handy-man

My husband is upstairs trying to catch a bat. Once or twice a year one gets into our living quarters from the eaves or the attic and causes quite a stir. His attempts at trapping the unhappy animal have turned into a spectator sport tonight. S just arrived down reporting that the bat has flown into Anna's room and Kevin can't catch it until the light is turned on. He has to go into the room to get to the light and he "is going in with a sheet over his head and he is screaming. Did you hear that screaming?" I did, in fact, hear some screaming, but it sounded distinctly young and female.

I suspect my husband is enjoying the drama a bit too much! But I can't blame him! If you end up with the unpleasant job of catching the bat (or the rat or the mice or the raccoons in the garage) you might as well enjoy it! Last week he rescued a baby robin from the dog's mouth and made it a make-shift nest in a box in the fork of a maple tree. For days we watched the parents fly in several times a day to feed the baby. My husband checked it every morning and it seemed hearty and energetic, but yesterday a weasel (or a house cat. . . ) found the box and the tiny bird met its Maker, despite Kevin's heroic resuce from the poodle.

My husband and sons not only have to act as animal control officers for our own house, but they service the neighborhood. We live across the street from a fierce feminist, a full professor at an Ivy League school who is just returned from an international round-table at Oxford on the Rights of Women. But she still calls my husband when a rat drowns in her toilet or a bat appears upstairs in her ancient house! We never rag her about it, but we do always smile. Some things you still need a man for.