If You Give a Mouse a House

This morning, it was unmistakable. As I came downstairs and walked through the living room, the rustling sound coming from the woodpile beside the fireplace told me: it’s still here. Our latest mouse, I mean. Steve made a valiant effort to catch it, but as Steve moved the wood, our tiny friend skedaddled across the room and under the sofa. We are having company tonight, and I can only hope little Mickey (or Minnie) makes him (or her) self scarce during dinner. But there’s no guarantee, alas. At any moment this evening we may be treated to a flash of fur zooming from here to there. If any of our guests are reading this, apologies in advance!

Not sure what we’re doing wrong. We’ve set multiple traps all over the house, filled with a gourmet extravaganza for rodents—cheese, peanut butter, chocolate. While once in a while the traps are sprung, often both goodies and mousie have disappeared by the time we check. Mind you, in the past we’ve only had these pesky visitors a few times a year, so it was no big deal—until recently, when the word apparently got out that our home was a perfect Mouse B&BLD (bed and breakfast, lunch and dinner). At that point we called an exterminator, who found their hiding spots and sealed up places they’ve been using for entrance from outdoors. That seemed to do the trick, for a while. But we once again have been invaded by at least one mouse, and I fear it is not alone.

Our neighbors also have mouse challenges; I know it’s not just us. But I am a bit amused at the evolution of my attitude since childhood. Back in the day, one of my favorite books was Stuart Little, E.B. White’s classic about a dapper mouse in search of his bird friend Margalo. Of course, the Disney mice were adorable, if a little weird with their human clothes and voices. I never had a pet mouse, but knew kids who did, and I thought they were precious. Now, as a New York City girl I well knew the difference between mouse and rat. The latter always terrified me when I’d spy the occasional one in an alley or by a garbage can—and for good reason: they are huge, filthy disease carriers. But at some point, I transferred my terror to the harmless, miniscule field mouse, and I became the cliché’: leaping onto a chair when I’d see one.

I know things could be much worse: giant roaches, scorpions, carpenter ants. We humans sometimes have to share our living spaces with a wide variety of unwelcome pests, and if I had to choose a plague on my house, I guess I’d prefer mice to other yucky alternatives. So tonight, I will read Aiden If You Give a Mouse a Cookie before he goes to bed, and remind myself that all God’s critters, indeed, even our resident varmint, have a place in the choir.