An Innocent Question

An innocent question, from a 9 year old opened the floodgates today. We were discussing animals and a boy asked, "What does put to sleep mean?" Well, I got through the story about our second German Shepherd, Maverick, and how he got hip dysplasia and after much talk, we decided to put him to sleep. And, I told the kidlets about when a horse breaks its leg, sometimes they have to be put to sleep. And, I told them about how I found Beauty that morning last June and she was already dead in her corral and one little girl asked, "Are you going to cry?" Cry? Me? Oh, gosh, YES! I bawled. In front of my class. I just couldn't stop! It got deathly quiet and somebody brought me a kleenex. They were deathly silent (NONE of them even got out of their seats and this is the class that got 4 referrals on Friday!) Okay, so I'm human. Now the secret is out! Two of my former students, now 6th graders, brought me cards for Teacher Appreciation Day and one wrote, "I know how much you miss Beauty and I'm so sorry for your loss." That card, I didn't read until after school and I was okay with it. But, from the mouth of a little third grader, a simple and innocent question got me bawling. Let's just say, we didn't get much of our math lesson done this afternoon and double digit multiplication will have to wait a day. Photos are of Beauty. Beauty was one of my two feedlot rescues, and was an untrained two year old when I got her from a rescue that rescued (rehabbed) horses on slaughter-bound feedlots. Beauty... 2004(?) - June 25, 2009. RIP my wonderful girl! The cause of her death is still unexplained and as best we can guess, she got cast in her corral, hit her head on one of the metal pipes, and instantly died. I found her the next morning.