Of mice and not men

OF MICE AND NOT MEN

Lisa of Alco-Mouse Cottage
Chapter two
“The making of friends”

Practice and discipline were crucial to the life style Lisa had developed, she discovered when she first started doing yoga that she needed to keep up the regular practice to gain the benefits, she found this most difficult at the start because she had a mind that was forever rushing about to other places and never staying still for a second.

She woke each morning as the sun came up, had a cup of lemon tea and then did an hour of yoga practice, as she lay on her yoga mat at the end of her asanas she would allow sounds to come and go through her mind. Sometimes these sounds or thoughts wanted to lodge there for longer than a second and would start becoming larger. By breathing slowly in and out she was able to push them gently from her.

One morning after yet another successful yoga session, she was sitting quietly in lotus pose on the floor of her house, listening to the sparrows tuning up for the day. She was fortunate to live in the same hedge as a sparrow family that were renowned for their operatic twittering, this morning they were practising “Nessan Dorma”.

As they sang, Lisa drifted in and out of memory, she had been living in her new house for about three months, in that time she had decorated everything inside in bright colours, had painted the window sills, put in by a helpful ferret, he had hung a lovely door for Lisa (which she had painted yellow), and had put in some shelves for all her books and bits and pieces. Lisa had made a bedroom, a lounge, kitchen and toilet and bathroom in her book cottage and was immensely happy there. For days on end she would walk around her home touching things and peering out of the windows, feeling so pleased that she no longer lived in the smelly town.

She had wonderful neighbours. Living above her in the hawthorn hedge, apart from the sparrows, there was a robin called Charlie, he had built a nest quite high up and lived there with his partner Barbra, they were planning on staying for a while as Barbra had laid four eggs, there was also a young thrush beginning her journey of life and discovering how to build her first nest, there were dragonflies and bumble bees, busy buzzing and collecting nectar.

Joe, the blackbird lived in the woods at the other side of the canal and he called every day to make sure she had the things she needed; he was a mine of useful information about what was happening in the area. He found seeds for her to plant in her garden, buttons for her to make mobiles with, which blew in the gentle breeze, wool to pull and tease and then use as rugs for her floor.

There were three ducks that often slept on the bank near her house; they were a mother and two daughters. Lisa would listen to them at night, moaning about the state of their feathers, how worried they were at times about their weight. The mother would chide the two daughters that they had no found partners and how was she supposed to keep feeding them as well as herself, despite the conversations sounding cross they actually seemed quite happy together. Joe explained to Lisa that this was Yorkshire humour; they really liked each other a lot. He told Lisa that the ducks had left the canal at Rotherham, which was dirty and smelly and had lived here for years and years.

Behind Lisa’s house was the field she had first seen when she came here on Joe’s back. The field was teeming with life; there were rabbits, dormice, a fox, pheasant and grouse, butterflies, birds, ants, bees, and many many more. Lisa would here the gentle chatter of them as she washed her pots in the morning. Humans sadly often did not hear them, and sometimes did not even see them, unless they tripped over one or a bird flew up in front of them. When Lisa first moved to her house she was worried for a while that humans would see her home and maybe want to destroy it, but over time she realised that they did not tend to look under the hawthorn bush, nor hear the scurrying noise of her rushing from one place to another

Lisa was happy, days drifted into months and she settled into the rhythm of life at the side of the canal, each day she practised her yoga, even being brave enough to do headstands at the side of the canal in good weather, it was whilst doing this, she met the water rat, who was not as fearsome as she had heard, but was a little frightening none the less, but that could be that she looked frightening as well standing on her head. He wanted to know what she was doing upside down, Lisa, found herself, from this position, telling him about yoga and how it had helped her with her fears and concerns, how it calmed the mind and was generally good for one. The water rat huffed and puffed and said he doubted if it would do anything for him, he was always in a rush and, nothing nor anyone could slow him down, in fact he felt quite depressed with it all. He really, he said, did not have time for this chat either, and with that he was off.

However the next time the weather was good enough for Lisa to practice some more yoga outside she caught sight of the water rat watching her. She called across to him and said that if he wanted she would show him some simple yoga postures. He went bright red, which made him look most odd and said that he would really like to try as he had watched Lisa for days and she seemed so content with her lot, that he would like that if he could be as well.

So each day, for one hour, weather permitting, they met on the bank and did some simply wonderful yoga practice together. Lisa explained that they would start with exercises, and that she would then go on to show him relaxation and meditation. On the first day that it rained Lisa was worried that the water rat would not turn up, but he did, the rain did not bother him, Lisa opened her front door and she did her yoga in the dry and the rat did his in the rain.

