Many times when I sat on the floor, to pet him, he would jump up on my chest to lick my nose and eyebrows, trying to groom me, maybe in thanks for all the petting and grooming I loved to perform for him.

At the beginning of 2020 when I lost my best friend of 40 years and do to the inability to go anywhere, my wife and Noir were my support.  He could tell when I was down, which usually resulted in nose and face being licked or he would just snuggle into the crook of my arm or on my chest.  I spend a lot of time in my office, it is where I work and at the end of the day, relax.  And for the last 7 years, he was here for every moment of it.  Working from home can be lonely, so we had a lot of one sided conversations over the years, which still left me feeling better.  Nothing like having a confidant who cannot talk, either to spread a secret about or contradict you, he did have a harsh looking judgmental visage he would use from time to time.

Seven years of daily petting/grooming sessions, snuggling up together, getting my face licked and just having him around.  The way he would turn and look at me, like what now, when I was loud.  The fact that I could not play anything by the Gorillaz out loud, without him freaking out (harmonics we can’t hear maybe?)  The fact that he liked to sit on the window sill and watch the outside world.  Going to be hard to get used to his not being here, poor Orson has no idea what to do, her playmate, self-care assistant, and warm snuggle buddy is gone, so her answer so far is destruction of any paper products she can get ahold of.

I hope Noir was happy/content, I tried to give him a good life and to let him know he was loved and appreciated, and I think he knew.

May Lord Frith welcome him to the fields of plenty, where the shadows of the many enemies of rabbits will never fall.