I've always been grateful to the people who posted to the FML about
their mistakes and accidents.  I've never been one of the people who
believe "it could never happen to me," so I've taken every warning about
dishwashers, doors, recliners, dryers, etc., very seriously.  That didn't
protect Jackson, though, and I lost the most perfect ferret I have every
known.
 
I'd been having a terrible time.  Two events so distressing and confusing
that I could barely begin to process them had happened within 4 days of
each other.  I was still shaking and exhausted the evening after the
second event when I did some laundry.  I was in a hurry, and I thought I
was being efficient and handling things pretty well, all things
considered.  Hours later I found Jackson in the dryer.
 
He was truly the perfect ferret, and I told him so every day.  I often
thanked God for giving me a little guy like him.  Much as I have loved
every one of my ferrets, Jackson seemed like a reward for all the bites
and poop and bickering over the years.  (He was perfect in the litter
department, too.) He was a silver, with those beautiful triangular-shaped
dark eyes.  He was my test ferret.  When we moved and I was setting up
the new ferret room, all I had to do was sit for 10 minutes and watch
Jackson to see where the weak spots in my ferret proofing were.  He was
so smart.  He loved to cuddle as much as he loved to play, and everyone
who visited fell in love with him.  When Martin was dying recently of
cardiomyopathy, Jackson would wrap himself around him for 5 or 10 minutes
to comfort him when he was making his rounds.  He always joined me this
way when I was giving Reiki to Martin.
 
Jackson came from the SPCA, where the employees loved to carry him around
because he was such a dear.  They sent him home with a little teddy bear
he had become attached to, and he always took the best care of it.  It
lived in one particular hammock, and Jackson checked up on Teddy whenever
he had been sleeping for a long time.  On rare occasions (because I
didn't want to upset him) I would put Jackson's Teddy on the floor just
to enjoy how adorable his response was.  He would sniff Teddy, run to
the hammock to confirm his worst suspicions, run back to Teddy, and carry
him arduously through the three connected cages to his hammock.  Then he
would sling Teddy up on the hammock.  What happened next was the part
that grabbed my heart.  He put his front paws on the hammock, slid his
head under Teddy, and gave a deep sigh as he absorbed the Teddy Love
through the top of his head.  He was just a sweet guy in every way.  When
my daughter had to give me her two ferrets, and Francis was making them
miserably unwelcome, Jackson just took them in as if they were old
friends.
 
Trying to comfort me, my husband said that I was the last person he
would think such an accidental death could happen to.  I checked and
double checked everything.  I changed floor cleaners.  I nagged him about
opening doors, wearing shoes around the ferrets, etc., etc.  I was so
very, very careful.  I'm not saying this as an excuse, because I am
still too far from forgiving myself.  I'm saying this as another warning
in addition to Check Your Dryer.  I'm saying that we should be doubly
careful and not trust ourselves to think normally when we are stressed
and exhausted.  Just like we know when we have to be especially attentive
while we drive, we need to be especially conscious and careful with our
ferrets when life seems out of control.  This was the hardest lesson I
have ever learned with an animal.  I can only hope that my confessing it
to all of you may save a ferret life someday.
[Posted in FML issue 4560]