It’s a tough day in the NFL, my husband said conversationally a few weeks ago. I thought that meant someone died, but no, it was the day the draft picks got cut from 80 down to 53. My husband watches the NFL draft every year – the sound when someone is drafted is actually the ringtone on his phone – which means I vicariously watch the NFL draft every year. I do like seeing the absolute joy when a player is drafted, particularly from the family members watching, and, even more specifically, the happiness on his mother’s face. The years of work and sacrifice and wondering if it will ever pay off; then when a player’s name is called you can see the relief and pure joy. Now imagine that same mother, just a few months later, when her son gets cut. Even if the player survives the cut, such a career is tenuous at best. I always think of a player’s mother, when I see one get carried off the field with what my husband will inform me is a career-ending injury, sometimes before the season even begins.
Parenting is hard, is what I’m saying.
So it’s been a very roller-coaster week around here, and I’m not going to get into all the ups and downs, or bore you with my subsequent existential crisis, but I will say that Thursday was my last first day of school ever, and I came home to a completely empty house, for the first time without a sad Barkley to commiserate with.
Well, onward. Let’s rewind two weeks to our Mexico trip and how the boys fared on their own.
I was a bit nervous to leave the boys to their own devices for five days. What if there is an emergency? I kept saying, but when my husband asked me what kind of emergency I was pondering, I just couldn’t articulate. I don’t know, someone gets gravely ill or the house floods or the furnace explodes or something? But the fact is that a) we have left them overnight before with zero issues, b) they are both very responsible and have pride in the house, c) they are both fairly competent in the kitchen, and d) my older son is 18, so technically an adult. I had two rules. Rule Number One: No parties! Rule Number Two: If you do have a party, erase the evidence and make it look like you didn’t.
I mean, we have to be practical here.
The boys did have friends over, and I know all their friends and they are all good kids. I wasn’t worried; as long as no one barfed in my house or got alcohol poisoning, everything was fine by me. Let’s not be naïve! I’m of the belief – and this may be controversial, and it really depends on your own personal situation – that the European way of introducing alcohol as something that is not forbidden, but should be consumed in mindful moderation is what’s best for my family. I also don’t want the boys sneaking around; I know some of their friends hide booze from their parents, but I wanted my kids to tell me if they were having a drink. If you want a drink, have a drink, but don’t sneak around and for god’s sake, don’t barf or drive or do anything stupid. Open communication! It’s something that has worked for us; my older son is legal drinking age now, but we’ve been doing this for both boys for a few years. Again, this is something that should be looked at on an individual basis but for us, it’s worked. I think flat-out forbidding things makes them that much more desirable, which leads to bad decisions.
In any case, I knew that they had a few friends over early in the week and a few drinks were consumed. I know this not only because they told me but because there was cheap beer leftover in the downstairs fridge (Mountain Crest, who are these people), and my husband’s very expensive five-year-old bottle of Patron was opened, even though we have many half-empty bottles of cheap vodka in our liquor cabinet BUT WHATEVER. Side note: kids, if you are going to take from your parents’ liquor cabinet, don’t choose the very most expensive bottle. And then don’t tell us you MIXED IT WITH DR PEPPER. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD THESE PEOPLE ARE MONSTERS. Anyway, I texted my sons while we were getting ready to come home, and was surprised that my younger son didn’t text me back until late in the morning. He’s an early riser generally but he said that was up late because he needed to “take care of some things late last night.” I was sure they didn’t have friends over at that particular evening, since my older son had a job interview early the next morning, so I figured he was just cleaning things up from two nights previous. We got home to a perfectly clean house, and I just shrugged it off. I don’t need to know every single detail, the house was clean, who cares.
The day after we got home, I decided to make a loaf of banana bread. I reached into the drawer under the oven where I keep all my baking pans. I noticed something suspicious. I moved the pans and confirmed that it was not my imagination. I started screaming my younger son’s name over and over, moving over to the cupboard underneath the sink. He came running out, probably thinking I was dying, which I was in a way. By the time he got to the kitchen I was taking everything out of the cupboard under the sink, screaming incoherently.
Me: That thing you had to take care of, what was it? WHAT WAS IT?
