Why run with the crowd when you can run around in circles?

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Home Sweet Home, Part -1


My mother came to visit me right after I had moved into this lovely cottage. Her last night here, we had our first cold snap, so I laid my first fire in the wood stove and lit it.

The house filled with smoke, the alarm went off, the dogs hit the cathedral ceiling yelping. I doused the fire and figured screw it, it’s not that cold; I’ll call the landlord in the morning to check it out.

After returning from dropping my mother at the train station the next day, I pulled into the drive and let the dogs out of the van. Then I noticed that both house doors were wide open, and it was cold out. Hmm…

The dogs frolicked in the yard as I stepped into the house. The place was a shambles, with broken crockery everywhere, off the shelves and smashed on the floor. The beautiful piece of hand-blown glass in the round window in my bathroom was shattered in the tub. I backed out of the house, my mind in a whirl. I already suspected that the landlord must be insane to accept a tenant with not just one, but two terrible terriers, as well as to let her plant a 12,000 pound boat smack in the front yard. What had set him off? Did he not like the new throw rugs and the floor lamp I had added? The lamp was lying on its side and the rugs were crumpled. Was it just one of those days to pitch a fit, breaking his own belongings as well as mine? I looked at the boat I just gone to great trouble to have trucked to the yard. If I had to flee, would I be able to arrange to get it out fast enough before he trashed it too?

Just then I saw him exit his house next door, headed my way. I edged towards my van. The dogs ran towards him excitedly. I tried to call them back, knowing it was futile, because Jack Russells are disobedient little brats. I tried trickery. ‘Come on, guys, lets go for a ride, let’s go to the beach, let’s have a cookie, let’s go for a walk, quick, get in the van, c’mon lets go lets go.’ They kept running towards the psycho as I watched in horror, feeling helpless. He could whack them both with whatever that was he was carrying before I could get anywhere near the scene. The dogs reached him and didn’t get slaughtered. He got closer, dogs at his heels, and I could see he was sort of smiling. Did he have a more diabolical plan? Where in the hell was my cell phone? Should I just abandon those damn dogs to their fate and run for it? Serve them right for not listening. I could now see that he was carrying a shop vac. Was he showing remorse for his actions; was he now calmed enough to not be homicidal? Or was he going to try to lure us all into the house and finish us off with the vacuum, which he had cleverly modified to super suck and compress large items to fit in the canister, sort of like a trash compactor and vac combined?

I hovered near the van’s open door, keys in hand, as he drew near and said one word:

“Squirrel.”

I sighed in relief. He said that when he had opened the woodstove door, a squirrel leapt out at him, crashing off walls, furniture, shelves, and every breakable item in the house. Apparently a veteran of this, he had opened the doors and tried to shoo it out, but it disappeared somewhere. At that point he decided to leave the house open in the hopes it would find its way out. Together we cleaned up the mess and then searched everywhere for the creature. He told me that when he and his family had lived here, he had once come home to find the place in such a mess that he thought they had been burglarized. He was about to call the police when the culprit attacked. He dodged just in time, narrowly avoiding being smacked in the head by an angry squirrel as it leapt from a shelf and fled through the open door. He assessed the damage to be about $20,000 worth of valuable artwork. They didn’t have insurance.

As soon as we were finished cleaning up, he went off to the hardware store for a squirrel baffle for the chimney top. I couldn’t help but think, why in holy heck didn’t you do that when you were attacked five years ago?

That evening, as I was enjoying a nice fire without barbequing any rodent bodies, I heard a rustling noise. I glanced at the dogs zonked beside me on the couch. Not a twitch from them. I put down my book, quietly got up, and followed the sound to the bookshelf. Scritch Scritch. SH*T. ‘Dogs, out.’ I called next door, hoping that I wasn’t waking anyone at that late hour. My landlord answered. “HELP, it’s still in here!” He dashed over with a have a heart trap, and together we managed to shoo it into the trap from under the enclosed bottom bookshelf, where it had been hiding for the last twelve hours. As my landlord left with his new pet, I let the dogs back in. “You’re both fired for never noticing that a SQUIRREL, for heavens sake, which you’ve made your life’s mission to eradicate, was in YOUR house all dang day!” And I thought, wow, wouldn’t that have been exciting if that bit of wildlife had decided to come out in the middle of the night. My dogs would have had a blast, I would have had a heart attack, and my landlord would have suffered greater losses.