I'm a sucker for a wildlife sighting.
Living in the suburbs means you can't get too fussy. You take what
you can get. This afternoon I walked to the supermarket to do some
grocery shopping. I needed the walk. Needed to get out and get moving. It was late arvo and the streets of Camberwell
weren't vacant by a long shot but were still fairly quiet. I cut
through a one-way alleyway near the supermarket and as I was walking
past a garden bed full of hardy green council appointed plants I
heard a noise in the undergrowth. I feel like a part of me is always
listening out for the sounds of something interesting on the side of
whatever path I'm walking along. Usually if I do see whatever made
the noise it's just a bird, most likely an Indian Myna, fossicking
around for food. However sometimes it pays off. I once saw an echidna
after hearing a slight noise off to my left while cycling. That's
pretty much the mother-lode when it comes to animal sightings for me.
Don't expect anything like that in this story.
The noise I heard this afternoon was
definitely not a bird. Birds aren't that noisy. It sounded like
something small but not insignificant was crashing through the
undergrowth. More concerned about quick concealment than keeping
quiet. I couldn't see anything though so carried on walking.
I bought lots of groceries, paid for my shopping and walked back
the way I had come, a carry-bag full of food in each hand. It was
only when I heard the noise again at exactly the same spot did I
recall I'd heard it earlier. An initial noise like an animal ducking
for cover, followed by a subsequent noise as it pushed further into
the plants as it saw me looking for it. On the footpath in front of
me, was... I don't know. It might have been the remains of a melted
ice cream. Or a dog's vomit? I want to think it was ice
cream. I figured this was what had tempted this animal out from the
safety of it's home.
My curiosity peaked, I decided to see
what it was. I walked about 5 metres past the site of the noise and
then stopped and turned. I got out my phone and turned it on,
pretending I was checking for messages because clearly whatever it
was would understand that humans get very pre-occupied when they
check their phones. Ok, so getting out the phone was probably more so
that any people driving through the supermarket carpark wouldn't
think that I'm a crazy person staring at the ground for an overly
long time. Checking a phone is more acceptable than looking for the source of strange noises.
Around thirty seconds passed and my
gaze wandered for a moment and then moved back to the sticky-looking spot on the footpath and there
it was. A mouse! Or maybe a rat. It was either a large mouse or a
small rat. I suspect just a mouse. It was cute! Mice are cute. Just
as long as they aren't in your house, they are cute. I'm pretty sure that's a scientific fact. He was very busily eating away at the ground, trying to get as much of
whatever it was into his little gob before the next person walked
past and interrupted him. I didn't want to interrupt him. I was happy
for him to eat his fill so I watched him eat for about a minute then
I turned and was on my way.
So no, it wasn't something cool like a
crazed pet turtle or a blue tongued lizard or an echidna. It was just
a mouse. Yet I still really enjoyed seeing it. A sighting of a wild
animal that very much didn't want to be seen and yet a little
persistence paid off and I got a small glimpse of a life pretty different to mine yet doing just what I do regularly - eating. (No, not eating ice cream off the ground! Just eating.)
I had been feeling a tad flat earlier
but oddly, a mouse sighting buoyed me. As I walked back up the Burke
Rd hill, I thought about my weekend, the parts of it I enjoyed, those
parts that annoyed me, the bits that left me nonplussed, and I
decided that on balance, it had been a pretty good weekend. It was
ending on a high too. In the space of a Sunday I had:
- Cycled 24kms
- Had brunch with friends where I ate great food, drank nice coffee and talked to great people
- Sat in the backyard with my shirt off soaking up a little vitamin D (got to enjoy it while the waning autumn sun can manage it!) while reading a good chunk of a novel.
- Eaten healthily (this is a work in progress but I'm enjoying giving it a shot)
- Seen a mouse eating it's dinner
I'd say this well and truly cancels out
a whole Saturday spent at a database conference, my team's football loss and me
missing the wonderful Ruth while she does wonderful things over in
Nepal. Anyway, life is all about perception. You can choose to focus on the negative or you can focus on things that might be little (like a mouse) but that still bring joy.
Life is good. Quite often! Of course, it's better experienced when one is not too tired so I'm going to end this post here and go to
bed.