Younger Son: It’s okay, Mom. I took care of it. You don’t want to know.
Me: THERE IS MOUSE POOP EVERYWHERE, WAS IT A MOUSE.
YS: Um, yes. But I didn’t see any poop! I didn’t know about that.
Me: THEN HOW DID YOU KNOW THERE WAS A MOUSE?
YS: I saw it.
Me, now hysterical: WHERE WAS IT?
YS: Um, in the hallway.
It is a miracle I didn’t black out right there. I mean, I feel a bit dizzy just writing that. Reader, it is impossible to convey my reaction and the depths of my feelings, but when I relayed this information to my mother on the phone later, she let out a low-pitched sound like aieeeeeeeeeee and that pretty much sums it up. My son assured me that he found the traps and caught the mouse! It’s all okay! But how did he know there weren’t many mice, and if they were in the hallway, what is to say they aren’t everywhere right now. What if they are in my dressers, what if they are in my bed. At this point my husband, who was working from home and had been on a call, came upstairs to see me spiralling into insanity, hysterically disinfecting everything in sight and wondering whether boiling all the baking pans would suffice or if I should just burn down the house and start over.
Five traps later and things seem to be under control, mouse-wise. But for how long? I ran into one of my neighbours down the street, who casually mentioned, with no prompting from me, that they were having mouse problems. They mentioned a certain trap they had obtained and that in the last week they had caught over thirty mice in their house and garage. MY NERVES. THIRTY. If it comes to that I will have no mind left, none at all. As it is my poor fragile sanity is hanging on by a thread.
Whew, let us change the subject to something infinitely more pleasant: my garden. The flowers have been gorgeous; the roses are still blooming, the daylilies are beautiful, and we’ve had lots of tomatoes and zucchini. I thought I would have more zucchini, given I have seven plants, but perhaps I overplanted. Maybe there is just too much competition for the soil. Lessons for next year, I guess.
Exhale. In any case, the crazy week ended on a high note, as I spent a couple of nights at my parents’ house on the lake. It was a great way to end this very beautiful summer.
Weekly Reading
The Lies That Bind. Okay, so the first 2/3 of this book, I was thinking this is a cute little romance! It takes place in the months before and after 9/11; I was 26 in 2001 and so the events and the cultural details really resonated (remember Fodor’s guides?). Then it TOOK A TURN. Then it got really wild, like a weird train wreck that you have to keep reading but the whole time you think wait, what? What? Did that just happen? I’m not recommending it but I’m not NOT recommending it either. It just…was not at all what I expected. Reading it, I felt like that meme:
Literally, me as I was reading this.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. I hardly know how to describe this gorgeous piece of writing. The author spent twelve years creating new words for the very specific emotions we all experience. It’s brilliant and profound, and also makes me feel very, very seen. What a unique and creative work!
Here we are; the long weekend is over. We are officially in September and fall mode! I guess it’s back to reality on all fronts. Happy September to you all! xo
Oh my gosh. A) A very well-told story; I was on the edge of my seat, B) BURN IT DOWN, but first burn the neighbours’ house, C) Be glad you live in Alberta, where AT LEAST THERE ARE NO RATS???? 😫
Every year or two we have problems with rats in our (detached) garage, and last winter one of our traps disappeared. Curious. This summer when my husband was giving the garage a deep clean, he found it. A rat had got its leg caught and then ran off to a hole under the workbench and tried to escape the garage, but the trap meant it got stuck. I mean, BARF AND TRAGEDY. I cannot with any of it. I hate them but I don’t want them to suffer!
I remain extremely grateful we haven’t had any problems in our house. Because BARF.
(I think your attitude toward alcohol and teenagers is very sensible.)
OH DEAR GOD ARIANA. Barf and tragedy indeed!!!! I don’t want them to suffer either but I also don’t want them in my house aieeeeeee.
THIS IS WHY WE HAVE PETS. I’m pretty sure my cat would just play with a mouse until she killed it and my dog would bark in terror, but I would KNOW. And I would KILL. We have mouse problems in our detached garage, but my husband handles all of it. I do nothing except buy traps and fret about what happens if they make the thirty foot trip from the garage to our house.
