Sweetney

I swear by all that is right and good in this world that this isn't some kind of covert Disney plug

It's like motherfucking Wild Kingdom around here these days. WILD KINGDOM OF THE DAMNED.

So here's what happened.

I was sitting in my living room this morning trying to jump-start my brain with epic doses of caffeine, when I heard a very light scratching sound coming from behind our TV cabinet (if you'd like a visual aid to help you conjure an image of the setting for this story, the giant black armoire to the left in this photo is said TV cabinet, and I was seated in the chair visible in the foreground). The scratching sound lasted for perhaps two or three seconds and then stopped, so I shrugged it off. Our house was built in 1914, it makes all kinds of random and unexplainable noises, believe me. I mean, if I got freaked out every time I heard scratching, or the sound of rattling chains in the basement, or blood curdling screams coming from the attic at 3am, well, I'd be freaked out a whole lot of the time. Anyway, a few moments later I looked to my left and saw a teeny tiny gray baby mouse punch-drunkenly climbing out from behind the cabinet over the thick white satellite TV cables strung along the baseboard.

Right about this time, give or take a few stunned, horrified seconds, was when I began running around in circles like a cartoon character, hands flailing wildly, repeating over and over like a mental patient off her Very Important Meds: OH NO OH NO OH NO OH NO OH NO OH NO OH NO OH NO. Yeah, so basically I'm real good in a crisis and stuff.

I then did what any sane person would do, which was find a bowl, plunk it down over the mouse to trap it, and then proceed to stand there for five minutes with my mouth hanging open staring at said bowl, as if awaiting further directives from the part of my brain containing Reason and Problem Solving skills. Sadly, my brain was all, Dude, I've done what I can. You're kind of on your own from here on out -- I have some equations related to wave-particle duality I need to be working through. I'M OUT! Stupid brain.

At that moment I was standing about two feet away from my desk (and I use the term "desk" loosely -- it's not so much an actual, functional workspace, but rather a shambolic dumping ground for bills and paperwork and other distinctly Not Fun things I don't really want to deal with (an appointment request card from my dentist has been sitting atop one of the several piles that comprise the mountainous terrain of my desk for well over 6 months; my teeth will surely rot and liquify before I make that goddamn appointment now that the card has been consigned to The Desk Of No Return)), so I grabbed the nearest folder and gingerly scooted it, inch by inch, under the now-mouse-filled-bowl.

On a motherfuckin' roll (I AM A WOMAN OF ACTION! TAKING CHARGE OF THE VERY SERIOUS AND COMPLEX MOUSE SITUATION! YEAH!!!!), I gently picked up the folder/mouse/bowl and took it out onto our broad front walk, so that upon release from its bowl-prison the baby mouse would instantly be vulnerable, exposed and clearly visible to birds of prey from the air.

Yeah that's not very impressive.

Okay, how about this?:

DINNER IS SERVED!

Okay, a couple of things to note here:

1. I swear by the power of Greyskull that it was completely by chance that I grabbed this particular folder. Disney had just recently sent an Imagination Movers CD to me (Imagination Movers exist within the 7th Circle Of Hell incidentally, named "Violence Against Art," located just beneath Circle 8's "Pimps, Panderers and Seducers." The more you know!), so it just happened to be conveniently laying atop the uppermost sedimentary layer of my deskscape. Still, that's some pretty sweet happenstance right there, you gotta admit.
2. OH MY GOD IT'S SO CUTE I COULD DIE, GAH! Why do disease-infested vermin have to be so cute, whhhhhy???
3. Okay, and this is the eerie part: it's a baby. Barely had it's eyes open. Was still unsteady as a newborn foal. So you know what this means, right? THERE IS A NEST OF MICE SOMEWHERE IN MY HOUSE. AIIEEEEE!!!!!
4. © Copyright Walt Disney Records, 2009. All rights reserved. OH I KEED!

(Sorry, got a little caps-lock crazy there. Deeeeep breaths.)

So after a few stunned and trembling seconds, baby mouse scuttled off under the ivy surrounding our front porch. Which probably means that baby mouse will be reappearing inside my house within 24 hours. But really, what am I going to do? Feed it to my cats? Flush it down the toilet? Create a baby-mouse-inspired theme park and animation studio and become a bazillionare? Oh, wait...

(The truth I'm trying very hard not to admit to myself is that baby mouse is probably done for. Poor thing could barely walk yet -- he's not going to present much of a challenge to nearby wildlife with the fever for the flavor of the mouses. Can't say I don't feel bad, I'm kind of a pussy about cute fuzzy mammals truth be told, but it's not like we could keep it...)

(Alright, fine, Circle Of Life and shit, I'm over it. Sigh. Stupid life circle.)

Saturday

There's a dead bird on our porch, he said.

He's always been overly repulsed by the sight of dead animals. And so from our earliest days together it was one of the few critter-related matters I had to take on in our relationship, as he, incongruous as it may seem, has no problem killing hideous eleventy-bajillion-legged alien bugs, or escorting by hand the odd lost ladybug that materializes inside our house back out to its proper place among our garden's hydrangea blooms. But I am the sole Person Who Deals With Dead Things around here, and as such have, over the years, had to dispose of a fair number of hapless former mice, tangible evidence of our retiring housecats' still formidable hunting skills. Anyway, the point is that I knew immediately he'd be of no help in dealing with the thing on our porch.

Where is it? I asked, grimacing.

His left arm flew up, gesturing broadly toward the front of our house. He winced visibly. Over there.

I peered out our front door and spotted it, laying beside our rocking chair. Indeed, that bird is no more. It has ceased to be. It has kicked the bucket, bought the farm, it's pushing up daisies. It is an ex-bird.

I have no idea what to do with it.

And so there it remains. Rife with symbolism so obvious it makes me want to punch whoever's in charge of dropping these metaphoric talismans into our lives squarely in the ethereal jaw for insulting my intelligence with such a ham-handed, amateurish trope. I'm mean come on, universe -- you can do better than that, can't you?

But what do you do with a dead bird? I honestly don't know.

Instant joy

Breathing underwater

Echo

Falling

Happy Anniversary to you, you live in a zoo... no, wait, that's not right.