Calmly walk into a room with a dog in it and she might wag her tail and come up to lick your hand. Calmly walk into a room with a cat in it and if you’re lucky, your existence might be acknowledged. Calmly walk into a room with an unprepared rabbit in it, and you might as well have leaped in, flailing your arms while blasting an airhorn and firing a machine gun.
Place your hand in front of a dogs nose and he’ll smell it and possibly let you pet him. Try the same thing with a cat and she might give you a few sniffs before she turns disdainfully away. Put you hand in front of a rabbit and you’ve entered a blind spot. He’ll sense you, growl, and either lunge or back up and run away.
How often do you think about the fact that the two most popular types of pets in the United States are predators, more accustomed to hunting than being hunted? Probably not at all until you adopt prey. It’s one of the first things you learn about rabbits when you become an owner. Websites, books, information packets, everything is peppered with the bolded warnings that rabbit are prey animals, and therefore not at all like the cool, confident, predatory pet you’re probably used to. You see this both in rabbits’ behavior, and in their painfully delicate bodies. They are surprisingly light for all their chubbiness. Their bones, especially their backbone, are fragile and easily crushed. They are like rodents, whose only purpose it would seem, is to provide nourishment for larger animals. Sadly, it’s become apparent that Rory knows his role in the world, and so he is always on, always aware in case the barking dogs and the shot guns have finally caught up with him.
What this means is that for the last three months, Ben and I have had to learn to become bunny people. I wake up every morning to my husband softly saying “Ok, Rory, I’m coming around the corner now,” as he enters the Living Room. When I was about 3 or 4, my grandparents made up the term “hiker’s walk” to teach me to raise my feet when I step instead of dragging my shoes. But, sadly, this habit is dying off in our household as Ben and I loudly scuff our way from room to room so that our little roommate knows where we are and whether we are about to turn a corner.
However, the most startling and life changing part of living with a prey animal is discovering how much time they spend being curious, comfortable, playful and even exuberant. Fear and hesitation aside, I’ve lived with few pets that displayed the kind of curiosity and excitement I see from Rory on a regular basis. Even as I write this, he’s been nudging my arm, walking across my computer (ex][-=po\ <this is from him), and settling down into a happy, purring (yes, rabbits purr) bunny puddle when I scratch his neck or massage his ears. Yesterday, he spent about a half an hour chasing me around the house, allowing himself a joyful and disorganized leap every few hops (I guess just because he was SO happy).
I watch Rory binky through the obstacle course he made himself, or attack a phone book and I think “How can you be so cheerful and determined knowing how much you have to be afraid of and how many obstacles are in your way?” and I hear the question echoing back to me. Whatever made me think that just because there are fears and obstacles, we shouldn’t be cheerful and determined?
And as I feel him ramming his head against my leg, arm, any part of me he can reach, in hopes of getting a goody, I think “How can you be so trusting, knowing how much I could hurt you?” and I hear him answer as he butts his head against my nose, “What a dumb question! How am I going to get any raisins if I don’t even try?!”