Okay…so I am an animal lover in a BIG FAT WAY. We have eight dogs. Only because we found homes for two others, we used to have ten. People dump their dogs off in our little cove on the lake. There is a private boat ramp that affords sneaky prigs the chance to throw scrawny, unkempt animals out of their Dodge darts before heading back home to eat the raccoon they killed that used to live under their porch. So we pick them up, dust them off and fall in love with them. We try to find homes for them…some stay.

I am a bird lover. I adore my little squirrels. I have feeders for both in the front yard. At Christmas time, I splurged and got them special food so they would know there really is a Santa Clause. Sometimes I just walk around the neighborhood and yell out “Come to my house, you don’t have to struggle in life! I’ll feed you! I’ll leave you strings and sparkly things to feather your nest with!”

I sit down by the lake and wait on my birds. Herons, egrets, hawks, a bald eagle or two, those funky buzzards and if the world is in perfect order….pelicans.

I leave bowls of food in random places for cats with no homes. There was a possum family under my porch and my dogs were chasing one of the little ones. They were grounded to the house for the duration of the possum family’s stay.

I love animals.

I even love mice.

Kendall had several pet mice when he was little. They don’t scare me…they can startle me. Especially when one runs across the top of my feet.

I have lived here for six and a half years. We have caught two mice. Two. In SIX years.

And then this year….ELEVEN so far!! My husband thinks it’s because all the other animals I feed put out the word that I was a sucker for a furry face.

Unfortunately, there are little mouse bb’s all over my house. I mean, not any more, I cleaned it all up. BUT, I have to keep cleaning it up.

Ten mice ago, my husband put his foot down and said we had to catch some mice.

I tearfully agreed on several conditions.

1. I didn’t have to clear out the traps.

2. I didn’t want to see it. Hear about it. Talk about it. Nothing!

3. If we caught one and he wasn’t at home or asleep, I could stay in another room until he was available to dispose of it.

4. I am allowed to cry for the mice.

So……

Everything was going as planned. For us, not the mice. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly. It was being handled. Horribly, in my opinion, but handled none the less.

Until today.

I decided to make a cup of hot tea. My throat has been a bit peckish and I needed some nice hot tea and honey. I walked over to the stove to put the kettle on and……there was a mouse on the trap.

I lost my mind and ran out of the kitchen hollering, stirring the dogs into a barking frenzy. Shushing the dogs and trying not to completely flip out, I decided I would just suffer through, tea-less…………And then it made a sound. Not a good sound. A bad sound…..

Holy crap. It was alive. Stuck. Suffering. CRAP! What was I going to do now?

I paced the kitchen and dining room floors for several minutes. What was I going to do??? I couldn’t leave it there! It was crying. I was crying. A frigging mouse was stuck to what amounted to a giant maxi pad. Trying not to vomit, I made the decision to end the poor thing’s misery. There was no hope for him. His whole body was super-glued to a sheet pan of death.

I gingerly picked the little guy up, soothingly telling him that I was eternally sorry for this precarious situation I was a party to and I swore on my mother’s grave that no other mouse would suffer in this way, His torture would not be in vain. Saint Sorrel of Mouseisi. A martyr for all vermin everywhere. (My Mom’s not dead, btw, but I was hysterical)

Although I am being a bit flippant, I am seriously upset about this. To me, this is no different than if I would have found a kitten stuck to this death trap. NO MORE.

I gingerly brought him over to the trash can, him making squeaky little noises of distress. I am not even kidding. By this time I am full out Scarlet O’Hara bawling.

I have to do something with him now. I decided the quickest way to end his anguish is to just step on him. So I lay the trap down on my hard wood kitchen floor and mash the Fraggle Rock out of him. I am trying not to throw up, I have snot running down my face and I am hiccuping because I have been crying so hard.

I stand there a moment and try to regain my composure. Sighing, I reach down to pick the trap up so I can do away with it. I actually thought about burying him, but it’s seventeen degrees outside and the ground is frozen solid. And what does it matter now?? I have ended his life, his soul is gone. So into the trash he goes.

The trap is stuck.

It is stuck to my floor.

The whole thing.

It’s like someone duck-taped this atrocious contraption to my floor. I pick and prod at it. Sobbing again. I finally get hold of each corner and start to peel it up off of my hardwood. I can see the mouse, the sound that this is making….. I am trying not to pass out. I am right by our basement stairs! If I fall out, down I go. With a gut wrenching yank, I get the trap up. Most of it. The poor mouse is up but there are bits of sticky trap stuck to my floor. Martha Stewart would pass out if she could see this.

This has been a traumatic day for me. I am exhausted. I had such high hopes for today. Then I murdered an innocent creature. I have no words. I mean, except for all of these I just typed out. I am spent. I have no intention of even getting out of my pajamas today. I have picked up all the other sticky traps in the house and thrown them in with the graveyard that my trash can has become.

If you have mice, be kind.

Oh no…..

I can hear him…..

Or is this the Tell Tale Heart?

I may be going mad…….

squeak