What We Talk About When We Talk About Charlotte

We once owned a goldfish that wouldn’t die.

She was purchased at a fair in Tulsa by my loving parents who delivered her onto my lap in a plastic bag when picking up my daughter who had been staying with them one weekend.

“Oh...fun,” I had said, wondering what I had done in my pre-Jesus life to deserve holding a leaking bag of water on my lap for over an hour. Unfortunately, I didn’t have to think for too long.

Charlotte, as often happens, became my goldfish. Not that my daughter didn’t love her, take random selfies with her, or feed her whenever the mood struck, but ultimately, Charlotte became my charge.

The thing about Charlotte is that she was prone to trying to die. Not so much in a masochistic kind of way, just more in an exaggerated soap opera-y kind of way. For example, she couldn’t have just any type of water in her aquarium. She had to have either filtered water (from our fridge specifically) or mildly expensive bottled water. Case-in-point: whenever we’d drive back to Tulsa to stay with my parents, we’d bring Charlotte along (which meant more time with a wet lap, but seriously, if you knew the person I was before Jesus got to me, then you’d conclude this was certainly a fair test in patience), which meant having to change out the water in her travel aquarium when we got there.

This is where I learned she’d only inhabit “special” water because as soon as I tried to fill up her small tank with water from my mother’s fridge, there she’d go all dying on us. She’d do this thing where her eyes would start to glaze over, and she’d take her time floating belly up to the absolute horror of one child, four adults, one great-grandmother, and an insane standard poodle who couldn’t take the emotional turmoil of the humans around her (my parents have a penchant for insane standard poodles who can’t take the emotional turmoil of the humans around them. They also like gifting people with live animals).

Fortunately, my mother had mildly expensive bottled water and we got to waste roughly five hundred dollars and several pounds of plastic to save one dramatic goldfish.

The next time(s) she tried to die always involved my lunch hour. I’d get off of work, thankful to live so close to my job that I could go home and enjoy a nice pleasant lunch in my own kitchen, drying out the work sweat in my blouse, and wondering what sort of horrible things I used to do pre-Jesus that landed me in the testing ground of a debt collections call center that was more insane than my parents’ standard poodle.

And then I’d remember.

So I’d stroll into the kitchen, super excited to eat something stupid like broccoli because I used to think healthiness was next to godliness (it’s not...that’s cheese), and there she’d be with one eye open, waiting for me to step onto to the linoleum where I once laid down a hot pot of boiling water that I had in my hands because I was trying to defend myself against a scam call (we still have the brown, round indent which I will miss whenever we replace the flooring). As soon as I’d make an entrance, she would start to go belly up, slow, real slow, closing both eyes and giving off an air of, “Well, I guess this is it.” I’d then spend the remainder of my lunch hour praying over her, changing out her water, and remembering all those times I drunkenly prank-dialed unsuspecting strangers.

This still seemed fair.

But the most horrifying time Charlotte didn’t die was one particular time when she was in her bowl that wasn’t covered. I came home from work (really craving that fresh broccoli...I literally can hardly write this sentence), when I discovered her on the counter, slightly dried out and glued to the formica.

She was dead. Absolutely and completely.

Except for the fact that she wasn’t because I cried to Jesus, asking Him to intercede like He did with Lazarus as I splashed her with fresh emergency bottled water that I had begrudgingly bought in the case that she would indeed finally try to die on us for good.

Once wet and unstuck from the counter (which still gives me PTSD), I then put her in a fresh bowl of water, placed something on the top of her bowl so she wouldn’t try this again (even though she was still pretty seemingly dead), and waited as her body slowly but surely twitched its way back to life.

I naturally assumed this was a once-in-a-lifetime kind of miracle (until I Googled it and apparently goldfish have a knack for dying and then coming back to life. What is wrong with these animals??). But regardless, Charlotte’s short life span (she did eventually die...for good) taught me a lot.

God’s not done until God’s done. And even when it looks like your life is dried out, stuck to the counter, and the only way you’ll ever be revived is by somebody else’s hand and not your own, He comes and changes the water unexpectedly, unbeknownst to you. And then there you feel it, the shock of life in your arms, your legs, in your heart, and the very mind that tried to tell you all along that you’re gone for good.

But you’re not dead, friend. You, like Charlotte, are very much alive (well, except for right now because she’s not anymore but you get my drift).

Keep going, and I will too.