Little Friend

While we're on the subject of furry friends, I made a new one this week in my very own apartment. While home alone, I saw a little brown dot scurrying in my peripheral vision. I flicked my head to see an adorable little mouse slowly making his way across my kitchen floor. It has been my experience in the past that once a mouse knows it's been spotted, it will run for cover immediately. This was not the case with my new little friend, who seemed unperturbed as I walked closer to him and watched him sniff the inside of my vacuum cleaner hose. This made me think he was either injured and unable to run away, or too hungry to be bothered with the threat of a giant shadowy figure looming overhead.

I grabbed a flower vase from the top of my cupboard, and crouched beside him. With a less than swift movement, I easily covered the mouse with the vase, careful to not set it atop of his fragile tail. Then I grabbed a flattened cereal box from my recycling bin, and slid it under the vase. I flipped it all over, trapping the mouse inside the vase. I grabbed a little hunk of mozzarella from my fridge and dropped it in. The mouse grabbed the cheese gratefully and began to nibble*. While he was placated, eating his cheese, I walked him down to the park and dropped him and his cheese nibblet in the grass. Goodbye little friend! I hope you have a successful life as a field mouse, rather than a house mouse!



*I realize this sentence embodies what Werner Hertzog would describe as the Disneyfication of animals. However, the look on his cute little face, coupled with the twitching of his whiskers as he gnawed through the cheesy morsel clearly expressed gratitude to me.