COVID, Marigold, and Favoritism or What Everyone Needs

 I bought Marigold on an impulse. It was July of 2020. I was wearing a black muumuu patterned with funky colorful animals and a black, fabric mask. I was going to Petco pet supplies and then to Target. The two were situated directly beside one another. I have never failed to look at the mice when at a pet store that carries mice. They're often my first stop. Before buying bedding or pellets or whatever. Sometimes I sit on the floor--often, I've noticed, the glass tanks of mice are near the bottom of the small mammals shelves. I suspect this is because more people find hamsters cute than do mice. Whatever. I sat on the floor on this day in July. It had been months since I'd hugged another person. The world was tumultuous and interacting with it was more stressful than ever. 

So anyway. I sat on the floor of a Petco, wearing my cutest muumuu, and as I stared at this little orange mouse: she stared back. 

I took this picture of the mouse I'd saw and texted it to my friends asking should I get this mouse? Then I went to Target and wandered around texting with my friends who all seemed very supportive of my impulse to take this little creature home. 

I do not, actually, recommend impulse buying a pet of any kind. It was not smart of me to buy Marigold that day. I had two adult mice at home and no knowledge of the care you ought to put into introducing new mice to a habitat. I also lived with my sibling in their house and bought this mouse without even mentioning the idea to them first. 

Still, I could have done nothing other than what I did. After wandering through Target and loading up my car, I returned to the pet store, fetched a sales assistant, and pointed at this little orange mouse. "I'd like to buy that one, please." 

I made my first mistake as soon as I got home and put the car in park: I opened the little cardboard carrier case I had been sent home with. I wanted to admire my new little friend and, if possible, to reassure her. She sprang from the box, and would have, I'm sure, leapt clean over my shoulder, escaping into the wilds of my Kia Soul. I caught her, though, next to my ear. In my memory, I caught her mid-air, though I suppose it is more likely that she was on my shoulder. 

She seemed smaller than a thimble, lighter than a breath, faster than a blink. I quickly maneuvered her back into the box and sealed it. I held her again once inside. 

There is a proper way to introduce new mice into an established habitat of mice, but as previously mentioned I knew nothing of it. I didn't even know to look for it. I knew she was much smaller than Luna and Sage. I knew she was already frightened. So, I cut a small hole into an otherwise closed small cardboard box so that she could enter and exit the box at will but the other two wouldn't be able to follow her into the box in case she wanted space from them. 

What one ought to do is keep a new mouse in a separate cage altogether. Quarantining them incase they have a transmittable illness. Isn't it laughable, now, that during COVID--two months after my sibling had been exposed to COVID and we self-quarantined--I had not considered a small mouse may have been carrying an infectious disease that could transmit to the mice I already had? She did not, so, things turned out all right. 

After you have determined your new mouse is not ill, you begin swapping bedding between cages, introducing the smell of the new mouse to the established cage and the smell of the other mice to the new. Then you might introduce them in a third location. If there are squabbles, you may tap their noses with vanilla so they all smell the same. Depending on how the new mice do together, you might want to remove toys and hideaways, adding them in slowly as the mice grow accustomed to one another. You may clean out the primary cage, holding the other mice in a third location, and letting the new mouse run around establishing their scent throughout the cage before reintroducing the others. 

I did none of this, though. Nor did I do it the next time I introduced new mice to a cage. Instead, I made a very small hole in a box and hoped for the best. I do not know how Marigold must have felt, tiny and new and in an unfamiliar location. I know she hid in the box as one of my other mice, Sage, faced with a puzzle she was hell-bent on solving, worked throughout the night to get the box open. When I awoke the next morning, I found Marigold hiding in the nest Luna and Sage previously occupied and Luna and Sage sleeping in the box I'd prepared for Marigold. 

The second day, I again formed a box with an opening only big enough for Marigold. She once again entered it. Sage, once again, spent the night working the box open. On the third day, Marigold huddled with the other two. 

When she was little, Marigold had an anxious and possessive personality. She was incredibly fast and nervous. She would hold onto Sage in particular in a way that reminded me of one of my cousins' children who, when she was two, would declare "MY mama" any time she entered a room that her mother was in. Marigold would pester the other two so I would take her out of the cage for long bits of time to give them a break. Since it was COVID, I only worked half of the week. So, most days I could get her out of the cage for 30+ minutes or so whenever she started pestering the others. 

When I lived with my sibling, we didn't have any predator pets. So, I wasn't too worried about letting her run around on the couch or atop my bed: I was poised to scoop her up before she had a chance to escape and I was nearby to quickly clean up after her. 

Was Marigold my favorite mouse? I would have been loathe to admit it. I have a very strong sense of justice and fairness. Even now, years since all three were buried, I fear the accusation of favoritism. I can say confidently, though, that few mice have loved me half as much as Marigold did. 

When young, I handled her frequently to allow Luna and Sage breaks from her. She had so much energy, too, and I perceived such a longing for exploration from her. Twice she terrified me by escaping into the bowels of the couch. She was quickly retrieved and returned to her cage, but still. I bought her a plastic ball to run around in, and then discarded it after realizing she mostly just sat in it looking nervous. Later, I read that mice can easily get injured in those plastic balls by getting their feet caught in the airholes. 

