It was one of those slow summer Sunday afternoons. Our newly wedded daughter Bethany and her best friend Gitta were hanging out with us for the afternoon since Beth’s new husband Will was out of town for the week.
The two girls were stretched out, relaxing in the family room. Rod and I had just climbed the stairs to our room, looking forward to some reading, perhaps even a catnap that comes so easily when a warm Oregon breeze curls through the window and caresses your face.
The mood was quickly broken by Bethany’s call, “Dad, come quick!” The tone of her voice clearly conveying a note of urgency that indicated immanent crisis, such as when a total stranger forces his way through your front door, only to sprawl on your entryway in a puddle of his own blood.
Heart racing, I followed Rod down the stairs expecting the worst but knowing we had no choice but to face whatever lay ahead and do whatever we could to help.
We looked where the two girls were pointing. There in the middle of the hardwood floor a tiny little pink fleshed creature bathed in the afternoon light of the patio doors, writhing about on his back, making squeaking noises much too loud for his size.
Our grey tabby cat Tofie had just brought in a baby something, and dropped it, meowing loudly to get the girls’ attention.
Rod picked it up and carried it out to the raised wall, placing it among the flowers and strode back in.
“What did you do with it?” I asked. He told me where he had put it.
With the little cries echoing in my head I went out to see the hairless body lying in the cold wet soil, lifting its head feebly, eyes sealed tight yet searching with all its might for whatever comfort it had so recently known. Thrust into a world of cold bright lights and sounds, it struggled against massive odds to find again that warm secure place, its cries now weaker, mouth gaping, it seemed to be losing hope as the cold earth sucked out what little warmth remained in its body.
I haven’t had a lot of luck saving the little creatures brought in by the cat. Be it fledgling bird or baby rodent, pretty much any creature the cat brings to your attention to is going to die soon, if not from obvious puncture wounds, then internal bleeding.
My code of ethics is that I can give them a peaceful, un-tortured death, so I scooped up the creature, found a little cardboard box and some tissue, put him in it, and left him out in the garage to die in peace. I assured the girls that I would check on him, but his chances were not good. Before bed I looked again and was relieved to see him lying there on the tissue motionless. I looked for respirations but the little body was stone still. I thought, “as peaceful a death as could be under the circumstances.” I told the girls of his demise. We all slept better knowing he died with some sense of dignity and comfort.
The next morning on my way to get into the car for work, I thought I would dispose of the body. I opened the box to verify the death, knowing now that the body would be stiff and cold, easier to dispose of in that state, the delicate little features frozen, limbs contorted and bent.
I was startled to see the little limbs move ever so slowly. Somehow the creature had made it through the night without heat or food. Upon opening the box, his hope seemed to renew and he struggled to crawl toward me. Call it maternal instinct, but this “baby” was struggling to live like any other little creature. The drive to live was still beating in a heart that refused to give up if there was someone or something that might lend it what it needed, it would still grasp at that survival. A weak cry escaped from the little pink mouth, perfectly formed pink lips parted with each peep.
Its sheer drive to live demanded something of me.
Now what!? How do you save a baby mouse? If you succeed, what do you do with a mouse? I went on to work trying to decide what to do.
His chances weren’t good even with my best efforts, and if he did survive, then what? A pet mouse in the house of empty nesters? Maybe my son in law Will would take him for his 2nd and 3rd grade class room next fall. Perhaps I could get him well enough to be on his own and let him go in the field at the end of the street. Maybe it would give him the fighting chance that some awful circumstance had cheated him of.
I still thought he would probably die, but the girls and I did some research on the internet and found out that baby rodents can be fed diluted infant formula. The trick is getting it down them. Gitta and I went to the pet store later in the day and bought a tiny bottle but the nipple was too big. I knew I had a pointed syringe for dental care that might allow me to administer tiny drops. Bethany ordered supplies, she even had some tiny nipples over-nighted in her zeal. This mouse had allies!
Yet, I still kept thinking, “why?” We set traps for the adult mice, we have cats to keep down the rodent population. How could I justify trying to save a mouse even if it was a baby? The girls were persistent. Rod was doubtful, but he has lived with us long enough to know better than to try and talk us out of such crusades once the cause has possessed us--in this case a tiny, hairless, cause who would need a name if we were to give ourselves to him. Timmy.