I think it’s SO SWEET that your son tried to hide the evidence of the mouse appearance by cleaning the house. What a thoughtful young man you’ve raised!
I feel like the garage is one thing, but the house, and particularly MY KITCHEN is another! I mean, my oven drawer? DEAR GOD.
THIRTY MICE in your neighbor’s house? THIRTY??? That is 30 too many mice. I believe burning it all down is the appropriate action here.
I love your attitude towards alcohol with your sons! I think it makes a lot of sense and will likely help them develop a more healthy relationship toward alcohol when it isn’t looked at as something forbidden/secretive.
Thanks Stephany! I know a lot of kids “sneak” at that age and I just want it to be normalized and not something to go crazy and binge on. So far it’s worked, fingers crossed.
My son and his buddies are the biggest football nuts ever and they consider the NFL draft their favorite “holiday.” Up until COVID, they would travel to whatever city was hosting to watch the whole thing live. And I’m sure they aren’t thinking about the players mothers at all. As a mother who watched TWICE (with my heart in my throat) while my son was carried off the field, I can imagine all to well how those mother’s must feel when their child is injured.
THIRTY mice in ONE house? OMG – I would have burned the house to the ground! Luckily, we don’t seem to have an issue with mice (knock wood) but we also have several (feral? God, I hope not. I know at least two belong to neighbors) cats that seem to love our back yard.
What a thoughtful son to try to remove the “evidence” of the mouse.
Gigi, my heart just went into my throat when you wrote that. Whew, deep breath. I love that your son and his friends traveled to the draft city!
“At this point my husband, who was working from home and had been on a call, came upstairs to see me spiralling into insanity, hysterically disinfecting everything in sight and wondering whether boiling all the baking pans would suffice or if I should just burn down the house and start over.”
This quote, and every other one from this post, solidify what I’ve been thinking each time I read anything that pours out of your mind: Please write a book, Nicole. If I was sitting beside you I’d start chanting it: Write a book, Write a book, Write a book. Will peer pressure work?
Moving on.
I grew up going to a very rustic cottage every summer that always had a few mice milling about. It didn’t bother me too much as a kid, but I never wanted to get too close. Once I had a friend visiting me in the summer and she actually chased and killed a mouse with a broom. That was a bit much for me – ick.
We never had mice in our apartments, but when we moved into our current home there was a small hole on the side of the house we didn’t have filled properly at first. For months I kept hearing all these weird noises at night. It drove me crazy. We eventually figured out it was mice scampering through the heating ducts. This lasted for almost a year. It stressed me out SO much. We hadn’t figured out where they were getting in yet, but I didn’t want them to DIE down there and be stuck in our vents forever, putrefying.
Around the same time, I started a load of laundry and found a mouse floating at the top before I put down the lid. I shudder. Another time we came home from vacation to find our little stockpile of dried goods had been plundered. They had eaten an ENTIRE bag of shelled peanuts and nibbled the edge off of 4 bags of chocolate chips. Not one bag…EVERY bag. I have since started keeping any stockpile of food in plastic bins and we haven’t had a mouse in years.
Oh and the last horrible mouse story – years ago we installed a set of IKEA blinds in our basement window. The empty long plastic tube it came in got stashed in our furnace room until garbage day. But it got tucked in a place where I forgot about it. Eventually I noticed our furnace room was really smelling. Like…*really* smelling. I looked everywhere and couldn’t find the source. Eventually I literally followed my nose, sniffing at various heights all around the room. The culprit – a mouse had climbed up the wall, tumbled inside that plastic tube, been unable to climb back out and had died and…you can imagine the rest. I discovered the dead, decaying mouse and screamed. I’m not sure how my husband dealt with it all, but any time I smell anything suspicious ANYWHERE, I start looking for dead mice.
Elisabeth, aieeeeee this is horrific!!! That is my fear that we will have mice and they will get stuck somewhere and die, decomposing in our house. Also, I hear you, I switched all my dry goods to plastic/ glass containers several years ago for just that reason! They chewed into all my food and argh!!!
I second this request to write a book, Nicole! Come on!!!!!!
