I recently listened to a short novel called Sipsworth by Simon Van Booy. The gentle story was a welcome change from the previous novel I'd read, The Vaster Wild by Lauren Groff.
Vaster is the story of a young woman who flees from Jamestown in the winter of 1609-10, the "starving time." The premise seems appropriate for a YA survival novel, but the book itself is no such thing. Before she runs, food is so scarce during a siege by the native people that the Jamestown immigrants resort to cannibalism. The flight itself through the winter wilderness is also brutal, and the story is not about survival, but she has no choice.
Sipsworth, on the other hand, is the tale of an 83-year-old woman who accidentally befriends a field mouse, and the novel is very much like a children's story for adults. It is sweet and somewhat unpredictable in its exploration of aging and living with loss through the relationship between Helen and the mouse she names Sipsworth.
I thought of Sipsworth a few minutes ago when a little mouse ran across my classroom. By this time of year the mice typically have moved outside; their appearances, so common in the cold winter months, dwindle to few or none. Rather than timidly hugging the walls as his kin usually do, this little one today explored the open spaces fearlessly, scampering within a yard or two of my desk until I raised a hand and it retreated behind one of the bookshelves.
Years ago, when a cat of ours deposited a white mouse, stunned but unharmed, on the doormat on his way in for dinner, we kept him in a tank of cedar shavings for the rest of his life. Even so, despite Sipsworth and Fibber (our mouse), I do not want to make any mouse my pet, although I guess I would if it became necessary.
Life Lesson: If you ever look behind, and don't like what you find, there's something you should know: you've got a place to go. ~Michael Jackson "Ben"
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