And so the daunting task began. The first hurdle was how to keep him in his bed between feedings. After finding him outside his basket lying cold and still on tables and tile counters between feedings, I finally commandeered a teeth whitening box with plastic ends that fit securely, cutting air holes in the top and side, then adding soft flannel and cotton in the bottom. This kept the little bugger in but I soon realized that much like a preemie baby, these little mammals have no way to keep their body temperature stable without the aggregate warmth of the bigger mother and siblings to snuggle with. Even secured in his box, his body temperature would plunge between feedings and I would have to warm him up before he had the strength or energy for food. Any heat source I put near him had to be ever so gentle with the option of him getting away from it should it be too warm.
The first couple of rice and bean bags I warmed in the microwave oven overwhelmed him and sent him into some kind of seizure-like activity, even though by human standards they were just cozy. I knew it was just right when after a feeding, he would go over to the warm side of his box and curl up in a tight little “c’ shape against the warmth and go right to sleep…the only problem being that the warmth would not last until the next feeding.
The internet said not only would he need small feedings (define small?) as often as every 2 -3hrs, but also I would have to stimulate him to relieve himself of waste before each feeding by stroking his genitalia as many mother mammals do by licking their young.
At first we thought maybe this was some kind of sick joke but other websites verified this so I settled on q tips and warm water for this task and usually had a little success, (again define success on a creature so tiny!)
The feedings themselves were tedious. The pointed syringe worked the best but did not lend itself to being very gentle on the tiny pink lips which eagerly mouthed the hard tip but with no strength to suck out the milk. Even the slightest push on the plunger would strangle him. Once or twice the formula would come back out his nostrils as I struggled to hold him just firmly enough to direct the milk in his mouth while not injuring him.
You would think that between being alternately chilled to the bone and sometimes “water boarded” that the little blind creature would hide anytime I came near, so it was to my surprise after a few feedings to find him sitting up, waiting quietly for me to open his box lid, and then quickly scrambling up my hand and rooting at the base of my fingers for something to suckle.
It became apparent after a while that he had learned to discern my voice and anticipate the opening of his little habitat. You could almost see a quiet “intelligence” as he waited for that lid to come off and fingers to descend for a gentle lift to yet another massage and chow time.
My friend Carol happened to be over that week and after hearing I was feeding a baby mouse she wanted to see him. I opened his box and gently extended my fingertips. They were met with tiny pink skinned “hands” that grabbed on for a skitter up.
I just caught the look of alarm that passed over my friend’s face, maybe a slight recoil of her body when it occurred to me that I had just let a mouse run up my hand--a mouse that in a few hours had sprouted a silky grey velvet coat just like the creatures that despite their size and lack of malice, often put us women into a screaming panic, causing us to climb chairs or find any higher ground until we are sure the “threat” is dealt with.
I thought, “What has changed? Why is it ok for THIS mouse to run up my hand but any other mouse would have run ME up a chair?
I studied Carol…who had stepped back a bit….eyeing the mouse with less curiosity now and more fear….suddenly I realized the power such creatures give boys who use their familiarity with outdoor insects and reptiles to torment and overpower girls.
Carol was poising herself now to make a run for it should I lose control of Timmy, her eyes fixed on his silky grey body while her peripheral vision searched for higher ground or doorways should this “villain” escape my grasp.
How had this happened?…one moment I am the hysterical woman running from one of the most helpless creatures that God created, yet now, at this season, acting as a surrogate mother?
I realized that the difference was two things: empathy and familiarity.
Empathy had captured me in the first place when he was crying, cold, lost, and helpless, in a world that I knew would show him no kindness or mercy, rather pitiless torture--torture that would cause him to welcome death. A death that would come not at his command, but when cruelty was done with him and he had served the purpose of whatever predator or element claimed him first.
Something in our human psyche abhors that aspect of life here on earth…each of us seeing ourselves or those we care about often the victim of this “fallen” version of what God originally created to work in harmony and beauty.
Familiarity was more gradual…a learned thing that happens as we “get close” to that which we fear, close enough to see the perfections of God’s design and the similarities we share.
As I would feed him, I would marvel at his perfectly formed pink lips and tiny red tongue. I didn’t need a magnifying glass to know that every feature of his body, including his internal organs were just as complicated and amazing as my own. I watched in fascination how he would stop feeding to wipe a droplet of milk from his face, smoothing each whisker, eyes still sealed tight. After feeding, the little pink hands and opposing thumb would carefully groom his face and head, smoothing each silky facial hair.
Thus began a difficult responsibility of feeding an orphaned infant that desperately needed the twenty four hour attention, feeding, and warmth of his better suited mammal mother, but who now had transferred that dependency to me…an intelligent and sympathetic human, but one lacking the facilities to meet the needs of even such a humble yet marvelous creature.