And thank you, Elisabeth, for your very sweet and kind comments about my writing! xo
Seriously, Nicole. Get a grip. I thought we were taking about burning down the house because of a huge spider. Mice however? Meh. I am not afraid of mice. LOL (We used to have a few in the attic at my parents’ house during the winter months, until they built up the field behind our house. No more mice after that.
Also, I think it’s great that you’re raising responsible sons (who can take care of a little party with their friend AND mice during the same time!) and I absolutely agree: the European way of introducing alcohol as something that can consumed in mindful moderation, and not something forbidden is a much more reasonable approach to responsible drinking.
A spider I can handle! A spider isn’t going to chew all my things and give me the Hanta virus!
I just think the Europeans are so smart with their views on alcohol. Like, don’t make it a big forbidden thing, but be smart about it!
First of all, your garden looks beautiful. Second, I totally want to get that second book. Third…how do you feel about cats? Not only do they catch m*ce, they end up serving as a deterrent. And if you get the right cat, they can be very cuddly and sweet.
Thanks Erin! No cats for us – my husband is very allergic!
aAieeeeeee is right!! I thought it was going to be a barf story, but it was a mouse story! Also, how awesome are your kids for trying to protect you from it all?!
I’ve seen that gif that you posted about the Emily Griffin book before, but in conjunction with the book I legit chortled.
Hahahaha I am SO glad it wasn’t a barf story!
You should probably never visit us. Our house is old and as the pest control company says, “porous,” so a mouse sighting is not unusual. We trap them and when Matthew was still alive he used to catch them, but Xander can’t be bothered.
I am much more freaked out by roaches. I cannot stand them. (They are the reason we employ a pest control company and fortunately, since getting a contract with them we hardly ever see one.)
I would also be freaked out by roaches, but they are not a thing here, not that I know of anyway. I don’t know anyone who has any – must be a Calgary climate thing.
I have a solution for you- get a cat! You won’t be lonely AND they scare the mice away! Mice don’t like the smell of cats so they’ll just leave on their own (and if they don’t, the cat will take care of them.). It’s a win-win!!! Personally I think mice are kind of cute (I know, you’re shuddering right now) but they really can’t be living in our houses with us. Your new orange tabby cat (I’ve already picked one out for you) will solve everything.
No cats for us! My husband is very allergic!
How did I miss this post? I swear I checked yesterday and didn’t see anything from you. Today in the US, it feels like a Monday, so here I am.
I’m glad the boys had no issues when home alone, other than the MOUSE. Good grief. That is unnerving. I do tend to agree with you that not being overly strict about alcohol and allowing them to ease into it makes sense. Coach gained so much weight early on in college that when his mom came to pick him up at the airport she drove past him. Didn’t even recognize him. When we leave the kids home alone, we won’t allow them to have friends over. My fear is that a kid would drink too much and then be in a car accident and we would be liable. Adults have gone to jail for these kinds of things in he United States.
Curly started high school today (3 weeks later than normal because of construction) and I’m trying to decide if that is something I should feel strongly about. My youngest – off to high school. I’m watching 9 little people today, so I’m going to embrace this distraction.
Love the meme. So funny. Hooray for time spent at the lake.
Oh yes, the car accident thing! The thing about their friends is that there are a couple who don’t drink at all and they are usually the drivers – and the kids all live in the neighbourhood – but still, I see your point! That would be scary.
Good luck with Curly in high school and your NINE littles!
THIRTY MICE IN ONE HOUSE? My jaw dropped.
How do they even get in? I would also feel insane/uneasy about having critters in the house.
Loving the description of the mind bending book.
I agree with you on raising kids and alcohol. Banning anything 100% is too restricting and will cause trust issues.
The trust issues! Yes! I mean, that’s a recipe for sneaking around behind our backs!
OH MY WORD. I would be losing my mind, too. We had mice in our house when I was in HS. One morning, a mouse ran across my room when I was getting ready and I screamed so loud that my parents thought there was an intruder in the house! And apparently my screaming made the mouse urinate because we could not get rid of the mouse smell, and we eventually had to replace the carpet! Plus, at the time, I was reading 1984 and there is a torture scene involving rats, so then I had nightmares about said torture scene. We had a cat, but she was an outdoor cat. So I just lived in terror for quite some time. If I ever suspect we have mice in our house, our cat is coming home. She has gone to live with my MIL – where she has caught mice! So she is a good mouser and that sharing arrangement will be OVER if we ever have mice.
