The year I quit my job and started my own freelance business. My guinea pigs, Melissa and Peotr, started a new life, too. One bleak December morning I became a grandmother to four lively, chirping, curious little balls of fluff.
Working out of my home, I had a front-row seat at the blessed event. With her teeth, Melissa matter-of-factly plucked out the furry miniature piggies one by one, licked them clean and inspected each of the newcomers.
Within minutes of their birth each of the tiny creatures showed a distinct personality and totally individual approach to the world. In no time they were up and about, exploring their surroundings and playing with each other. In less than a month, they'd learned the essentials of being a guinea pig - where food came from (the refrigerator), when it arrived (whenever I opened the fridge door), and what my function in the universe was (to feed them). They rewarded me for my anticipated services with wildly excited squeaks and chirps. The singing of hungry guinea pigs, for those who've never experienced it, is the single most cheerful sound in the universe.
Between meals the piggies got into mischief doing the things piggies do - arguing with siblings, annoying Mom and Dad, testing the limits of their cages and sleeping - pretty much like human adolescents. Each sib had his or her special place in the family structure. The brothers engaged in some spirited rough-housing, but their rumblings and posturings were mostly practice for bigger things to come.
From Day One, it was obvious that Sean was the dominant male. The spitting image of his Dad, he was just waiting for his chance to challenge the Big Guy. That inevitable moment came unexpectedly when Sean, hoping to re-join the females in their neighboring cage, scaled his cage wall. Unfortunately his sense of direction wasn't as keen as his amorous yearnings, and he landed right in the lion's den, so to speak.
If I'd doubted Sean's ferocious strength, his bite made a convincing argument. The hand I'd inserted into the swirling mass of orange fur to extract the wayward Romeo came back with Sean firmly attached, dangling by his teeth. They may have been designed for munching grasses, but they were pretty darn effective as weapons.
Francois, the runt of the litter, had one major goal in life - to avoid Sean. High-strung but affectionate, he exuded an air of quiet dignity when he wasn't running for cover. The day I separated the males into cages around the females' central space was a great moment for Francois. Free of his tormentor, his personality blossomed and he exploited the opportunity to flirt openly with Becky through the bars of his cage.
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