In a People House

I just finished cleaning and sanitizing all the cupboards.  We had a mouse.  Construction on a house in the lot next to us may have displaced it.  OR maybe it just wanted a warmer place to live.  We've had mice before - at our old, old house.  I was always completely disgusted cleaning up after it.

This year's mouse was different.  In the few days the mouse shared a house with us, I grew pretty attached to him.  I think the mouse reminded me of our late pet bunny (named Bunny).  I always venomously denied any bunny-mouse resemblance when my brother teased me about Bunny.

I was up late one night reading and I heard the mouse scratching the wall.  Oh wow!  It sounded exactly like Bunny!  That was Bunny's favorite thing to do besides sleeping!!  Bunnies have the softest fur ever.  When a bunny likes you, she hops in circles around you. Bunny was my first real pet (B Rabbit's, too).  We picked her out together.  She was the only bunny that playfully hopped away instead of just sitting there and looking around.

The mouse was young and full of energy.  He was also scared to death of the kids.  He stayed mostly upstairs under my bathroom cupboards during the day.  At night he'd sneak down and eat in the kitchen and then explore.  He had a healthy sense of when to stay completely hidden.  I only saw him once....and that was after I'd been quietly typing on my computer for over an hour.  After that, I'd stomp around the kitchen every hour (after the kids had gone to bed) so he'd know to stay away.

As a child, one of my favorite books was 'The Ghost in the Attic'.  It's about a friendly ghost who gets lonely when the people go on vacation for a whole month.  A mouse moves in and the ghost is thrilled.  But the mouse has no sense of right and wrong.  The ghost tries to get him to behave, but the mouse won't listen.  The people come home to a big mess.  Finally the ghost yells at the mouse and everyone is very sad.  Then the mouse listens to the ghost and learns how to live with the people without making them want to catch him.  The ghost is happy again and starts rattling chains in the attic because that's what ghosts do.  The people hear the chains and joke with each other about their ghost in the attic.  Everyone lives happily ever after.

I told Strong Bear we could keep it as a pet if the mouse would just learn to be potty trained.  After all, they don't make diapers small enough for a mouse.  Strong Bear did his best to negotiate this deal.  The mouse failed to agree to our terms.

When the time came, I disposed of the mouse properly. (Seraph was in the hospital during this mouse incident - whew).  Haqon was at work when I found the mouse.  I felt sad.  It looked so cute - all brown on top and white underneath. That was Bunny's coloring, too. It almost looked like a toy.

I wish mice weren't so yucky. I kinda miss him.