Just sitting down to write a short blog before
heading off to Monarch / Raynesford for week-end duties, I heard a
scratching sound about 10 feet from me in the living room. Moses, lying
near me, noticed too, and looked at me to take control of the matter. I
said, "It's Bela!" I walked over to a small box with computer
accessories, and there s/he was, in the box, seemingly trying to climb
out. We may have awakened the creature from sleep, but bats usually
sleep in high points in a home, such as a corner of a room. Taking a
tip from parishioner Patrick Simpson, I put on leather gloves, handy on
the hearth, and picked up Bela. Carefully cradling the bat in my
gloved hands, I could not unlock the screen door, so I went to the
garden door. I had to slide one hand out of the glove, unlock the door,
slide my hand back in, carefully to carry Bela outside. Zoe and Moses
were with me. Bela took off inside the door, and flew to the lowest
level, into the laundry. Looking up high, I found the bat on a screen,
near the ceiling, and reaching up with gloved hands, gently pulled it
down. Escorted by pups, I carried Bela outside, and released the
little fellow onto a high wood pile, where dogs cannot reach. Quickly
the bat sized up the situation, and took off, making a few loops around
us, and around the yard, and then headed south towards the
neighbor's. Bela has returned to nature--something Rousseau could
never do, despite his efforts.
I first saw him on 1 August, at
midnight, with the full moon, and today, 4 August, just before 1 pm, he
flew away. A three-day visit by a fascinating creature. Why some people
are petrified of bats, I do not know. Bela is dark brown to black,
with wings of same color. And yes, Bela is surely a bat, and not a
bird, not a mouse, not a vampire.
