Hickory Dickory Dock….Angelina Ballerina…Mickey…Three Blind Mice. Mice are abundant and as children, we look at their cute fuzzy faces and quivering whiskers with delight.
I remember more than one spring, at my family’s cottage in South-western Ontario, where we found nests of baby mice in the engine of our garden tractor. As we cleaned them out, separating babies from parents, my brother and I took great delight in trying to keep those little mice alive. We fed them with milk from bottle droppers and stroked them lovingly. We were never successful, but boy did we try.
Living out in the country, as we did, it was all but impossible to keep mice out of the house entirely. I didn’t see it, but my Dad tells a wonderful story of walking into the family room one Christmas Eve and discovering a little mouse sitting among all the presents under the brightly lit tree. I wonder if he (or she?) was waiting for Santa Claus?!
When my own children were small, I was very involved with their co-operative preschool. As I was speaking with other volunteers in the kitchen one morning, we saw a mouse and trapped it in a cupboard. I’ve never been squeamish about mice, so I was sent to get rid of it. I scooped it up into a mason jar and used aluminum foil for a lid, puncturing it with just enough tiny holes for the terrified creature to breathe. Because, you see, I’d had an idea. I so enjoyed taking care of those cottage mice that I thought this generation, who as city dwellers, had probably had never seen a mouse up close, might like to see this one before I set it free in the little wooded area behind the school.
So off I trundled to the first of two classrooms where the wonderful teacher thought this was marvelous. The children all gathered around and quietly waited their chance to see the mouse face to face. It didn’t go quite that way in the second classroom. The teacher wasn’t thrilled with the new addition to her classroom, and was less than enthusiastic about this unexpected show-and-tell. But she put on her game face and let the kids take a look – even if she stayed away.
When you buy a house, the first year is always one of “discovery”. There have been a few as the first weeks and months have gone by. And this fall, as the temperatures plummeted at my new house, I discovered new tenants moving in – none of whom were planning on paying rent. Funny how these four-legged little creatures with their twitchy little noses seemed far less cute when they were planning to freeload chez moi. Fortunately, it appears we caught it early and by plugging up a few potential entrances (and perhaps a little chemical help we won’t speak of), we’ve managed to convince there is no room left at the inn.
Birds, on the other hand, we’re inviting into the neighbourhood – so long as they stay outside. We’ve put up a bird feeder and have been entertained by ruby red cardinals, bright blue jays, black and white juncos, cheeky little chickadees and more. But of course, that means bird food, which is a good stand-in for mouse food.
I just hope we don’t have our own Christmas mouse this year!
