Pre-meditation

Two weeks ago, I found a new reason to clean. It started in the garage, next to the furnace. I blocked off a cabinet I knew led deeper into the house. Next, I found droppings behind the washing machine. I tore down cardboard boxes and taped them to the walls, cutting off possible access points. I cleared out, organized, moved dog food and rag piles, stacked items in another room.

Every morning I swept, swept, swept new droppings. Few, tiny, hard, black: I didn't mind too much. I descended into the subterranean area of the crawl-space to check for a nest. No luck – not that I would have known what to do if I had found something. They are in the space in-between the slab and a finished, two-stair platform that suspends the utilities bathroom. How did they get in there? When will they leave?

The visits decreased, no longer every night. I held hope they would disappear, find some other place to go. But it is snowing again and cold outside. Why would they leave? So, I went to the 'household cleaning' aisle this week. I found my options. I swayed from one foot to the other, trap or poison, trap or poison. [Thank God they were only tiny mice and not HUGE rats! Those traps would take my hand off.] At last, I couldn't bring myself to purchase one of those heinous hook-and-bar traps. I grabbed a box of poison. [Apart from garden pests, I have never plotted to kill anything. I'm even switching to non-toxic cleaning supplies. This is traumatic.]

Their visits were unreliable. I waited. Finally I put on gloves – you shouldn't even open the box without them - and put out the bait. The first night nothing. No bait missing. No droppings. I wondered if it would work at all. How much would they eat? But the next morning, I was shocked. The entire bait was gone; most of the droppings were in the paper box where the green pellets had been. They sure were tiny rodents. “Kills in as little as one feeding.” Should I put out another box? Yes. Two nights later, they ate that completely, too! It's just a waiting game now. Box Three is out for tonight. Do they have tummy aches?

Well, now I've killed knowingly. It's a new experience. Certainly I have been complicit in the ignorant killing my species makes a habit (another blog topic). But this is not a sin of ignorance. To plot demise, to put out bait, wait for death, wonder if I will find it [squish it] or if it will die underneath my floorboards...

I don't feel guilty – exactly. Here at the end of this post, I am waiting to name my feelings. Realistic and matter-of-fact. My abode not theirs. A desire to prevent actual damage that would cost.

How does this connect with my recent reading on non-violence? Is violence only violence when committed against another person? Certainly one can commit violence against nature. How does one deter pests, especially once they enter your sphere? Perhaps this jump is too big. Death is a part of Life, part of this Fallen World, my present Reality.