A rodent moment

By Audrey Kletscher Helbling

That I dislike rodents is a well-known fact among my relatives. Actually, the verb "detest" would more accurately describe my feeling toward these skittering creatures.

Rooted in my childhood, this fear of mice stems from the scratching sound of mice inside my bedroom walls, of pink baby mice curled up in a barn nest and of adult mice suddenly dropping from a hay or straw bale.

As an adult, I’ve had such mouse encounters as finding a beady-eyed rodent in a silverware drawer; being trapped in my in-laws’ bathroom in the middle of the night with a mouse running laps (did I mention that I was six months pregnant?); and discovering a dead mouse floating in a water-filled crockpot. If you’re interested in reading a detailed account of these incidents and more about my history with mice, track down the May/June 2006 issue of Minnesota Moments and my "Mouse tails" essay.

My cousin, Jeff, further fueled my dislike of mice when he inadvertently toasted a mouse in his toaster. You can read my retelling of this in "Another mouse tail," published in the same issue of our magazine.

But I’m getting a bit sidetracked here with background information. Last night I experienced another rodent moment. My husband and I were sitting in our lawn chairs on the patio when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw "something" move. That "something" was black and furry and about the size of two mice. I reacted instantly, letting out a blood-curdling scream while simultaneously lifting my toe-exposed, flip-flopped feet off the ground. Honestly, I’m surprised the neighbors didn’t show up. My son came running to see what was wrong with mom.

What was wrong? I had seen what I believe was a black, rather fat, slow-moving (at least in comparison to mice) shrew. I apparently scared the wits out of the little bugger because he high-tailed it back into my flower bed as soon as I screamed. But I wasn’t taking any chances. I high-tailed it inside the house.

From the safety of the kitchen, I pleaded with my husband, "Do something. You’re the man of the house. Protect your family."

He laughed.

My son commented on the sexist nature of my request. He was right, but I couldn’t help myself. I get rather irrational when rodents threaten.

"This is his home. He lives outside," my husband responded, not budging from his lawn chair.

"Yeah, but he can live in the woods, not in my flowers," I countered and walked away. I feared the shrew would move into our garage as has happened in the past.

Soon I heard the screen door slam and my husband clomping down the basement stairs. I could only hope. Was he, as I suspected, getting a mouse trap?

"What do shrews eat?" he asked.

"Are you setting a mouse trap?" I questioned. "I don’t think a mouse trap is big enough for a shrew."

None-the-less, my husband laced a snap trap with peanut butter and set it near the flower bed on the edge of the patio.

This morning he went to the spot where he had set the trap. The trap was gone.