There once was a hamster named James. He lived a miserable life inside a cage, inside a 13 by 10 foot room, inside an un-air-conditioned dorm, inside a small suburb inside the southern part of Denver. His cage was rarely cleaned; He slept in his own pellet shit, ate rotting crumbs of bread, drank his own piss, and attempted to walk on his long-broken hamster wheel. One day, when James’s owner, Joe, had left the room, James executed a meticulously planned escape and disappeared into the Colorado night. When Joe returned from classes that day, he noticed James was not in his cage and entered a state of panic. On the verge of tears, Joe phoned his friend, Stephen, and explained the situation. Together, they searched for James in trashcans, toilets, beds, clothes hampers, drinking fountains, and even dorm food, but they didn’t find James. Thirty days after the abused fur ball disappeared, Joe and Stephen deemed him dead; they held a funeral three days later in Oakwood Cemetery. Stephen even made a miniature gravestone out of bar of Dove soap. The caption read: “Here lies the lost spirit of a dear friend. May his soul find everlasting peace in hamster heaven.”
A couple weeks passed, and Joe and Stephen were playing NHL 11 when Stephen saw something scurry across the floor. Joe saw this same figure running about the room; it stopped dead in its tracks. The mysterious blob was James. He was standing on his two hind legs and was holding a tazer the size of his rodent being in his paws. Joe bent down to greet his long lost pet and stuck out his hand to stroke James’s fur. Bad idea. James tazed Joe in the eye, disintegrating his rodent abusing brain in the process. Next, James pursued the screaming Stephen. He stretched out his tazer-weilding paws and electrocuted poor Stephan’s right foot. Stephen’s unconscious body lost balance and fell upon the tazer-weiling fur ball with a crunch and an explosion that resembled a tomato hitting a brick wall. No more James.
I thought that this was a very creative piece. I especially liked the description that was used when setting up the scenery for the hamster’s conditions, it made me feel really bad for him and I could relate to why he would want to escape. I thought it was interesting that the hamster, James was so abused yet they owners were very upset, searched for him, and eventually held a funeral for him once he had gone missing. It made me question why they had neglected him in the first place. Not only why did they neglect him, but was it just cleanliness that they lacked or did they completely ignore him. I thought it might make more sense if even though they didn’t provide him with adequate living arrangements they still appreciated him which is why they had the response they did when he went missing. As far as the hamster coming back with a tazer I found this part amusing and at the same time where did he get the tazer? Why a tazer? Why did he want to take revenge on them? What purpose was this revenge serving for him? Also, I think that it would have been interesting to tell the story from the perspective for James the hamster that way you could see where he was coming from and possibly answer some of these questions.
ReplyDeleteThis piece made me laugh, I really enjoyed the image of some kind of scorned hamster holding a taser. The funeral thing is probably a bit out of context with how they treated James before his escape, I think if you changed that part to continue James' perspective pertaining to his escape and finding the taser. It would also be interesting if James stalked Stephen first, and Joe had some "idea" of what was coming, would increase the tension, but it would also give some room for some more laughs. Otherwise there is an interesting question about college students and pets, and how horrible that life can be.
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