Hamster Heaven

I don’t like animals. I was the kid that was petrified of being bitten by a dog; scared stiff of being scratched by a cat, or paranoid about being pecked by a bird. My fear of animals has toned down, now that I’m a grown-up who’s trying to learn emuna. But I still don’t like them – they make a mess; they smell; they take a lot of time, effort and money to look after.
 
And if they are in your house, and you’re a Jew, that’s also a big problem, spiritually.
 
So it’s really nothing less than a miracle that my daughter managed to get me to agree to buying her a hamster.
 
I bought the first hamster two and a half years ago, and as rat-things go, it was actually quite cute. My daughter was going through a really tough time in school, and having the rat to cuddle and play with made her feel a bit better about it all.
 
But in my secret heart, from the first day I bought it, I was waiting for the thing to go to ‘hamster heaven’, so we could go back to being an animal-free household. Then, last year, a couple in our neighbourhood got divorced, and we were asked to take on their two hamsters – it was either us, or the rubbish bin, and I figured their kids were having a hard enough time as it was.
 
So suddenly, we became the proud owner of three hamsters – but the two newcomers were big, horrible, unfriendly things. I hated them on sight, and I started day-dreaming even more about ‘hamster heaven’.
 
Then, one hamster died – and my daughter was distraught. She arranged a prayer session for the hamster with her friends, and cried for about two days’ solid. I gulped. I prayed. I hoped that when the next one went, it would be a bit easier for her.
 
A few months later, ‘our’ hamster died – and my daughter took it very well. I was optimistic that once number three bit the dust, she’d be over it in a minute and ready to give the cage away to the next child with a rat addiction.
 
But I was wrong. When number three started to ail, she again took it very hard. She started saying tehillim for it every night (which kept it going for at least an extra five days…) and then, the ‘segula’ pendant that I’d been sent by Chut Shel Chesed disappeared from the kitchen – and reappeared next to the dying hamster.
 
I didn’t know what to do. On the one hand, I thought it was great that my daughter was praying, and making a spiritual effort, on the other hand, I couldn’t help but feel that it was all wasted on a rat…
 
But then, even despite the daily prayer vigils, the thing finally died Friday morning – and my daughter was absolutely distraught again. Crying floods of tears. I didn’t know what to do, but I could see that Shabbat was going to be tough.
 
I took myself off to a friend to get a bit of a break from all the wailing at home – and I came back with a hamster. It wasn’t planned. My friend’s son had bought two hamsters home from the pet store, and long story short, they now had 20+ running around.
 
My daughter was ecstatic to have one more. My friend was ecstatic to have one less. And me? Well, I was a bit perturbed by it all.
 
I was even more perturbed when my daughter came down a few days’ later to tell me that ‘Polly’ was looking fat, and had suddenly got very aggressive. O no! The only thing worse than a new hamster was a new, pregnant hamster.
 
I got into a foul mood, trying to work out what on earth I was going to do with 8 baby rats… I was cross with myself. I was cross with my daughter. I was a teeny bit cross with my friend.
 
And then, my husband reminded me that nothing happens for nothing – not even pregnant hamsters. I realized he was right, so I went to do some hitbodedut on it all – and G-d gave me some tremendous insights.
 
I have a tendency to take other people’s problems on as my own. When I hear someone is sick or suffering, it can affect me so strongly that it can even cause me to feel physically ill, or at the least, preoccupied and anxious.
 
This isn’t good for me, or my husband or my kids. I often spend so much time on other people’s problems, I don’t have the energy left to sort out myself and my family. I realized that the hamster was the embodiment of this negative trait of mine: I was so busy trying to ‘fix’ my daughter’s issue, and trying to ‘fix’ my neighbour’s problem, I’d imported a potentially enormous problem into my own home.
 
I realized something very profound: G-d is good. G-d is kind. G-d gives people all these seemingly difficult things to help them grow towards Him. He is certainly more merciful and compassionate than I could ever be. And my tendency to try and ‘fix’ other people’s problems was because I kept forgetting that.
 
The light bulb went on.
 
Then, another light bulb went on: G-d never intended hamsters to be domestic animals. They breed so prolifically because they are close to the bottom of the food chain when they are in the wild, where G-d intended them to live.
 
I suddenly realized: I am not more compassionate than G-d! It was ridiculous to even contemplate keeping the rats in our house. As soon as they were weaned, I was going to take them to the forest nearby, and let them go back to living their natural, G-d-intended life – however short it might be.
 
I came back from my hitbodedut feeling very calm and serene. My daughter heard the plan for any potential hamster babies – and accepted it 100%, with not even a small fuss or gripe (which is how I knew it really was advice from ‘Hamster Heaven’).
 
In the meantime, I resolved to try and keep a healthy distance from other people’s problems. I still care. I still pray for them. But I now understand that: 1) they are them, not me, and the test they are being given is exactly what they need, even if it’s hard to comprehend it; and 2) G-d is good. G-d is kind. G-d is far more compassionate than I am. And if G-d has decided that a particular person needs to suffer with a particular problem, then that is the best possible thing for them, and I don’t need to worry, agonize or stress over it too much.
 
As to the pregnant hamster…it was all a false alarm. Polly was just moody, not a mother-to-be. But the whole ‘Hamster Heaven’ episode helped me to work out some very important things. As my husband said, even a moody hamster can contain some very profound messages from Hashem – but only if you know to look for them.