Climbing the Third Stair

I have a collection of notes from my week, but first I want to note something for myself to ponder later. At some point this week my assistant manager and I were discussing something and she announced, "This is just something I've noticed in my life, but I think the people who talk the most about peace and love have the hardest time actually showing it to people around them." I was dumbstruck, as I had made the same observation years ago and had never imagined that it would be corroborated by someone half my age and not nearly as cynical. After a moment I told her that I had noticed the same thing, and that I had no explanation. Its root, I guess, is some massive disconnect between how the individual acts and how they perceive their acts, and it makes me wonder where my disconnects are. ( My week, let me show you it. )

This week I set into motion a series of actions that will, if all goes to plan, result in my moving into a new apartment at the end of this month.

I am scared out of my wits.

My future landlord still needs to call my references and give the final OK, so I'm in the position of telling my current landlord I'm leaving before I have totally and completely found a place to go to. This is in a certain sense a false fear: I've lived in my current apartment for over a decade, and in all that time I have paid my rent on time and refrained from knocking holes in the walls and setting things on fire. What more could you want in a tenant?

Then there is the issue of rent. The space I'm going to is over a hundred more than what I'm paying now. (Admittedly, my current rent is artificially low: the place needs some fixing up and my landlord is too honest to charge me full market rates on it until he does so.) However, some of the increase will be offset by the fact I'll be within walking distance of work (and a laundromat!) and will no longer need to buy a monthly bus pass.

But that increase will get me some important advantages. For one thing, a friend of mine is currently living in that space and she reports that it is bat-free. I've been sleeping with a light on since the Bat Incident last year, so that is fairly important to me. And the new place as a nice garden plot that I can take over, and fruit trees! That I can pick from! It also has an (unheated) sun room for my plant collection, and a really nice bathtub.

Most importantly--the new place is a two-bedroom apartment, so I will be able to have an office. This is strongly compelling. I will never be a full-time freelance writer; I don't have the temperment for it. But I would like to be more of a writer than I am now, and I think having space dedicated to writing would help. (And needing to make rent should help with the incentive! ;-) )

So...I'm taking the plunge. I suspect this is not a good idea, but I'll never know if I don't try.

I was woken up this morning by the sound of something moving about in a box on the floor next to my bed. This was highly unpleasant, because that box is full of old L5R cards a friend of mine gave me when she moved to California and the idea that it was mouse-infested made me unhappy indeed. I turned on the lamp on my nightstand and the noise stopped, so I got up and went to the bathroom while I considered my options.

The noise started up again, so I went and sat on my bed and leaned over the box, wondering if I could just grab it and throw it and the mice out into the driveway. That was an attractive thought, but somewhat risky as I'd have to dash all the way through my living room and kitchen to get to the door outside. As I pondered the matter the noise got louder and something dark, ugly, and wrinkled crawled out. I reared back in alarm and then threw myself down on the bed, which gave me the perfect opportunity to appreciate the contrast the repulsiveness of a bat on the ground with the beauty of one in the air.

Now I was really, really unhappy. I've had bats in my apartment before, but the problem had gone away after my shower was replaced. (The new shower unit fit snugly into the wall, which presumably eliminated their route into my living space.) I don't dislike bats at all--I'm in favor of anything that eats its weight in mosquitoes--but I have a highly developed aversion to being in the same room as a wild animal. I still get the jitters when I think about the time a squirrel fell through my bedroom ceiling.

I beat a retreat to the bathroom and closed the door to reassess the situation. I knew that Animal Control would send out an officer to collect the bat, but the phone was in the bedroom, along with the bat. Call me a wuss, but I find myself unable to look up phone numbers when there is a bat circling around my head. On the other hand, the door between my bedroom and the living room was open so the bat could move away from the phone on its own. I opened up the door and watched and when it flitted out into the living room I dashed out of the bathroom and closed the door. Now I had a bat-free space to let my fingers do the walking. I looked up Animal Control, dialed the number and let the automatic phone tree shift me over to the 911 dispatch to contact the on-call AC officer.

Said officer showed up in about 15 minutes with her high-tech bat-catching equipment--a pair of heavy leather gloves and a plastic drink cup and lid. (I note that the professionals seem to be very casual about this kind of thing; the last AC officer I had used an old cool-whip container with holes punched in the lid.) Sadly for all parties involved, the bat had meanwhile gone to ground again and we had no success in trying to locate it. After poking around for awhile the officer brightly said that their offices opened at 7 am and I could call back at any time. Then she left.

I have made my morning pot of tea and am thinking of breakfast. It's hard for me to get enthusiastic about it, knowing that my kitchen might be batty-trapped.

I have decided that I need to go buy a butterfly net. The AC officer said that it was ok for me to release the bat if I caught it, as long as it hadn't had any contact with me or a pet. I don't have pets, so that only leaves me. I'm pretty sure that I would have noticed if the bat had bitten me, so that seems to be good.

Now I just need to figure out where one buys a butterfly net, and gather the courage to hang out in a darkened apartment until my prey makes their move. I can just feel Yaichiro and Gempachi rolling their eyes at me now--being afraid some something that weighs about the same as a butter-stick and eats insects seems a little silly. The really frustrating thing is that I know I'd be much calmer if I had a Girl Scout in the area, because then I'd have someone to model good behavior for. I have a variety of Molly Grue's problem in The Last Unicorn--it's easy to be brave for someone else, but what could one do if one could be brave for oneself?