The 2 am and 5 am feedings began to wear on me. I would stumble out of bed at the sound of the alarm and become irritated, but compassion would fill me as I reached in and felt how lethargic and cool his little body had become.
I railed at myself inwardly for not being able to come up with a more consistent temperature for his environment which would have almost necessitated putting him against my own skin. I knew that if I ever succumbed to that measure I would have to admit that I had indeed become some kind of dreaded “rat woman” who kept vermin alive between her breasts. I vowed to never cross that line!
Then a few nights later it happened. I stumbled into the bathroom in the wee hours. His cool body was outside the protective bedding as usual, but this time as I warmed him in my hand he didn’t respond as before. He lifted his head weakly towards the syringe but not with the same vigor. I thought if I could just get a little down him and warm him up, maybe he was just sleepy like me.
The next feeding I knew something was wrong. He had no energy at all.
In vain I drizzled the milk in his mouth only to have it come out his nose.
A fear and actual grief gripped my chest…not unlike the kind that happens when you realize that important people in your life are slipping away and there is nothing you can do to stop it.
There is something humbling about such times, whether the loss be a human or animal. It is the moment you realize that you and often no one else can stop the cascading effects of death.
It is the panic of feeling somehow responsible for a death, or the empty ache of being helpless to prevent it.
I cannot truly compare this humble rodent’s demise to the death of my two brothers or any of the four parents we recently lost in just one 7 year period.
Yet, as I watched the soft little chest struggle to expand, my own recently buried helplessness and panic tore through my chest, snapping free all the emotional bandages that held at bay the raw pain of attending a loved one’s death. Once again I was watching someone or something dear fall through thin air from a cliff’s edge after desperately trying to pull them back to safety.
I could not run away from those feelings as long as I held such a poignant reminder so I sat up in bed during those wee hours, unable to toss aside my little patient to suffer those last throes of death without warmth and touch.
Tears coursed down my cheeks as I watched the life ebb out of his delicate little body, gently warmed and protected by the inside of my hand.
Long before the light of morning his body cooled, little feet drooped at the joints, the delicate mouth hung open and I knew he was gone.
In that moment, one little baby mouse seemed to represent all the anguish in this world that we cannot prevent; all the orphans who will never know the intended nurturing of a caring parent, and all those we will love and lose in spite of our best determination and undying love for them.
Morning came as it always does…rested, joyful, and naive of the anguishes of the night it relieves.
I looked over at the box that I knew now held just another cold, stiff, rodent….the kind people shake from a trap into the garbage as quickly as possible, most not looking too closely.
But I had learned from this little creature and invested so much! How is it that “small” makes creatures more disposable? I could not bring myself to toss such a beautiful creature into last week’s moldy food scraps.
People chided me about this, hiding their smiles behind their fingers while pretending to sympathize with my dilemma, eyes darting from me to the other person as if to say, “Let’s just humor her, she obviously is taking this seriously.”
I asked them if they would toss a beloved pet such as a kitty or puppy in the garbage can so easily, remembering how this little animal shared all the endearing physical qualities of both species, but then we don’t usually get that close to mice do we?
I thought of how soldiers are taught to see the enemy they must fight and overcome as less than human….ugly words like “Japs,” or “Krauts” allow us to somehow deem other humans and races as more deserving to die.
What we cannot tolerate we must demonize, unless we are forced to look close--close enough to see the same blue eyes and blond hair…or watch an enemy mother or father playing and protecting their young just like we do.
Looking closely with open eyes would break down walls of rationalization and make the necessary need to defend family and country an agonizing task. We avoid the agony by not looking too closely.
This same thinking has now insisted we tolerate the killing and disposal of our own children. Even perfectly formed infants with God-given intelligence and futures are snuffed out without recrimination, as long as they are small enough, as long as we don’t look at them very closely, they too can be thrown into a garbage can. Put the lid on quickly so you don’t see their humanity and our own barbarism!
With all Timmy had taught me, he was still just a mouse…now a dead one. I found some cotton and put the mouse on it in a little clear plastic box.
Husband Rod typed a little epithet, “Timmy, we hardly knew ye” on the side, probably more out of respect for my efforts and affection for the little thing than humor.
Those less acquainted with the journey always make more light of its hardships. So many laughed and made light of the little clear box and its gentle contents except daughter Bethany and her friend Gitta who wept with me a little that day, not because one little mouse had died but because life is so fragile and we are so helpless in the end to stop suffering, natural death, and victimization….and so few take the time to look closely at what they fear.
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