Three Things: One Mouse, Another Mouse, and a Third Mouse

3/5/09 – 2am

There was more than one mouse. Tonight I came back to my cabin to find that the trap had taken its second victim. This one was smaller than the first. I think these guys might have been wet, because their feces were smeared on the cabinet bottom beneath the sink next to the trash can. It’s so gross. Despite the threat of my new trap’s fierce bite – a THIRD one was rustling in the trash can. I quickly closed the door. What do they eat when the cabins are empty? What do they eat in the wild and why don’t they do that right now? Like some aggravated cartoon character I quickly opened the cabinet door –placed a large salad bowl on top of the can – put three plates on top of the bowl, took the whole oversized mouse cage outside in the snow storm, and put two more logs on top of that. I expect by tomorrow mouse number three will be dead.

It is quite horrifying, really. I think these are the first mammals I’ve ever killed myself. I’ve eaten plenty, of course. Not mice! But the typical white and dark meats appropriate to our culture. I wonder exactly how many pigs and cows I’ve eaten by age 36? I’ve had rabbit before too. (Not more than once.) Also, some deer meat, buffalo, maybe kangaroo – but only at that weird meat bbq that my friends used to have. (There I ate alligator and beetles.) Weird.

I find it disturbing to observe that “the mouse annoyed me, so I killed it.” Now of course, the critters do carry diseases. And they are eating my food, well – I have the food safely tucked away, really they are only eating my trash—but STILL. I don’t want them crawling over the kitchen and shitting where I prepare my food. Or horror upon horrors, crawling over my face when I sleep. I’m not down with that.

It’s awful to see their feet stick out from the trap – the straight hairless tails– the trap’s plastic jaws clenched at the top of their spines - their dull grey eyes all buggy and bulging. How limp they drop into the creek where the current takes them away. It’s really quite awful to think that these little creatures were once scurrying about – enjoying a bit of olive, of avocado, inside a warm cabin in the otherwise desolate forests of eastern Oregon, and then I come along, and kill them. Who am I to do that? And when does it stop? Am I treading some fine line? Is this a gateway killing?

A part of me wishes we all grew up slaughtering our own food – that way this wouldn’t be quite so jarring. And I don’t mean, I want to go out and take up hunting. More like – if you want chicken – you ring its neck and pluck it yourself. Then this mouse-moment wouldn’t be much of a moment – just a par for the course – “I just say NO to the plague thankyouverymuch” – done with it. I wonder if Mr. Three is experiencing hypothermia yet? The trap is much kinder. I’d give it a benevolent quick death if I only knew how to do that without letting it go. Some would say I should capture then release it somewhere. Except that I’ve heard 2 or 3 miles is nothing to a mouse – and I don’t have a car here.

This is really stressing me out. I’m lying awake noting every creak and grown of the cabin – is that one? Is it scuttling? Is it close? When I stop obsessing on that I try to figure out the significance of the mouse motif in my spiritual-emotional world, and surprisingly – I’ve ACTUALLY come up with something. This is probably more a testament to the human species’ innate ability to create connections regardless of whether they exist or not, based on some neurological principal I have no intention of researching right now. But anyway, moving backward, these three mice are coming at a time when all these annoying thoughts are eking into my otherwise happy mind – residual anger left over from a bad relationship with a - I’m not even going to call him a boyfriend, shall we say psychic vampire? I am nigh on seven months out of it and am over the biggest shockers – but boy, am I still mad. And so the mice show up. Stick with me…

I’m also about twelve weeks out of a job that was a serious struggle from the get-go. I did good there, and I made some great friends – learned a LOT – and can sincerely say that the experience was very valuable. But it was a BEAST of a job that I kept trying to make work for me. The org had weak leadership; was completely disorganized (in the two years I was there I think they restructured the org chart like 3 times). There were mandatory week-long staff retreats - UGH – which featured naked co-workers, interpretative performances of our issue areas complete with cardboard Caribou antlers, and sharing circles. This job included some BIZZARE-even-on-office-sitcoms-would-this neuroticness -not-make-any-sense behavior; and basically it stressed me out like no other job has ever stressed me out. That said – I was also undergoing aforementioned relationship stress – and the two together proved a toxic combo that PLEASE GOD help me, I hope to never to create in my life again. So – what does this have to do with the mice? Well, to add insult to injury, the office was infested with the fu#@$ers, and mice feces on my desktop and key board welcomed me home from the holiday break. Once working late, in the office alone, the brazen bastard literally crawled over my feet. It made me livid.

The mice became a symbol of all the little annoying sh$#t I could not manage at that place, that never-the-less impacted my performance / success there. And the word in the office was that we needed to use HUMANE traps, out of respect for the vegans we worked with. I was GLEEFUL when HR not only contracted the exterminator on the sly, but when he actually took a few out. The schadenfreude was a bit more than one should feel, I think– the emotional reaction was not in proportion to the actual event.

Anyway – the third and final mouse encounter happened ten years ago, and that was also a major moment in my life. In my twenties – a man I’d fallen head over heels for turned out to NOT be the artist-in-residence at a cancer retreat center like he said he was, and subsequently proceeded to empty my bank account on a drug-induced bender that was allegedly to end in suicide. This catapulted me into a crisis of sorts (go figure) and I left both my job and apartment to stay with my family for a few months.

Once back in the saddle, still dealing with the residual anger and trauma to a certain extent, I went to get my boxes out of storage where a FAMILY of mice had nested and given birth in a box of my clothes. They’d chewed through some highly coveted art books, shoes etc. I literally had to shake out the little pink goblin-like-alien-babies from a lovely silk skirt. I sobbed hysterically. The mother-fuc#$#r in jail upon hearing this story (I’d visit him from time to time to glare, let him have it, and cry) told me not to blame the mice – they were only doing what came naturally. Apparently that was some analogy for him as well.

I’ve had nice boyfriends in case you were wondering –and GREAT jobs. But there are no mice even remotely connected to them. So, really mice have only appeared in my life –totem animals that they might be – in the relatively angriest of times. So how do I make my peace with the vermin? What do the mice have to teach me? Are they some indication that I’m gnawing on the debris of my life in a way that I shouldn’t? Are they teaching me how to dump someone in a body of water and not worry so much about it? I sure don’t know yet– but for now, I know what I’ve got for them – another glob of peanut butter and a snapped neck. Die, motherf*&$!!rs Die! Die!