Ok, so I’m not so proud of the incident that got me this lil revelation, however the revelation was so relevant. So I had a mouse in my house recently, I called him “Mickey Flicky”, and I WAS NOT PLEASED! It was even crazier when I didn’t discover him, but a few friends who were at my house were the ones who discovered his presence…..EVEN MORE EMBARASSING! Anyway, I often spoke out loud like I was the mouse whisper, like my friend Lotus Moon, however to no avail, he ignored me. For days in and on I often shouted and showed my displeasure with him being in my house. Now so frantic, not because of him, but more so of his slithering predator, so just the thought of him being there and the potential of what could come scared the living mess out of me. I was so distraught that I found myself creeping around my own house, afraid to move things because I was not sure what I would find.
So to get rid of my non-rent paying visitor, I went and purchased $70 worth of traps and preventative materials. Was this smart….sure if you actually put them down, but I truly believed me “talking” to him would make him leave and that I wouldn’t necessarily have to… SIKE! So I finally made up in my mind, I AM GOING TO GET YOU! I declared one night before I went to bed, that day came and went, and so did a few more days. I finally came to the place where I refused to continue to live cautiously and in fear. I made up in my mind that I would BOLDLY SEEK HIM OUT AND CONFRONT HIM!
That night I came home, made my last warning and began to seek him out. Now I noticed that he loved my storage closet. NEVER did I ever see him in the kitchen, hanging in living room or anything, but when I did see him, to the storage room he went…. So that’s where I began! So with my rain boots on, long sleeve shirt and pants, elbow length gloves and face mask, I open the closet and didn’t immediately see anything out of place….THEN REALITY HIT! I picked up a laundry bag, old college bookbag, shopping bag with some things in it and what did I find!?!?!?!?! POOP! I found why he was in my closet and not my kitchen. It looked as though it had snowed in my closet and all over my things. I became angry, and even furious as I combed through and sorted what I would keep and throw away. Everything from bed linen to old college papers that had been chewed through, and I thought to myself how dare you come in and violate me and my things, especially my organizational materials and professional signs. WHO KNEW THEY EAT PLASTIC!?!?!
As I continued I made it up in my mind…. BAMN (by any means necessary) YOU ARE DEAD! Sorry PETA and I’m a Christian, however NO MERCY! As I got to the last bin, I cried. Then in a moment of being tired and frustrated, and wanting to give up, guess who scrambles from seemingly nowhere and is frantic in the closet?!?! I quickly grabbed the tube of the vacuum cleaner and attempted to catch him. As he frantically ran back and forth every time I tried to catch him, he began doing flips off the wall. He was not going to WILLINGLY let me catch him, but he was making me work for it. I sweated, was out of breath, uncoordinated, afraid, and angry all in the same right …. then I GOT HIM… and HE GOT ME BACK! He ran right through my legs into my kitchen an under the stove.
I later became extremely fearful when I moved the stove and saw where and how he got away. There was an extremely large hole that the pipe to my stove was coming from. I also found that there was a space between the floor and the wall that he could get in and out of. I was then afraid, because there was the potential for more. I didn’t sleep, and the next day I called for help, from my building manager… who seemingly brushed me off, and then I called a friend. My old school South Side of Chicago Mama Oddie loving Stewart Little Catcher neglected herself and came to my rescue. She came attacked my home and combed through every inch of my space and things and helped me lay traps and preventive measures. Once everything was done and we sat to eat and rest, guess what happed …. YUP lil Mickey Flicky peeks from the corner of the same closet I just scrubbed as if to say… GOOD JOB… BUT I’M STILL HERE!!!
At this point I AM FURIOUS AND DETERMINED TO SEE YOU DEAD! I went into straight attack mode. Sparing you additional details, needless to say we awoke to the problem gone. A VICTORY for us! It took all of that! Now the interesting thing is that a few days later that incident spoke volumes. Here’s the TRAP! How often do we find ourselves with intruders in our space and life and we have tools to rid ourselves of them, but we never set them up. We spend time talking about them and to them and yet they never go anywhere, and sometimes we are merely wasting our breath talking to air. We make a plan to attack, but fear keeps us from moving forward. How often do we SEEK out the intruder and say even in fear, I’m moving forward to rid self of you? And when we seek out the intruder, we see exactly how much damage has been done, and makes you wonder “just how long have you been here without me knowing?” “how dare you come in and intrude my space and damage and disrespect my property?” Now the interesting thing about this is that as we combed through my space, I realized that of all the possible entry and exit ways, “IT WAS AS IF I HAD INVITED HIM HERE AND HAD CREATED WAYS FOR HIM TO COME IN.”
How dare I get mad at you for being who you are and doing what you were created to do especially when I basically invited you inside. I had left goodies out of a bag, and I had pulled the cord out of the wall leaving a hole, and I had never checked behind my stove. The whole time I had invited you in and it wasn’t until you made an embarrassment out of me that I recognized how much I’ve lived with you here. How often do we call for backup and assistance with the things that seem to have invaded our lives and made a mess beyond what we thought, and has us fearful of it becoming worse? And even still does that very intruder still pop its ugly head in visible light to let you know, oh you thought I was gone, but sorry… it’s not enough. I had to realize that this was WELL BEYOND A MOUSE, I had intruders, I had the tools, but didn’t use them, and had been living with some of them without even knowing how much damage has been done, and ultimately I had let some of them in and others had access that had I checked prior would not have been in.
Now after all of this I recognized the need to have backup on speed dial and that even then, it is important to have measures in place to keep intruders out, and that sometimes others will notice an intruder in your life before you do. TAKE HEED TO THE WARNING! Seek out what you know and don’t know may be in your space causing damage and disrespecting your space, and if you too have “created” an opportunity for him to come in, set up “
