The Secret Life of Mr. Bubbles

Shortly after we moved in to the rental house we used while waiting for our home to be rebuilt, my friend Linda came to visit.  Linda is the Animal Control Officer in the neighboring community of Hurricane.  During that visit she sat and talked with my girls asking how they were doing.  They both expressed how sad they were that we had lost one dog, our cat, the turtles and fish in the fire.  Aunt Linda, as my kids call her, mentioned that she had a bird at the shelter that needed a home and so soon, Mr. Bubbles as Lela named him relocated to our living room.  I wrote about that time in our lives in a previous post, you can read by clicking here.

The first Mr. Bubbles in his pink cage.  Could he died of mortification due to such feminine housing?

About a month later, we had to have our other dog that had survived the fire, Dancer, put to sleep due to cancer.  (Read more here)  Needless to say, that was a very hard time for our children.  I was so grateful to have Mr. Bubbles and another dog, Daisy, we had received from a friend to help our children through that time.

On the Sunday morning following this latest bump, Rick and I woke up to our son Wil telling us that he thought Mr. Bubbles was dead.  Sure enough there was a blue parakeet laying in the bottom of the cage.  We knew that this was not a loss that our girls would be able to easily overcome following so close to the loss of Dancer.

What then proceeded was one of the greatest operations in history.  It may be said that it could rival many of the military operations from history.  While Wil kept the girls distracted in his bedroom watching movies and having breakfast, thus keeping them from the living room, Rick made a mad dash to Petco to acquire another blue parakeet and I stayed home to aid in the distraction and in case it all fell apart.

Upon returning home with bird in box, Rick told me there was a problem, the store only had female parakeets that were blue.  Thus began the great deception that has lasted for over two years - Mr. Bubbles was really Miss Bubbles.  I did tell Aunt Linda that if they day ever came that Mr. Bubbles began laying eggs, I was bringing the girls to her for an explanation.  Luckily, that never happened and except for a select few, no one ever knew that the bird was a different one than the one we received in those first weeks after the fire.

Mr. Bubbles (aka the other)  - When we moved to new digs, his (her) quarters improved as well.

The charade ended yesterday when Mr. Bubbles again passed away.  We are not sure what happened.  Within 10 minutes, he/she went from flying around the cage to lying on the bottom unmoving.  A friend asked me if the cat may have finally got her, but the funny thing about this bird was that she was friends with the cat.

Blink's favorite snoozing spot has been the top of the bird cage where she would put her tail in the bars and Mr. Bubbles would play with it just like she did her bell.  I had never seen Blink be aggressive towards Mr. Bubbles and any concerns I had about Blink accidentally hurting the bird were eliminated when we had Blink declawed.

Yesterday after all the children got home from school, we had a small funeral for Mr. Bubbles.  Lela even made him/her a headstone.  Later that evening, she commented how quiet the house was without Mr. Bubbles' chirping and ringing the bell.  She wondered if we could go to the pet store and purchase another bird.  I asked if she would want some finches or a something else and she said no.  It would need to be another blue parakeet and she was going to name it Mr. Bubbles II.  I said it would be more appropriate to be Mr. Bubbles III.  And so the story was out.  Jon did point out that since the second Mr. Bubbles really was a girl, that if we did purchase a male parakeet, Mr. Bubbles II really would be more appropriate.

Rest in Peace our dear bird - whatever name you want to go by.  You fulfilled your role valiantly and I am only sorry it wasn't longer. We will miss you.