Saving Mortimer Mouse

Last week Sorcha Dorcha rehearsed in Tompkins Square Park. As we were unpacking our instruments, Tyler noticed a small white mouse near the fiddle case at his feet. Having spent a fair amount of time on Lorcan Otway's Flikr site, I immediately recognized the little fellow as none other than Mortimer Mouse. Having owned an assortment of rodent pets, I didn't hesitate to scoop him up and introduce myself.

Photo by Lorcan Otway, used with permission.

Lorcan confirmed that, indeed, this was the one and only Mortimer who belonged to one of the "crusties" - a group of rather grungy young people who more or less live in the park. Since none of them were in the immediate vicinity, Lorcan left to have a look around. Mortimer stayed with me. Accustomed to being handled, he didn't mind a bit.

After about 10 minutes Lorcan returned with someone who took one look at Mortimer and said said, "yep, that's Mike's mouse." He gladly agreed to take over the temporary guardianship of little Mortimer and set off into the center of the park, presumably to find Mike.

Like I always say, you never know when you will need to save the life of a homeless person's mouse when you go off to rehearse Irish music in an East Village park.

© 2007, Linda Mason Hood
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