"Once a King in Narnia, always a King in Narnia. But don't go trying to use the same route twice. Indeed, don't try to get there at all. It'll happen when you're not looking for it." - C.S. Lewis
Chase and I have been working through our grief after losing Brisby on Sunday. The loss of our first bunny Gideon was traumatic and painful, but when Gideon passed, we still had Brisby. We were still bunny parents. Still in this special period of life that began 9 years ago. One friend gone, but one that linked us to her. We worried Brisby would be unable to cope with the loss of her sister, who was her link to us. The baby of the family, who’d always had two parents and a big sister. What a huge shift in her tiny world.
To our relief, Brisby became more adventurous than she had been in years. She'd lost much of her sight at a young age from e. cuniculi and depended on Gideon for companionship and guidance. Without her, Brisby was forced to venture out of her hutch which she did more frequently as the months passed, and I'm grateful for that. I’m grateful for the last 14 months we had with her. Grateful that she had the chance to evolve and let her little light shine. We had planned on going to Europe last May, which was canceled due to the pandemic. Two weeks we unknowingly got back with her. We usually travel home for the holidays, but stayed home this year, avoiding several long drives she didn’t have to suffer. We were home every day to open her door in the morning and only put her to bed late at night… Of all the silver that could line a global pandemic, I’m grateful for the time and peace it gave Brisby.
Time moves quickly. Last Saturday I was sleeping outside of Brisby’s house, giving her water from a q-tip and praying through tears, her unsteady body leaning hard into my touch. There was so much uncertainty. So much hope drowning in stress. Today, she’s gone. Our living room is free of the incessant hay and void of a huge presence. It feels like we’ve been catapulted into a new chapter of life. As though we flipped to the end and realized that we were on the last two pages. At that point, there was no way of setting the book down. We were forced to finish the story and leave the world we had been living in for the last decade.
I read the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe for the first time a few months ago. I sobbed when they returned home, children again. The people they had become, shut away behind the solid wood backing of the wardrobe, forced to move on with their lives. Our little Narnia has left with Brisby. We are now forced to fill the spaces in our home that she used to occupy, and attempt to do the same with the spaces in our hearts. We must forge on, into the next part, and pray to never forget the people we were when they were with us.
