Nothing More Beautiful: Where's my fish?

The Life and Times of Ronaldiago Weasley Cox-Gentry

On the sixteenth day of October, in the year 2010, two roommates, Debra and Katelyn, found themselves bored on a Saturday night with nothing to do. Desperate for some more companionship since their roommates were elsewhere with their own families, the two lonelies decided to go to Wal-Mart and buy a fish. Upon arriving at the pet section of the store, Debra and Katelyn were immediately drawn to two types of fish that happened to be listed as good tank mates for each other. One was an Oranda; the other was a Black Moor. Being lovers of fish, literature, and good corny jokes, Debra and Katelyn decided to get the Black Moor fish and name him Othello. They knew not the name-to-be of the Oranda, but would decide after some time.

These fish had what the girls thought to be personality, but in reality, the fish were just broken. Othello's head was too heavy for the rest of his body, so he often flipped his fins as if he were backpedaling to keep his head upright. The other fish, who was livelily following the girls' fingers in the store, started playing dead as soon as they got in the car to ride home. It was as if, once removed from the tank, his life was devoid of purpose and he had no desire to smile, as it were, at their fishy games. Katelyn also noticed that this fish, who was all white with the exception of an orange spot on its head, had a little hole at the base of his dorsal fin, just a fraction of an inch from the front. It was decided, based on both his coloring and that hole in his fin, which could serve as a convenient wand-holder, that this fish would be named Ronald Weasley.

It was not even two days later when tused-to-be-lonelies realized that Ronald was back to his playful self, swimming all over the tank, albeit backward and sideways more than forward. But wait! Where was Othello? Alas, he had sunk to the bottom of the bowl, head down in the rocks, with the rest of his body pointing toward the surface.

It was then that the girls recognized Ronald's previous weirdness as nothing other than a symptom of his frenzied thoughts of premeditated murder. Ronald had, in fact, killed Othello, which caused his owners to re-think his name. The fish's namesake would never have committed such a cruel act. He needed a name that better fit his harsh personality and heinous crimes. Thus he was renamed "Iago."

After some time, the girls forgot about Iago's temper and forgave him for his offenses. They decided his full name should still reflect both sides of his personality, so he was then called "Ronaldiago" (in a very Spanish accent, with the rolled "r" and everything).

Ronaldiago lived a long life (at least, compared to his 2-day bowl buddy) and overcame many hardships, including an accidental 10-day fast over Christmas break. Regardless of the low room temperature and the lack of food, as soon as his owner returned from celebrating the Christmas holiday with her family out of state, Ronaldiago perked up and swam around the bowl. He ate his food and became a happy fish once again.

Fast forward approximately 6 months. On the morning of the tenth of June, in the year 2011, Ronaldiago started to fade. He could only swim on his side, and couldn't make it up to the top to eat the food that was given him. His owners thought he wouldn't make it through the day; they kept asking him, "Ya dead?" and when he wasn't (but acted like he was), they decided he deserved just one additional name before his life ran out. And so it was that the fish became Ronaldiago Weasley "Sanka" Cox-Gentry. He passed away late that night/early the next morning, after a hard-fought battle to reach the top of the bowl. His owners had been watching Seven Pounds. They wrote a beautiful eulogy for him in the form of a song, the lyrics of which I will share at this time:

Bye, bye, Ronald Weasley just died.

Named him "Sanka" 'cause he sunk-a

When he swam on his side.

When we woke up this morning, he was barely alive,

Singing, "This'll be the day that I die!

This'll be the day that I die!"

And so it was that the fish departed. Katelyn and Debra were the only two present at the intimate, beautiful service, which consisted of a slow saunter to the toilet, accompanied by the playing of Taps by Katelyn's nose-harmonica. It was the saddest toilet flush of their lives, but both knew that there would be other fish in the sea (or fishbowl . . . and probably toilet bowl too) some day.