They say that you learn something new every day. Well, they are very correct.
But before I can tell you all about what I learned today, as you surely expect me to, I have to tell you a story.
Once upon a time, there was my house. And in my house dwelled a healthy population of mice. Outside my house dwelled an even healthier population of said mice. In fact, there were also chickens and hawks and things living everywhere.
As a result, Dad set up several glue and snap traps to catch some of these mice. Sometimes they don't work (and I swear I'm not even sabotaging them or anything). Today, they did.
So I was sitting at my computer, quietly and happily doing computer things, when suddenly I heard a small something being flipped over and a lot of terrified squeaking. I was all like, "OH MY GOD!!! Shit, if a mouse actually got caught in there, I'm gonna have to go kill it!"
Please let me clarify that I wasn't scared of the mouse. In fact, I think they are very cute. Mice are one of my favorite creatures.
No, I was scared that if no one else came downstairs, I would have to be the one to kill this mouse, which hurt me to think about, because I just don't kill things in general.
So I started yelling for my dad to come downstairs because he "caught something and it's squeaking downstairs." He took the trap and mouse (it was a glue trap) outside, and I heard a suspicious grating sound, not unlike that of the green waste bin lid being removed.
I asked him what he was doing. He refused to give me a straight answer. I kept asking. I asked again. Finally, I said, "Either kill it or let it go, but don't just throw it in the green waste bin alive!!!" (Which is exactly what he was planning to do, because we caught another mouse a few years ago and that's EXACTLY what he decided to do.) He asked me why. That was a rather confusing question because I thought it was obvious, because I didn't want that mouse to suffer for days before dying, that it was better just to end it quickly. I told him so, and he said, "Oh. [pause pause pause] OK, then. I'll kill it."
I went outside with a big stick to see if he was going to be humane (sort of) or if he was going to go throw it into the green waste bin ALIVE, again. I walked in on a charming little scene, in which my dad was covering the live, squeaking, terrified little brown-gray mouse (still stuck to the trap, which was upside-down) with a piece of newspaper. And then my grandma prepared to step on it.
OK, so not exactly humane. I yelled at her in TWO DIFFERENT LANGUAGES to stop stop STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP. She said she wasn't killing it, she was "making sure it doesn't escape." That sounded surprisingly close to, "I'm gonna half-squish it and then toss it in the garbage can."
I would also like to point out that this mouse had about the same color fur as most of Coco's feathers were. And (this is gonna sound corny, but I'm not embellishing) for a moment, it was exactly like seeing Coco's body in the yard again, except this time Coco was still alive, and screaming, and she was about to be killed, and I had to DO SOMETHING. It was like being given a second chance to save her, but I couldn't. Because I could never get my dad to understand simple concepts such as, "If you have a choice between getting the job done five seconds faster and getting the job done humanely, pick the f***ing second choice."
I think I started half-crying and grinding the tip of my big stick into the fence. My dad looked at me angrily and said, oh get ready for this one, well he said, "What is wrong with you? Go away and let me deal with this." I wanted to say, There's nothing wrong with me. Can't you see what you're doing?! You are the one with the issues! ...But I didn't.
My grandma chimed in, "Back then, we killed mice. Mice and rats and flies and all that. That's how you're supposed to treat vermin."
Vermin. That's a very ugly word, don't you think? She was asserting that mice were pretty much the same as flies, only bigger and louder and more pest-like in general.
Except there is one major difference. Insects do not feel pain. Mice definitely do. So while I might whack a fly on my window with a rolled-up newspaper, I could never toss a live mouse into a trash can.
(Here's a fun thought: I just searched up a definition for "vermin" using Dictionary.com... The definition includes such choice phrases as "disgusting animals collectively," "difficult to control," and "objectional or obnoxious person." So you could literally be correct if you said, "Humans are the vermin of the world." Because each of those three phrases describes us well. Great, let's massacre each other!)
I have given up trying to explain why it is not fun for me to joke about shooting and killing animals (in fact, it makes me wonder how one could even joke about something like that... jokes are fun... so basically people who do that think that killing is fun. OK, just clarifying my point there). This explains my next action, which was to run away, hurl my stick across the yard (it was a good throw, too; I could have speared something on it), and sit in the chicken coop to watch my beloved chickies.
I'm ignoring both my dad and my grandma as much as possible now, because I don't want to talk about how "it was the right choice" and "it doesn't matter, just a mouse..." And I DEFINITELY don't want to try convincing them of the fact that people would be burning our house down if that mouse had been a cat, or a dog, or a rabbit, or anything that wasn't deemed "vermin" by some queer blockhead dirtbag idiot.
The end.
Now I get to tell you about what I learned today. I learned that people who claim to love animals and be humane and all that crud are lying if they don't love all life. This includes bugs. This includes... oh my dear lord, it includes vermin. And plants, and little things like birds and fish and lizards.
People seem horrified when I tell them that there are dog-meat restaurants in China. They say stupid things to me, a chicken-keeper, things like, "How can people eat rabbits? They're so cute... They're not like, chickens or something... Like, nobody keeps them as pets..." To which I usually reply with a choice insult and a raised eyebrow.
The only humane people out there are the ones who would make difficult decisions that aren't the best for them... if they could help anything else. Any animal, not just cute ones, not just pets... I'm not completely sure yet, but I hope I'm one of them.
(Next time something gets caught in a trap that this time I'm actively sabotaging, I'm taking care of it. I'm not letting anyone else do it, because who knows, that mouse might still be alive in that garbage bin. I don't know what happened, but I'm certain that it wasn't pretty.)
