Dear Jada,

Spring is starting in earnest, you weird little animal.

The winter-to-summer transition always evoked my guilt about keeping you in a cage despite your daily romps outside of it, during which you mainly worked on your Domestic Annihilation Project (DAP).

Animal displaying spoils of Domestic Annihilation Project, December 2016.

Luckily for us, the DAP was contained within the living room, because although you were free to roam a few hours a day, your self-imposed domain was defined by the ancient beige carpeting found therein. Of course you would inspect the End of Your Universe, sniffing at the thresholds to the foyer and kitchen, but you’d never set so much as one paw upon those unwelcoming hard tile floors.

That said, I had a lot of respect for the way you endeavored to eat the entire living room. You made real progress on the carpet and the amount of the desk you consumed was surely formindable.

During the peak of your DAP, I deemed you a “loincloth-eating terrorist” and that was no exaggeration; I wrote about your exploits back in 2014:

Sometimes the bunny makes out with the house protectors. We have two in the living room. Thankfully they are positioned such that they cannot see each other so they don't know about the bunny's promiscuity.

She has eaten both of their loincloths and most of the hair on the one that has hair.

I'd call the Humiliation and Sexual Enslaving of the House Protectors the bunny's greatest exploit.

Do you remember growling at me? You had a pretty fierce growl considering you were a dwarf bunny, weighing in at just about two pounds. I once even caught you snoring.

Nonetheless, during those times I was alone in the house, with the kid at school and the Goat at work, you were my secret confidant. Whenever my article wasn’t coming together or I was sick of paying bills, or I just couldn’t face transcribing the last half of an endless interview, I’d visit you. I’d lay flat on my belly with my chin in my palms and talk to you.

Who is the bunny? Who is the pretty girl? I’d say in my ridiculous bunnyspeak.

You’re better off in there. You don’t want to go outside. You’ve got hay and yummy pellets in there, I’d explain as you chewed your grass indifferently. No vrooming cars or coyotes—especially coyotes. You might be a terrible beast, but you never EVER want to meet one of those guys.

Eventually, you stopped hopping up on the leather couch, which was already dotted with holes that were the exact shape and size of your jaw. Your daily energetic bounding from the cage for play time evolved into a careful climb. Then you stopped leaving your cage all together.

Within a few days of that development, I was sipping coffee on a cold dark January morning and a frantic rustling rose amid your grass and hay.

I stood over your cage in horror as you thrashed, not sure what to do. Then as quickly as your violent rustling started, it stopped. For a brief moment you stood upright on your hind legs with your front paws curled tightly before you. Then you fell over and died.

I touched my fingertip to your fur as the last wisp of your sweet bunny spirit drifted away.

Oh Jada, I cried and cried and cried as I covered you with a tea towel and called the Goat with the terrible news. That was 2017.

Jessie and Jada, October 2015

Was your death the most responsible exit I could have shepherded? I honestly don’t know how I could have gotten you to a vet and a proper diagnosis in time to save you from the death throes and that cartoonish end. Maybe I should have taken you to the vet in the days before your demise when you were lethargic, but peaceful and still eating a bit. You just didn’t seem ready.

At least she died at home. I tell myself.

The simple fact is, when we brought you into this house, it was up to us to care for you to the best of our abilities regardless of how much carpet you ate and how many pieces of furniture you vanquished. I could never have imagined hurting you, much less eliminating you (and that deeply unfortunate news item is why you’ve been on my mind), but if there was a better way to send you over the rainbow bridge, my sweet little animal, I am sorry I didn’t find it.

We loved you and I think you loved us as best as a bunny can love a set of humans. I miss you every day.

Love, Erin

---

ps: When Jessie named you Jada, I wasn’t so sure about it. Now I can’t imagine you any other way.

pps: The Bunny Barn is always my favorite stop whenever we go to a county fair.

Bunny Fabulon, various Ohio county fairs

ppps: None of those bunnies—not even the prize-winning ones—could hold a candle to you.

Not one of them.