As I mentioned, when I bought Marigold, Luna and Sage were already grown. They each a little over a year old. Ah, the folly of the impetuous. I bought Marigold in July. In September, I noticed a lump on Luna's stomach and some signs of aging in Sage's features.

Throughout September, Sage lost weight until she and Marigold were opposite ends of the same small size. Marigold, small and new, with growth ahead of her. Sage, small and old, shrinking. At the same time, Luna's tumors multiplied and grew. It was heartbreaking. Along with the heartbreak, though, was fear. 

Mice are social creatures. It is not good for them to live alone. So, here I had a small orange mouse, barely four months old, with two geriatric companions. Even if they lived to two years old, a feat for a mouse plucked from a pet store, Marigold would certainly find herself a lone mouse. 

Sage died at the beginning of October. I was devastated. I was also, increasingly, worried about Marigold's imminent solitude. After a great deal of thought, I determined to buy two, new little mice. I got them at the end of October. I had taken a couple of days off to host a virtual writers retreat that would kick off NaNoWriMo, which, I believed, would make an opportune time to introduce two new mice to the cage as I would be home for four days straight to supervise their interactions. 

I did not, as you may have gleaned, yet research the proper way to introduce new mice to an established cage. I was just planning to do as I had done before. 

Enter Goblin and Sprout. Cue Marigold's next major stress. Marigold did not like having two new mice in the cage. They stressed her out. She would perch on a high point in the cage, eyes wide, monitoring and would chase them back into their dwelling if they attempted to do anything in their new home. I drew this after the first night: 

For the first day or two, Luna made herself Goblin and Sprout's protector. Their mother. Then she passed, and Marigold made herself their tormentor. 

When they emerged to get water, she would let them take one or two drinks from the water bottle, but as soon as they took a third sip, she would chase them away. She would pounce on them when they would go to retrieve seeds. If you are going to introduce new mice into an established habitat, it is worthwhile to add a second water bottle, to prevent one mouse from staking control over the water source. It is also wise to "scatter feed" instead of containing all of the food in one dish or pile. So, I added in an additional water bottle. I had always scatter fed because I think food dishes for mice are just silly. 

It didn't matter. Marigold, it seemed, was a bully and I was distressed. I had brought home these little mice to be her friends, but instead she was their tormentor. I don't know how long I waited, hoping they would adjust to one another. There wasn't bloodshed...but there were frequent squabbles. Anytime I held Sprout, she would chatter, long strings of little tcks. I imagined her attempting to tattle on the behavior of the cage. "I know," I would tell her. "I'm sorry. She's just...anxious, I think." 

Soon, I bought a separate cage. Initially, I had planned to use it as something like a time out for Marigold whenever she would bully the others, but, well, she was constantly bullying the others. It didn't seem like she even let herself sleep. So, instead, I moved her into the separate cage. 

Even in her separate cage, no longer a danger or a nuisance to the other mice, I handled her far more often than the other two. Mice are, as previously mentioned, social creatures. If she couldn't regularly socialize with her own species, she would, instead have to socialize with me. 

Again, I ask, was Marigold my favorite mouse? She got more attention than the others. I bought her a ball and a couple of friends and a cage of her own. Later, I bought her a bigger cage of her own. She got sick and I drove all over the metro looking for an emergency vet who would see a mouse without an appointment. She got better and then sick again and the second time I drove her an hour away and spent $200 on medicine. 

Sometimes, when she was sick, I would let her sit in my bra for hours at a time. When she was well, I would let her explore the couch or climb a mint plant or crawl atop my head. 

Surrounding COVID, the country was asking itself what is fair? I suppose, really, the country has been asking itself this for ages. Or, maybe not asking itself, but rather declaring this is fair, that is fair, this isn't fair, that isn't fair. Consider, for example, the concept of masking. I remember a lot of rhetoric surrounding COVID that suggested it would not be "that serious" for most people--only the elderly, individuals with chronic conditions, and folks with weakened immune systems. It isn't fair, some able-bodied disbelievers said, that I have to wear a mask in public! If you're scared stay home! It did not matter to them that doing something that was, at worst, a nuisance ensured that the space would still be accessible to the people with higher risk health factors.

For the past decade, I have given a lot of thought to what is fair and what is just and what do we owe one another. Back to my mouse. Was it fair for Marigold to live alone? Was it fair for her to get more attention than the others? Was it fair that I bought her toys I never even tried with the others? Was it fair was it fair was it fair? Yes, I have decided. Was she my favorite mouse? Yes, or no, or they're all my favorites in ways and at times. This was simpler than that. Fair, I think, is for everyone to get what they need. 

Luna and Sage had needed occasional breaks from a rambunctious and anxious mouse. Marigold needed space and time to run about. Goblin and Sprout needed a home that was safe. Marigold needed social interaction. Everyone needs to be able to go to the grocery store and, what that means, is that in 2020 some of us needed to suck it up and wear a mask to ensure that others weren't getting sick. 

Anyway, one final photo of Marigold before I leave you.