Zip, 2009(?) - 2011

"Dad, I think something's wrong with Zip," Cole told me last Sunday as we were getting ready to go to the symphony. "He's at the bottom of his tank, and his head looks funny." Unfortunately, Zip had passed on to the big fishtank in the sky.

Cole had taken pride in little Zip, who was a gift from Santa Claus almost exactly two years ago. He drew a "ZIP" sign that he kept in front of Zip's tank, and decorated his tank with a dinosaur carved out of stone, and a couple of special rocks.

Zip was put to his final resting place yesterday, under the crepe myrtle tree in our back yard near Goldie's grave (Grant has already picked out a plot for Valentiny Tim Tim, and even started digging it yesterday). Cole dug the hole, into which we put his paper clip box coffin. Grant kept hounding me to see Zip before we put him in, but Cole didn't want to see him. In fact, when I told him Zip was dead, he didn't want to go into his room until I took him out. I put a shroud over his tank until we were able to bury him.

Still, you'd think Cole would have been more sentimental about Zip, but no. We ended the ceremony by placing a rock that Cole picked out on top of Zip's grave. When I asked if anyone had any words to say, Cole just said, "He had a long life". That may be true, since the average life span of a betta is two to three years, and we don't know how old Zip was when he came to us. When asked if he was OK, Cole later told Mary, "That's OK, I'm not too sad. I know I can get another fish."


So long, Zip.