Tenacity

So, there was this mouse.

My screened-in porch, with its cat door, is like a death camp for mice. Each night, the cats catch mice out in the fields and bring them in to play on the porch, where they can't get away. We scoop up the bodies each morning. A little gruesome? Yes.

But a few mornings ago there was this one mouse, different from the rest. This mouse, faced with certain death, refused to give up. He wedged himself between the screen and the porch railing, in a very thin space that squashed him flat, and pulled his tail up parallel to his body. This mouse just waited, barely able to breathe. He found a hiding place that others had missed and, most important of all, he had the patience to stay there all night.

When I found him the next morning, I could only see him from outside the porch -- a silhouette of a rodent. I went into the house, got a flat ruler, pulled his tail down and slid him out of the flat space. He was just fine. I took him a long way from the house and let him go.

I keep thinking about him, though. When all else is against you, when it seems impossible to try any harder or to wait any longer, remember that one small mouse can beat three cats, given enough tenacity.