And Then They Were Gone

I had a bit of a fright yesterday.

It actually started the night before when Warren and I 

were discussing the need to check on Mikey's chinchillas.

You see Mikey has moved out and into an apartment 

with some friends from work.

What this means is that he left the chinchillas here while he 

worked to find a home for them.

Well, it turns out that they had a bigger piece of his heart

than he had realized and rather than give them to 

either of the two interested people he attempted to work it 

out so that he could take them with him.

That hadn't happened yet.

He needed a special cage and for that he needed money.

I have to say that he has been very faithful to come back 

and play with the critters, feed and water them and 

generally take very excellent care even from a distance.

However, 

yesterday it had been a few days and I was a bit 

uncertain of what I would find upon entering his room.

You see,

these two are amazing escape artists.

They have gotten out so many times that I kind of 

figured they would be on the loose and
I would have to figure out a way to get them back.

Well, that or dead.

I don't have any idea how long chinchillas

can go without food and water.

It hadn't been that long but I just didn't want 

to be the one that found them if the worst case happened.

I gingerly opened the door.

No scampering within the cage.

They always come to greet you.

This wasn't good.

I walked over and peeked into their favorite 

sleeping spots.

Nope!

Now my heart is beating faster and I turn to peruse the room.

When Mikey left he didn't take a whole pile of blankets

and comforters.  

They remain in a pile on the floor.

I figured if I was a chinchilla maybe I would have burrowed 

into that pile.

So, I carefully lifted them up.

No chinchillas.

Then my eyes rested on something that 

totally freaked me out.

There was a round hole in the wall down 

by the baseboard.

It was big enough for chinchillas.

Then I remembered that one of the dogs 

had gone spastic barking at nothing just a little 

earlier.  Of course we were upstairs when that 

happened but I was now picturing two curious

and hungry chinchillas parading through our walls.

Left to their own devices

Chinchillas are quite destructive

 so I had this image

in my head of them chewing every wire they came across

and then dying in the walls and smelling up the house.

Poor Mikey.

He was going to be devastated.

Sometime at about this point in my panic

I noticed that what had been blocking the cage door

shut was completely gone and the door was 

hanging wide open.

Wait a minute.

Could it be?

Maybe Mikey came and took them.
But when?

Surely if he had been here I would have known.

I checked the window.

It was locked.

He didn't pull that old climb in and out the window trick.

I hadn't seen him all day.

How could this be?

So I called Warren and asked him to find Mikey at work.

I had to know.

(Isn't it convenient that all of the 

kids work "with" Warren?)

Sure enough.

Mikey had moved his chinchillas to his new home

and they were happy as could be.

All of this had happened the night before while

Warren and I were practicing music with Pastor Mike.

Before we returned home Mom had picked up 

Jonathan for his overnight shift.

Jonathan was the only one in our house who knew

that Mikey had taken the chinchillas and by the time he 

got home from work yesterday morning it didn't occur to 

him that I might want to know that piece of information 

so he just went to bed without mentioning it.

Now, 

I know this is a big long story about "nothing".

Except that it isn't.

You see, 

If I hadn't been dreading what I was afraid I would 

find in that room I would have been a lot more logical.

As Michael told Warren,

he had taken the food bowl, 

the water dispenser and their wheel.

It was perfectly empty in the cage.

They would not have pulled all of those things into 

the wall to start their own little city.

But because I had dread of a worst case scenario

my mind created one.

From now on this will be a reminder to me

to stay positive.

You tend to see what you expect to see.

Although in my defense I could have imagined

happy, full tummied chinchillas in there 

and that wouldn't have been the case either.

lol

I wonder how long it will take me 

to take over that room........

now that they are gone!