The Little Christmas Barn Mouse

by Paula Caldwell

“Thou shalt love the Lord God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thyself.” Luke 10:27

We all know that God set down his rules for human in the Commandments. This first and great commandment found in the Gospel of Luke, became known as the ‘Parable of the Good Samaritan.’

The moral of the story is that regardless of what culture or religion we’re from, we should be willing to help people in need, even if they’re different from us. I extend this to all God’s creatures.

Christmas is a time we feel the pull, or push in some cases, to help people in need. Charity towards others is at it’s strongest at this time the year. There are so many organizations looking for our support for shelters, children who will be without toys, families without clothing and food, or the elderly without companionship. How to decide on how best to give back?

Every year my husband and I try to find a different cause to support and last year we decided to pick two ornaments off the Angel Tree at our township office. Each ornament represents a child who has asked Santa for something for Christmas. It turned out to be a lot of fun shopping for their perfect gift.

After dropping off the gifts that evening, after supper I made my way out to the barn to bring in the horses for the night, and to give them their warm Christmas mash.

Once the horses were settled and eating, I heard a scratching noise coming from the feed room. Annoyed there was some critter in my barn, I was surprised to find a little field mouse at the bottom of a large plastic bucket, close to frozen. He/she was looking for food and had become trapped.

I picked him up and knew he needed to be warmed so I brought him into the house, yes into the house, and put him in one of my husband’s rubber boots to thaw in our entryway.

A little while later he/she had come to and was trying to escape from the boot, so I got dressed again and brought him back out to the barn, where he was treated to his own little Christmas dinner which the horses kindly donated from their feed.

After tucking in the horses and turned out the light to go back into the house, my heart was full.

Merry Christmas everyone!