Leapin' Lizards: The brief story of Bindi

As I mentioned before, two weeks ago, Evie got a lizard for her birthday. She had been asking, begging really, for a lizard for at least a month before that, claiming that she wanted one more than anything. She was willing to help pay for it with her allowance. She would clean the cage, feed it, play with it daily. She just really, really wanted one. She needed a lizard. Please, please, pleeeeeaaassse. And so, Bindi the lizard came to live with us.

Then, the next day, Evie decided that she actually didn't want a pet lizard.

To be fair, it was probably partly my fault. I let her hold Bindi on the way home from picking her up. Evie was so excited about her new pet and the lizard actually even looked a little bit sweet lying there on Evie's shirt, so I decided that it sounded like a good idea for her to bond with her on the ride home. It wasn't until we were driving down the highway, with the girls squished together in one seat to make room for the lizard cage, and with the lizard UNDER THE BRAKE that i realized that, um, it was really a bad, bad, bad idea. Evie started screaming, then I started screaming and pretty soon you could no longer hear Michael Jackon singing Beat It for the 50th time that day. After an initial moment of freaking out, I fortunately came to my senses, put on the hazards, pulled the car over and pulled the emergency brake, avoiding the choice between a car crash or squashing Bindi.

While all safely walked away from the Bindi brake incident, Evie's relationship with her was forever altered. After Evie put her in the cage for the rest of the ride home, she decided that she pretty much never wanted to have her out of the cage again. She was scared Bindi would run away. I apologized for my mistake of letting her hold her in the car, explained that escaping in the house wouldn't be such a big deal, and watched as Toby worked with her on feeling comfortable about holding Bindi again. Still, she said she didn't want to play with her out of the cage anymore. And so, as we drove to the pet store to buy more crickets, I started wondering exactly what was the point of having a lizard.

But you know what? Sometimes life just has a way of working itself out. The next day at the gym, I ran into a friend who told me that she was just thinking of us because the night before she'd been looking for bearded dragons on Craig's List. I'm not sure if a thought bubble and lightbulb actually appeared over my head, but suddenly I found myself telling her to wait a few days before buying a lizard. When I told my idea to Evie at home, she became teary, explaining that she really loved Bindi, but then decided on her own that giving her away would be the right choice for everyone.

Today, we brought Bindi to her new home. Her new owner was a lizard last year for Halloween. (Actually a robot lizard, but that's being technical.) He took Bindi out and held her as soon as we brought her over. His mom, who is not squeamish at all about lizards, is taking her to the vet tomorrow for a check up. I can confidently say she is in a better place.

And so, we are back to being a family of two parents, three kids, and a cat. We're less exotic than we were this morning, but I have to say, I kind of like us that way.