Unwanted Visitors

Dear Little Brown Mouse,

Please consider this letter your final notification that you are to vacate our premises immediately. Should you not do so, the authorities will be arriving on Tuesday between the hours of 9 and 11 am to escort you from the property. I am sorry to do this.

It is not my intention to be harsh. I realize it is getting cold outside and you need someplace to go. I have nothing against you personally (I had many pet mice as a child) but as you are an uninvited guest, I find it exceedingly rude that you have chosen to also bring your family and friends. Perhaps you are a country mouse who has found your way to the city and you are not familiar with the etiquette of urban living.

Here in the city things are not like you might have found them in the country. In the country it may be acceptable to glean from the corners of the fields. Maybe even to venture into the interior crops and pick a bit of the choicest food from there. In the city it is wrong to help yourself to the food left on the counter. That was for my family’s second helpings. Just because we were in the next room dining together doesn’t mean we had abandoned the food still in the kitchen.

Another thing you ought to learn about city life is that even though the population density is rather high, and bodies are packed together on the subway, in the neighborhoods, on the streets, it is considered rude to compromise the illusion that our lives are private. One must maintain the farce that others are invisible. You made this impossible for us to do when you chose to hang out in the frying pan on the stove while we were still in the kitchen.

You have only four more days to gather your friends and family and move out. There are probably some lovely places nearby where you could go but I doubt you would be welcome at them either. Those of us who live in the city are just not open to having strangers in our homes. I wish you well in your new home but please, don’t say I sent you.

Sincerely,
Joan