the sleeping giant
awoken by the screaming spouse
I could hear the screaming from here.
Did you?
Despite being half way across the country, I could tell my wife was upset.
No, we weren’t on the phone at the time.
Her voice however has a special way of moving through space when large rodents are involved.
It was her second rat of the day and this one may have pushed her over the edge.
Before going into details dear reader, let’s roll things back a bit.
Dartmouth is a port town. There are grain elevators across the harbour.
Given this?
There are rats. Lots of rats. Special rats.
I’ve seen wharf rats so big they’d win a fight with a moose.
My part of town is just down the road from where the town dump was when my dad was a kid.
That area is currently being dug up for new buildings.
And the long term, bald tailed residents?
They’ve been on the move.
And my yard with its compost and berries and veggies and chicken feed?
It’s a meca for rats.
As such, I’ve grown quite fond of making warfarin and peanut butter - little bombs of oil and nutty rat poison.
Before they die, the rats get weird. They come out in the day time. They look for food and water. One even dyed its hair blue and threw soup at paintings.
Vermin are always going to act like vermin. I warned my wife before leaving.
Honey, I’ve been feeding the rats a lot of poison lately. Don’t be surprised if you find any funny shit going down while I’m gone.
It seems today was the day for funny shit to go down.
It began when my son went out to check on the chickens water.
He found this:
For those of you without the pleasure of eyesight, that’s a very dead rat floating in a blue farm bucket filled with water.
The text message that followed said Wish you were here.
I responded in the most appropriate way possible:
No compassion, just mockery.
I phoned shortly after.
So, you miss me do you?
No. I just wish you were here to get rid of the fucking rat in the chicken water.
As a solid, sensitive and loving husband I responded appropriately by laughing more - louder and longer this time.
Then, with her mother in the room, I put her on speaker phone as she gagged and panicked while attempting to dispose of the rat.
My mother in law and I?
We had big belly laughs at my wife’s expense.
It was glorious - truly satisfying.
You see, despite killing rats, I am sympathetic to their existence.
As a troll, I come by it honestly. Born in the year of the rat, I’m also a Scorpio - which according to some native astrology is considered a snake.
Rat, scorpion and snake?
If my wife wanted sympathy and compassion she married the wrong man.
There’s no nurturing in me when it comes to her panic about rats.
I’m basically vermin.
Ten minutes later was when I heard the screams that carried over a thousand miles.
There was a second rat - this one in the shed where we keep the chicken feed.
It seems as it entered its death throes it needed one last supper of corn and grain.
The problem? It decided to dine at the exact moment my wife went in there looking to feed the chickens.
I wish you were here…
I laughed again.
I’m glad that I’m not was my reply.
Stay foolish you fiends.