Did You Know a Mouse Will Steal Your Earrings?

Tales from an old house

I live in an old house. I mean, not old by UK or European standards. It’s not even terribly old by New England standards. But in Portland, a city that has burned three times and is symbolized by the Phoenix, our circa 1900 home is a grand old lady. She has big windows and lots of them, a lovely (albeit non-functional) fireplace with a pretty mantle, french doors between the dining and living rooms. We love the old girl and have poured countless hours into her rehabilitation and care. Sweat equity, they call it.

Among her somewhat dubious charms are a foundation built of stones and something that was once a kind of cement, but now behaves more like talc, at least on the interior basement walls. An exterior sheathing of tightly mortared brick protects the outside. According to the house inspector, it’s perfectly stable, but its inner surface is crumbly and friable, easily permeated by water, easily permeated by wildlife.

Our basement is host to a sometimes alarmingly large population of non-rent paying residents. The worst of these for all of us are the house centipedes, known by our family as walking eyebrows. If they stayed in the basement we could cope, but this time of year they find their way upstairs and frequently greet us first thing in the morning in the kitchen or bathroom sinks. Not a great way to start the day.

We’ve plugged all the small holes in the floors (most drilled for phone lines and various cables now long unnecessary) with dowels and corks. That helped. But the big win in our war against hairy, leggy, creepy bugs was learning that they hate tea tree oil. Now I keep a bottle of water with a few drops of the the stuff next to all the sinks. A spritz or two at night keeps the beasties at bay. A sprinkle of Borax along the doorsteps discourages ants. And spiders, well, I scream and my husband comes running.

Like all old house residents, we also struggle with mice. Steel wool is a strong ally in the battle and has helped us fortify our defenses in the kitchen and basement. The poem that follows is a tale of mice in the kitchen. It is a true story, and also my favorite poem written during the February Poetry Adventure.

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Did You Know a Mouse Will Steal Your Earrings?

You might put two small pearls -
fake, not the real deal -
into a small dish in the kitchen
because your ears are sore
and you don’t feel like climbing
the stairs to your room now.
You’ll take them later.

So they’ll spend the night on 
the sideboard and in the morning
your mother might notice one 
missing and think, that’s funny.
But your mum is busy and she 
forgets to mention it

But the next morning when 
she sees the small dish is 
empty, and one of the avocados
in the bowl nearby has a hole 
gnawed in it, tiny teeth marks 
showing in the bright green flesh, 
she’ll get suspicious.

She’ll ask the boys to pull the 
dishwasher out from the cabinet
and seal up the holes around 
the pipes with steel wool, and 
while they’re at it, look for a pair of 
pearl earrings - fake pearls, 
not the real deal. 

The boys love a job like this,
so they’ll yank the dishwasher 
and sweep out the space beneath, 
gathering with care the dust and 
lint that lays thick in such places
instead of just using the vacuum cleaner. 
And before they get to work jamming 
hanks of steel wool into the crevices, 
they’ll find one earring, just the one.

So now you share a pair of
fake pearl earrings with 
an acquisitive mouse who 
lives in your parents’ 
basement - or with her 
daughter, or granddaughter
because mice don’t live very long.

And somehow knowing you lost it
to a mouse who took it on
purpose elevates the loss above
those earrings that simply 
got caught in the folds of a scarf,
or dropped out, unnoticed,
in a parking lot. 

Looking at your one remaining 
earring, safely in a dish upstairs 
in your bedroom, makes you 
think of its mate, cherished by
generations of mice,
and you’re almost glad it’s gone.

---

My daughter is a very fine poet. We frequently share our poems with each other, suggesting edits and dishing out praise. I sent her this one right away. Her response was, “That’s great! Maybe I should write a poem about how mice hate me and steal my shit.” I told her I would very much like to read that poem.

Thanks for reading!