It sounds like you have a great, responsible boys. But patron and dr pepper! Ewwww! I am having flashback to the huge parties my brothers threw when my parents were away. There was so much drinking in my tiny home town. There was nothing else to do and it was such a forbidden novelty. I remember my brother paying me to collect a garbage bag of beer cans. Years later, my brothers also confessed that at one point someone brought their motorcycle through the patio door and into the house. I mean what in the world! So I am so very scarred by what my brothers did… but I think/hope it will be different for my kids because we live in an urban area where there are tons of things to do. I just think boredom is a bad thing for adolescents. But I think we will have the same approach when it comes to introducing alcohol, too. That said, there is alcoholism on both sides of our family so that makes things extra tricky… but we will be watching for signs of addictive behaviors. But I really cannot imagine my kids doing what my brothers did because that would just not fly or happen in our neighborhood. But in a rural area where there aren’t neighbors, things can get out of control fast!
The ending of 1984 is one of the most impactful and dramatic endings ever. I didn’t love the book generally but that scene and the one after, when he is just broken, are burned into my psyche. I GET IT!!! I think if a mouse ran across the room I would pass out immediately.
I totally get what you’re saying about parties! I think it depends on the kids. Mine aren’t that type really, but I sure do remember things like that from my youth!
So many things… I admire your attitude about leaving your sons alone. Trust is key. Our parenting styles are very similar. ❤️
30 mice?? I’d light a match and walk away. I believe the insurance company would have let that go.
Your Emily Giffin review prompted me to visit Goodreads. This led me to Net Galley. This prompted me to open a Net Galley account. So much for my morning plans. However, all is well. Except for the Emily Giffin book, which it appears I won’t need to read. 😂
Lolololol that book, I was like “this is so cute” and then it was like “wait what, what?”
Your garden is SO beautiful and prolific. I just love living garden-vicariously through your blog!
And your sons sound very responsible and kind. I cannot say exactly what horrors I was envisioning when you mentioned you started screaming for your son, but it was not mice. In fact, I am strangely relieved? Though obviously I am also deeply sympathetic for your rodent plight. Gross! I hope they are gone, far far away and never to be seen again!!!!
You have persuaded me to buy the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows for a word-loving friend. Thank you!
(THIRTY MICE NO.)
Hahahaha! I think they are gone now but…well, let’s just hope forever.
That book is incredible!
Eeeeeeeee…fingers crossed that it’s just the one mousie. I’m very grateful that when I was a single I never had a single mouse in the house and now when we occasionally have them I have an on-site exterminator (the hubs).
Good job to the boys on their Home Alone stint!
The great thing about my house is that no one would ever expect me to do anything about a mouse! Or mice. Yay for the on-site exterminators!
I vote for burn it down.
We had a “few mice” a few years back and had an exterminator come in who said you have to plug up any holes where they could get in (ours were in the basement) and set up traps/poison. He said that the mice will move to another indoor location once ours if off limits, so while I felt bad sending them to a neighbor’s house, I was very glad to see them go. We haven’t seen any since!
P.S. Love your approach to raising teens!
Thanks Colleen! A friend told me about an ultrasonic thingy that keeps them away as well and I’m going to try that!
“Aieeeeee!” It starts as an exclamation, turns into a shriek and ends as a high pitched squeal. There’s no other way to respond to a mouse in your house…and you have to tell yourself it’s just one lone mouse, spotted on its very first scouting mission inside your home, because the thought of a large, multi-generational mouse family comfortably ensconced behind the skirting boards is simply too horrific to bear…and even if you then go on to catch three or four mice in the ensuing days, you have to keep telling yourself that it’s purely coincidental…and it still takes weeks to feel like you can ever relax again.
I haven’t caught sight of a house mouse for at least a year, but there has been a decidedly plump individual visiting the bird feeder next to my garage every day. I tell myself it’s just one lone mouse, an outdoor, hedge-dwelling mouse, and that whilever it’s got plenty to eat outside it won’t embark on any scouting missions inside my home…but deep down I know that Winter is coming, and I’m staying vigilant. “Aieeeeee!”
