Goodbye Nemo

Last week I started to notice that our beta fish was looking a little pale. I thought maybe he was cold or old or a combo of the two. A few times I noticed him hanging out in his bowl sort of catywompus (as PaPa would say). I would get his attention with a gentle nudge on his bowl and he would start swimming. Then finally the other day I came home from work and was getting supper ready when I reached for the fish food to feed our dear friend only to realize that his little grey body was resting peacefully on the bottom of the bowl. I just left him there for the time being not wanting to have to address it with the kids. I thought I had made it through the evening without anyone noticing when all of the sudden I see Cullen pulling a stool over to the counter for his daily fish feeding time. I rushed over to him as he was dragging the bowl towards him. He was looking for Nemo and kept repeating his normal request "I wanna feed the fish, I wanna feed Nemo". I grabbed the bowl and told him no and of course he cried. I told him Nemo couldn't eat right now. Thankfully Emerson's hearing is affected to the point where she didn't hear me and no questions were asked. After our normal bedtime routine I tucked the kids in and sauntered back to the kitchen where I knew I would have to address the bloated fish. In a very brave moment I poured the fish into the net, did a quick exam, why I don't really know? I guess I thought I was working for the fish CSI lab or something. No, there was no internal exam given! I wasn't about to fillet a beta fish the size of my finger. Anyway, I didn't know what to do with him and I actually briefly thought about putting him in a box and letting the kids bury him. Then I pulled from my own childhood experiences with fish deaths and remembered exactly what we did. . .send him to the big toilet bowl in the sky! Yes, I flushed Nemo! But just like the movie I told him "all drains lead to the ocean, go be free!" Not really, I actually just held my breath and flushed. The next morning rolled around and no mention of the fish. Whew, I thought I had dodged a bullet. Then after work we got home and about an hour went by and Emerson came up to me and asked:
"Where is my fish?"
Me: "huh?" complete avoidance, I thought this tactic might work
Emerson: "You know, my fish, the one named Nemo?" which means "duh, Mom, the same darn fish we've had for a year"
Me: hesitantly "well, Emerson, actually Nemo died"
Emerson: "What did you do with him?"
Me: "ummmm. . .(I was really searching for something but I'm not a good liar so I just said it) I flushed him down the potty" oddly enough I sort of chuckled, how morbid?! Maybe it was one of those "not supposed to laugh at death moments"?
Emerson: "You flushed him down the potty? Which one?" Not sure why that's important?
Me: "mine"
Emerson: "okay" she turns to walk away and chuckles and says as she's walking into the other room in her growny nonchalant way, "You should have just put him in the trash."

Lesson learned: Don't sweat the small stuff, just put it in the trash!