The water rat wanted to know how Lisa had learnt all these movements, mediation and relaxation, she told him all about the magazine she had found and how she had looked for books on yoga in the houses she had lived in and had built her own kind of yoga practice out of it. Lisa explained that there was more to yoga than just standing on your head, sitting in lotus positions. The water rat, who was called Sebastian, wanted to know how to mediate and do the breathing and sometimes one would be amazed to come across Lisa and Sebastian sitting quietly at the side of the canal OMing together. They would sit for hours quietly meditating and calming their minds.

Sebastian was an excellent student and he took the practice of the yoga very seriously, there were times that he wanted to do it all day long and Lisa suggested to him that yoga was about balance and was not helpful if it became an obsession, she found that she enjoyed teaching Sebastian what she knew and that showing him how to do it made it come alive again for her. Lisa by this time had discovered that the water rat was actually very shy and rushed around so that he would not have to make conversations with anyone. Gradually over time he grew in confidence and suggested to Lisa that they run a class for other animals that wanted to learn yoga.

Where on earth, Lisa asked him would they find a room big enough to do that? No problems said Sebastian water rat, we need to ask DorDe, the dormouse.

DorDe it appeared was the local community project worker, she had started projects up and down the river bank for years and if anyone knew a space they could use it would be her. Sebastian disappeared after the practise and said he would go and find out whether there was space somewhere.

Sebastian did not return for a while, so Lisa busied herself in her garden, she had managed to find a pip from a lemon and was nursing it into a small tree, she drank hot lemon every morning and wondered whether she could ever grow her own lemons, Lisa had discovered since being on the canal side that she had green paws, she seemed to be able to grow all sorts of things that the other animals said were not going to grow. She scurried around, sniffing at this and that, patting the earth where it felt a little lose and generally making good.

Her good friend Joe would arrive fairly soon and she did like to have a little something for him to eat when he arrived, he was particularly partial to raisins and she had managed to get some in the day before. She went inside to put the kettle on for their shared cup of camomile tea.

Therefore it was no surprise to her when she heard her door open and soft footsteps come to her kitchen, she turned around and there in front of her stood the strangest mouse she had ever seen. It was a dormouse, but she was shrouded from head to toe in rainbow coloured crochet, she had a crochet hat, a crochet coat, crochet boots and a crochet bag, she had bright blue eyes that twinkled and a huge beaming smile.

My name she told Lisa is DorDe, I understand you might want some space in which to run yoga classes. Lisa had to shut her mouth, it had literally fallen open, she thought the little mouse looked so strange. Sebastian it seemed had found the dormouse, told her what he thought that they might need, DorDe, felt that she should find out from Lisa as she seemed to be the source of knowledge and Sebastian the pupil.

DorDe explained to Lisa that most of the animals that lived around this part of the canal were ones that had wanted something different from their lives, there was for example the heron who would not steal eggs nor young ducklings, the fox who refused to eat meat, the rabbits that had classes on the field about being responsible parents, the ferrets that liked rabbits, that she herself was not able to feel right about sleeping all the time, she wanted to be doing things and helping people.

DorDe said that there were lots of things happening in the area that she would be delighted to introduce Lisa to, if she wanted. They were planning to open a skills exchange project in one of the empty burrows, and if Lisa wanted to have her class there this would be great and maybe there was something Lisa might like to learn in exchange.

DorDe had a leaflet with her of all the skills on offer and the one that Lisa had been secretly hoping for leapt out at her, it was “Creative Writing”, she had always dreamt of being a writer, but had never known how to go about it, and there it was. DorDe explained that all the courses were free as they were exchanges and if Lisa wanted to go on the Creative Writing course she would introduce her to the tutor, she asked Lisa when she would like to start her yoga class and Lisa, found rather to her surprise, as this was never her intention, that she said two weeks, and suddenly she was arranging not only to meet the tutor of the Creative writing course in two days but also to go and check out the burrow with DorDe at the same time.

Two days later Lisa was standing in the biggest burrow she had ever seen, it was clean and airy and easily accessible, the floor was even and soft to lie on. DorDe explained that ever since the rabbits had been running the “Responsible Parenting” course, the numbers of unwanted rabbits had dropped and that this burrow was therefore surplus to requirements, it had once been a home for unmarried rabbits, but had not been in use for a few years now, there was also a large burrow that was used as a community centre that was once used to house rabbits who went off the rails as youngsters, but the “Responsible parenting” course seemed to have had an affect on this service as well. So that burrow had been used for the community centre. Lisa suggested she would start the course on a Wednesday afternoon in a fortnight and would see how it went after 12 weeks.

Lisa told Sebastian the next morning that she was surprised at the speed with which decisions had been made, she had made one decision about the yoga course, and another about the Creative writing course and was starting the class in two days time.

Sebastian told her that most people said the same thing, that when you met DorDe, you suddenly found you were doing all sorts of things you never imagined.