Amelia, that is EXACTLY how it sounded. It’s like you were here! Aieeeeeeee!
I enjoy your entertaining stories so much! And I love your gorgeous garden photos!
Thanks so much Michelle!
I loved the varied content in this post, Nicole! I totally agree with your approach to alcohol consumption. I encouraged my son to take a sip when he was in HS and he didn’t like the taste so he didn’t really partake. But Thanksgiving last year, he joined cousins who imbibed at home — and he got drunk and got drowsy and went to sleep. We were watching him…and we made it a talking point. Know your limits.
It was very sweet of your son to make the situation better for you — getting rid of the mouse that he knew would freak out his mom! What traps did you use? We see evidence of mouse in our yard and although our dog is a hunter, he doesn’t always get these as they are sneaky and come out when he’s in the house. LOL (He has caught a few opossums, though!)
Your garden looks lovely! My many zucchini plants didn’t do well this year; I didn’t get much. Our soil is not the greatest so I get the best results when I do gardening in pots, which I didn’t do this year. I was hoping I had enough gardener-experience the last 2-3yrs successfully growing veggies that I could make a go at it planting in ground — but no such luck!
Oh, and I must tell you! I finally opened the bag of Boom Chicka Pop — so yummy! So addicting! I brought it and a huge bag of shrimp chips (both from Costco) to my girlfriend-long-weekend-together but we had so much other food and the shirmp chips was more interesting to them so that got eaten. My husband and I got to be the happy eaters of the popcorn….and I went back and bought 2 more! So thanks for bringing it to my attention!
Oh yay, M! I love that you love Boom Chicka Pop! Isn’t it so delicious? Yay! Thanks for your kind words as well – having teens isn’t always easy for sure.
Oh my goodness – you tell a great story! I personally don’t get too upset about mice – they are disgusting, but I used to own an older home and mice were almost inevitable. Now we have a cottage and once fall hits they want to come into the warmth. I’ve just learned how to ‘secure’ everything that they may get into and we set traps. They gross me out but that’s cottage life — my worst experience was arriving at the cottage with a very full bladder and finding a mouse drowned in the toilet! I made my husband scoop it out – yuck!!
Just because of that gif I had to request the Emily Giffin book; very curious about it. Finally, I think you recommended “These Precious Days” by Ann Patchett. I have just finished it and loved the essays SO much. thank you.
Oh, These Precious Days was one of my favourite books this year – I am glad you loved it. Okay, if you’re reading the Giffin book you’ll have to report back. It’s just…kind of…weird and ridiculous. But entertaining! So let me know when you read it. Like I said some of it was very cute.
Okay, the mouse in the toilet. OH MY GOD PAT. I had to take a deep breath reading that.
I loved this post! The boys on their own and the mice!! I mean, mouse. Since you can’t get a cat, mini schnauzers are great dogs, originally bred to kill rodents and don’t shed! If that doesn’t work I have Terminix coming Friday. You pay a fee, they come and find all potential entry routes, set out those black boxes and come back four times a year to check on things. Because we had all contents of our home In the garage during our love, including grass seed, they thought they hit the jackpot! I saw two on move day by the grass seed and well, Terminix was called straight away!!
Oh!!! Thanks for the tip!
OK, I confess, I thought you were going to find barf in your pan for banana bread. 🙂
But mice are pretty darn bad. These are things I stress about, living in an apartment. I cannot guarantee the cleanliness of my neighbors. So, yeeks.
My parents have had issues like Elisabeth did, with them breaking into the chocolate stash. (Um, specifically, my mom’s chocolate stash… :>)
They got in because my parents’ dining room built in storage (“Breakfront”, they call it, for reasons that are unclear to me?) backs up to the garage and… well, you can imagine what happens in cold weather. Warm drawer with chocolate > cold garage.
I agree that your approach to parenting your boys sounds amazingly aware and forward thinking. Trust them, but also educate them.
(And yes, please write a book!)
Oh god, if I found barf in a loaf pan I would probably have an even bigger breakdown!