The Guide often says, "When we are Here, everything teaches us." Recently we have been taught by mice. It's not that experiencing mice around the buildings is a new thing. After all, we do live in the middle of 320 acres at the end of a dirt road, and we are aware that we share this land with many creatures. We'd just prefer that they stay outside of the rammed earth walls, and when that is not the case, we are presented with a wonderful workshop in “everything is the Buddha.”
Our approach to critters inside the buildings has always been to gently remove them to a different location. We have bug buses in every hermitage, outshower, and building for spiders, bugs, and the like. But when nighttime scurrying was heard around the utility room, it became apparent that another contraption was called for. We took a 30-gallon trash can, greased the inside of the can with margarine, and placed a generous dollop of peanut butter in the bottom of it. The hope was that the mouse would go for the peanut butter but not be able to climb back out of the trash can. It worked! One morning, we found two cute little things perched safely beside the peanut butter. Then we carefully loaded the trash can and mice into the truck and drove them away from neighborhood residences to a large open field and let them go. Watching them bound away through the wild grasses made one's heart sing. They looked so happy to be back in nature!
As the stewards of this property, our responsibility lies in finding the openings where they can get inside, deter them from entering, and remove them when they do. To do this, one has to step outside of conditioned mind and think like a mouse. With great diligence, we searched the area in question for any possible openings. Once found, they were boarded up. Then, learning that they dislike the smell of peppermint, we mixed up some diatomaceous earth + peppermint oil and spread it around as a way to communicate, "Not here please, not here." The whole project required so much attention and care, and was such an expression of “everything is the Buddha,” that it's hard to distinguish who was releasing whom to freedom!
Living in the oneness of Life is a joy and, one can easily project, a blessing to the earth. In deep gratitude for the teaching that everything is the Buddha.
Gasshō,
Rebecca