Sometimes it is the smallest of things that lays us low. Even the bravest person, someone willing and able to fight the good fight against difficult, if not impossible odds, can find himself at the mercy of something no larger than, say, a mouse. Or a bat.
Mice are rodents, bats are mammals; both have the ability to utterly creep out roughly 80 percent of the adult human population living on this planet.
Why? I’m not sure. I am a member of the 20 percent that do not get it. Neither bats nor mice hold any sort of emotional or psychological terror for me. I’m not scared of something whose life I can legally end with a tennis racket or well-placed boot heel.
Not that I would. I don’t kill bats or mice if I can help it.
At my old house in Lakeview, I was frequently visited by both. The bats I caught in a fishing net and released into the cemetery on the north end of town. The mice became playthings (briefly, after which they became snacks) for the two resident Siamese cats. This was kind of a shame, but ultimately, the mice were uninvited guests and knew the risks. And it gave the cats something to do with their otherwise meaningless lives.
Some folks consider mice and bats to be the terrorists of the animal kingdom, disgusting little disease-ridden vermin no better than snakes or Republicans. (Kidding, kidding, kidding! No angry letters, please! Some of my best friends are snakes.)
At any rate, I genuinely feel sorry for those who suffer from acute chiroptophobia or musophobia, which, as everyone knows, is the fear of chiropractors and mustaches. I mean, bats and mice.
I have seen grown men (my editor, Scoop, for one) run squealing from a house, sounding very much like the bats they’re running from. Now, if a manly-man like Scoop can be that intimidated by a 3-inch long rodent (sorry, mammal), it’s little wonder my girlfriend, Sweet Annie, flipped out when she discovered mice had invaded her previously vermin-free home.
By all accounts, Annie’s home should not have mice. It is only a few years old, for one thing. It was ridiculously expensive. It is located in a fancy-schmancy, private community in Ada, where — according to the Ada Chamber of Commerce — mice are not allowed without a special permit and the proper documentation filed in triplicate at the mayor’s office.
The few mice in Ada have good jobs and are required to carry proper I.D. at all times.
So when a half-dozen renegade rodents turned up at Annie’s house and invaded her treasured and closely-guarded industrial-sized bag of M&Ms, things got ugly fast.
Annie’s first response was wholesale terror; she spent two nights at my place, afraid to sleep in her own bed. But Annie comes from hardy, Irish stock and never runs from a fight, at least not for long.
Like any good general, Annie strategized her attack with care and deliberation. She went online and researched the topic; she read first-person accounts from others who had experienced similar mousy incursions. If she had been able to capture a mouse alive, she would have water-boarded him in an effort to learn his plans and vulnerabilities.
On the topic of mice, Annie went to a very, very dark place.
When she returned home, she went armed to the teeth; poisons, traps of varying sizes and types, baits, sprays, and something with a label claiming to be the rodent equivalent of Sarin gas. I couldn’t believe she’d been able to purchase all this stuff without attracting the attention of Homeland Security.
In the end, Annie prevailed. Her mice were captured and summarily executed, one by one; no trial, no last meal, no chance to tell their side of the story.
One might think Annie now rests easy at night, but this is not the case. She remains vigilant, like Poland in the years immediately following World War II.
The sanctity of her home has been violated once, and it will be a long time before she again feels completely secure.
I’m guessing the mice who managed to escape her wrath feel much the same.
mtaylor@staffordmediasolutions.com
(616) 548-8273
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