It was in the middle of the annual Cherry Blossom's Invitational Ice Skating
Competition when I was paged for an urgent call.  Whiskey, a 3-1/2 year old,
was in distress, something was wrong.  I called the vet and rushed home to
fetch him.  Surgery was indicated and I returned to the competition after
being assured all would be well.  My husband would pick him up.  Some hours
later - another call - Whiskey had succumbed to anesthesia shock.  And my
family nearly succumbed to the shock of his sudden loss.  This was the first
ferret we lost and our grief was hard.  This was also back in the days when
anesthesia for ferrets was risky business.
 
Within a short time, we set off the the pet store to look at some baby
ferrets.  My children were not dealing with the loss too well.  I still
remember my daughter, Amanda, and I sitting on the floor with laps filled
with kits.  We just could not decide.  Finally, we settled on two little
dark babies, a male and a female, which were named Dusk and Dawn before we
arrived home.  Today they would be called black sables, and their color was
the darkness seen at dusk before the moon rises and that quiet still
darkness when the moon goes to cover in the early hours of dawn before the
sun starts to rise.
 
Both kits settled in fairly quickly and both were blessed with gentleness
and joyful playfulness.  I cannot remember ever being nipped, not even once,
by either Dusk or Dawn.  Dawn was a quiet even tempered ferret with a pretty
face and a soft black coat.  It was not too long before she started sleeping
with me.  It was always the same.  Lights out.  Dawn would touch her nose to
my face, I would lift the covers and she would settle in near the small of
my back.  She had the type of personality, even as a kit, that I call and
"old soul" or a "gentle soul" - this is a ferret who likes to be petted and
held, is very responsive to you and displays a gentle spirit that you have
to see, or have a ferret like this, to know.
 
Ah, the years slip by so quickly.  Our first ferret was acquired when my
youngest was in first grade.  She is now a junior in college.  As time went
by, the ferrets fell more and more to my responsibility and - I don't know
how this happened - but our numbers seemed to just sort of increase as the
years went by.  "How much more trouble can one more ferret be?" I cannot
tell you how many times I've said this over the years.  We entered into a
period of tremendous luck, I now know, because we went many, many years
before we had another problem or another loss.  In fact, all of our original
Marshall Farms ferrets - except for Whiskey - lived to be very old.
 
The seasons and the populations changed, but Dawn was always my "even keel"
ferret.  She got along with everyone.  All the ferrets that came after her,
loved her.  And we did too.  She was my sweetheart girl, and a constant
companion.  She seemed happy just to be close and was sweet and gentle and
loving.  And she was never ill.  The only time she was sick was when she had
ECE three years ago.  As our older ones gradually left us, Dawn remained
much the same, not showing her age, and maintaining constant monitoring of
all the "doings" in our house.  The only problem she ever had was the
dreadful testosterone poisoned hobs who, for some reason, liked to hit on
her.  A squeal and I would be there to "save her" from the bad guy.  The
only time she was upset was when some thieving ferret would find one of her
beloved toys and steal it away.  She would patiently return it to her hiding
place, sometimes repeating this over and over until the thief would give up.
 
This has been a very busy season for us with kits arriving at steady
intervals since March.  Our last litter and late season arrivals were born a
week and a half ago.  It was at this time, that I noticed Dawn seemed a bit
frail and has lost a bit of weight.  I could not find anything in particular
wrong - but knew something was going on.  I endeavored to build her up a
bit, and suspected several possibilities as to what it could be.  She
rallied slightly, but by last week, started to become very thin, despite the
added supplements and everything I was doing to help her.  Last week I went
down with bronchitis, and she spent her time snuggled next to me.  By this
time, I was palpating a small abdominal mass.  And she was starting to
dehydrate when I slept or left her for any period of time.  Over the
weekend, the mass increased greatly in size and she lost interest in food -
only taking it hand fed and I know to please me.
 
Ah, this is tough.  Today I took her to the vet, along with a big hob, just
in case a transfusion was needed.  She had become very pale over the last
few days.  No go.  She had a large renal tumor and I had to make the
decision to let her go with grace and dignity.  I have always felt that if
you truly love your pets, you will not keep them alive for yourself when
there is no hope.  And I have always felt that his responsibility is part of
what we must accept for the love and joy they have blessed us with.  We must
fight for them when there is hope - a let them go, no matter how much we
want them to stay, when there is no hope.  Oh, but God, how it hurts.  I
held my little Dawny close to me for a long time and talked to her - silly
baby and love talk and told her over and over how much I loved her.  But
what heart she had through to the end.  After sedation, it took a couple of
injections before she left -- she was responding to my voice.  Finally, I
hushed her to sleep.  And sent her on to be with Frisky, Shadow, Dusk, Zoe
and Sweet Hart; and admonished her to wait for me there.  Right now I
remember her with tears and I grieve.  But she was blessed with a long life
and we were blessed by the privilege of her sharing her life with us.  On
the way to the vet, I played the sound track from "The Last of the Mohicans"
and this seemed somehow appropriate, for in a way she was the last of the
Mohicans - those earlier Marhsall Farm's ferrets that we could expect to
have a longer life.
 
Dawn will never truly be gone.  I will carry her forever in my heart. And so
she will live for me. Go with God, my precious Dawn. Until we meet again.
 Rest well my sweet one.
                                          Dawn
                                Jan. 1987-Aug 20, l996
[Posted in FML issue 1667]