The Dust Mouse

Once there was a little girl named Demetra who never mopped under her bed. Before long, the space under her bed was full of dust. Little bits of dust clumped together into dust lumps. The dust lumps clumped together into dust balls. Finally, from the biggest dust ball, a dust mouse was born. It was about the size and color of a real mouse, but it looked fuzzier and dustier.

As soon as the dust mouse was born, she was hungry. Luckily, dust mice eat dust, and there was plenty of that under the bed. The dust mouse ate dust and grew bigger and bigger. She got as big as a cat--- she knew because sometimes Demetra's cat came under the bed to play with her. Before long, the dust mouse had eaten all the dust, and she didn't fit under Demetra's bed any more. She was too big.



The dust mouse decided it was time to find a better place to live. She chose the closet under the stairs. There was more room there, and there was plenty of dust to eat in the dust bag of the vacuum cleaner. Sometimes Demetra's mama wondered why the vacuum cleaner's dust bag never got full, but she was happy she didn't have to empty it any more. The dust mouse grew bigger and bigger with all that dust to eat. Before long, she didn't fit in the closet any more. She was too big. And there wasn't any other good place in the house for a dust mouse to live. The dust mouse was sad. She liked living in the house with Demetra and her mama and papa. She liked it when Demetra's friends came over to play. Demetra was the sort of girl who only played with children who were kind to dust mice.

But the dust mouse knew it was time to find a new home. Someplace with a lot of room, and where there was enough dust to eat. The dust mouse remembered Demetra talking about the city dump. That was a very big place. And all the dust from all the vacuum cleaner bags in the city was taken to the city dump by the garbage trucks. There would be lots of dust to eat. So the dust mouse got a ride to the dump on one of the garbage trucks.

The dump was a nice home for a dust mouse. There were hundreds of garbage bags with vacuum cleaner dust bags in them, so she had a lot to eat. There was plenty of room to grow. And the dust mouse did grow. She grew bigger than a garbage dumpster. She grew bigger than the garbage trucks that came every week bringing more bags of dust. Soon she was even bigger than the little house where the dump man lived.

But the dust mouse was lonely in her new home. She missed Demetra and the other children who played in Demetra's house. There were no children playing at the dump, and that made the place seem sad and quiet. After a while, she decided to go back to live at Demetra's house.

But getting to Demetra's house was not easy. Maria and Rolf, the garbage truck drivers, tried to give the dust mouse a ride to Demetra's house on the garbage truck. But the dust mouse was too big to ride on the garbage truck any more. So she had to walk the whole way. She walked through farmers' fields, and got all covered with dirt. She walked through the fishing pond, and got all covered with pond mud. She walked through the park behind Demetra's house, and got all covered with grass seed from the grass seeding machine. Finally she came to Demetra's backyard fence. But she was too big to fit in Demetra's backyard.

The dust mouse was tired from all the walking she did. She wanted to take a long nap before deciding what to do next.

The dust mouse slept for a long time. She slept when the leaves fell from the trees in fall. She slept when the snow fell in winter. She didn't wake up until after the snow melted in spring.

When the dust mouse woke up, she found out she couldn't move from the spot where she'd been sleeping. She thought maybe the mud and dirt and grass seed on her outside had got stuck in place over the winter. But she didn't mind. She liked being outdoors in the fresh air and sunshine. She even wished she could stay there for always.

The spring rains soon made the grass seed sprout. Soon the dust mouse was covered with growing green grass.

"Look, a big green hill! Let's play on it!" said a voice the dust mouse knew well. It was Demetra. Soon all the neighborhood children were playing on the big green hill. They came back every day to play. Before long, grownups donated playground equipment to be put at the top of the hill, so even more children came to play. And the big green hill, which had been born a little dust mouse under Demetra's bed, was happy and stayed there for always.

c 1994 Nissa Annakindt
The moral of the story--- never mop. Ever.