so... i got a fish.

here is how the world works in terms of facebook when posting things about your day.

me: I GOT A FISH! (eight people like this post.)

jonathan: write a blog about it. (a comment on this post.)

me: i already blogged today. (a comment on this post.)

jonathan: you make that seem like i care that you already blogged today. blog about it. (not a comment. but i know jonathan well enough to know that he thought this.)

i think if jonathan had his way, i would blog about everything all the time. and i would, jonathan, if i had time, the capacity, and if i thought people actually cared about my life.

but you, my dear reader, are obviously interested enough to be reading this, so hi. jonathan. i am blogging about getting my fish.

ahem. the tale begins as such.

at dinner in the campus cafeteria, i sit with a variety of colorful people and we all manage to squeeze ourselves around this impossibly small table between the pasta bar and the pizza bar. we're loud. we're obnoxious. we shout and scream because life is too short to just sit and eat dinner together. life is about expressing emotions.

we were currently crowing about amy possibly getting an illegal bunny and housing it in the science building. i then boasted about my pet cactus and was instantly run down with "that's not a real pet" "it doesn't move" and "emily, it's a CACTUS." 

i get that a lot. and i don't care what anybody says, atticus is my pet cactus, dammit. you cannot take that away from me.

anyway. 

i had been sitting on the idea of a fish for a while.

pets are kind of a sore subject with me, honestly. it's mostly because i've never truly had one. my brother had a gecko for like... thirteen years or something, and he was already old when we got him. when he ate crickets he thought he was a dinosaur (a blind one at that) and it was fairly entertaining, but mostly he just kind of... slept around in his cage and ate crickets. he got bonus points for being named harry like harry potter back when only the first three books had come out.

there are no pets in my household. there is a very specific reason for this: my mother and i are both highly allergic to fur.

i'm not sure if you quite understand what this means. so many people say things like, "oh but my dog is hypoallergenic. he doesn't shed."

that's all fine and dandy. but he still has fur that is attached to him and he still salivates. i'm allergic to both of those things, soft cuddly fur and nasty slimy saliva. whether your dog or cat sheds or not, i will be allergic to it. see, what happens is this.

1. my eyes get itchy.

2. my nose gets stuffed up.

3. my neck/throat region becomes unbearably itchy and i claw it and look like i've been attacked by a werewolf going for my jugular.

4. then i start having problems breathing.

5. and if i'm around the animal too much, well. asthma attacks are welcome.

this isn't just cats and dogs. this is cats and dogs and bunnies and hamsters and chinchillas and basically all household pets. and horses and buffalo and kangaroos and anything with fur. 95% of the animal population makes me asthmatic and red-eyed. the same goes for my mother.

so no, i've never had a real pet. 

so yes, i'd been sitting on the idea of getting a fish for a long time. like, three years.

jacob (the boyfriend, not the best friend) and i ventured to walmart after dinner to buy an air freshener. my bathroom smelled something terrible and it would not go away, no matter how many times i cleaned the toilet and the sink. so it was a routine five minute drive to walmart to get some air freshener.

about halfway through picking out what kind i wanted (one of those weird gel squares that smells like happy laundry) i said, "i want a fish."

jacob said, "huh?"

and i said, "i want a fish. and i want one NOW."

impulsive. the same way i bought my cello.

well. walmart didn't have fish. i was upset. we'd already looked at rocks and bowls and fish food, but did walmart have fish? absolutely not.

so i squared my shoulders and said, "we're going to mt. pleasant to get a fish. meijer has fish. come on."

and jacob said, "let's pay for your air freshener first. then we'll go."

this is love, folks. this is true love.

i used a scary self-checkout machine and then we were in my car and driving twenty miles on the highway to mt. pleasant. we sang very loudly to mumford and sons. i was getting excited and nervous. our routine fifteen minute trip was almost an hour long now, but the exit for mt. pleasant was coming, and i was absolutely shaking with excitement.

we located mejier after putting in the head and the heart and singing "CATS AND DOGS AND ROOSTER CALLS" at the top of our lungs and then we were parking my car, then we were walking, then we went inside meijer and i made a beeline straight for the fish.

everybody gets a beta fish. that was my original intention. i looked at the beta fish for a while, grew bored, and then looked at the big tank with lots of fish swimming around. there was a guide that alerted me as to which ones needed filters and had to be in tanks. i looked around and saw what was available to a broke wannabe teacher with pet issues.

and then i saw him.

he was the most perfect cutest little fish i'd ever seen. i pointed at the glass and stated like a spoiled five year old, "i want that one."

jacob wandered away to find an employee and i bent over with my hands on my knees, looking at my perfect little fish with my butt sticking out in the aisle. i was not leaving the damn store without my damn fish. 

and then the employee showed up and i implored emphatically that i wanted that specific one, that i had to have it, it was that one, right there, no right there in the back, oh yikes he looks afraid of that net-

and then i was holding him in a plastic bag and i could feel him swimming over my fingers.

thus the baby talk began.

picture this if you will. i am wandering around meijer in dress pants, red toms shoes, and a bright green cardigan with a big bow in my hair (a teachery outfit, as it were). my boyfriend, who is of an immense height with a nice head of curly hair, is walking next to me and looking at bowls. i am completely preoccupied with the bag that i am holding with the fish in it. jacob is asking things such as, "what kind of rocks do you want? river rocks or plastic pebbles? these are the cheapest, we should get these. what kind of bowl? what size? we need fish food too."

this is what's coming out of my mouth. "aren't you the cutest little fishy i've ever seen. awww you're so adorable. i am so glad i found you, are you all mine and i love you, i love you so much."

in that baby voice. you know that baby voice.

we eventually found rocks and fish food. but we did not find a fish bowl that was suitable for my perfect little fish. 

so we went back to walmart. jacob held the fish in his lap and i went on and on about how happy i was that i found the perfect fish, and then we sang more of the head and the heart, singing singing singing. and then when we got back to the fair town of alma, we went back to walmart to get a fish bowl from the clearance glass vase aisle.

in the parking lot i ran into megan. while walking inside, i excitedly screamed about how i'd bought the cutest fish and he was currently in a bag nestled in my coat in the passenger footwell of my car, and how i was so so excited and so so so happy.

she said what you are probably thinking: oooookay.

we found a fish bowl for ninety-seven cents. i actually think it was some sort of vase. i paid the cashier in exact change: four quarters and three pennies.

we got the fish bowl. we drove back to my dorm room. we ran upstairs and cleaned out the bowl and the river rocks. then we dumped my perfect little fish into the fish bowl, put him on my desk, and crooned at him for an hour.

currently, my fish does not have a name. i am terrified that i will name him the wrong thing, or worse, kill him. i have never had a true pet. but oh, do i love him so much.

jonathan morley: i just blogged about me getting a fish.

and thus my tale ends.

he is the absolute cutest.