Here's a juvenile mouse I saved from my cat. I instinctively jumped in to save this creature rather than have my cat torture it. She doesn't eat them, just mauls them until they're in pieces. She gets feed but of course her natural instinct is to jump in and rip apart this creature.
It's funny. As soon as the mouse was in my hands it seemed a lot more calm. After some time it even began to trust me, it was in shock for some time, and had a damaged leg. I thought it best to let it heal somewhere away from my cat so I placed in it a cage I use to use for my hermit crabs.
A few hours later I hear tapping. I look over at the cage and the mouse is jumping furiously, trying to escape from the cage. I let it back outside into a field and it jumped off. I was hoping it was still okay with it's leg. Well, my cat caught this mouse multiple times. The last time I saw it though, outside my house it was still limping a little but it looked fair better. I felt happy that I could give this mouse another chance.
Although a few weeks later my cat caught another mouse and brought it into my room. I pounced on her trying to get it, and she kept running away growling. She had the thing mangled, and was biting down on it so hard it let out a massive squeal. It's scream was very distressing, and I tried my hardest to pry it from her mouth and finally I did. I saw its leg was bleeding and completely limp. I pulled it up slowly to me and looked into it's eyes. I could tell it was is extreme pain.
I was then presented with a choice.. Do I try and heal this creature back to health when there is likely no chance of recovery or do I stop it's suffering? I took one last look into its eyes, felt it staring back at me and almost telling me it was ready to leave.
I felt very panicked at this point. I did not want to take it's life. I couldn't think of a more worse thing than taking a life. But I had to do it.. I had many instances of how I could end it's life rushing through my head. Do I throw it to the ground? No, that's so violent and horrible. Do I hit it with something? Just as horrible.
No, drowning it and this was the only way I could do it. I filled up a glass of water and held the mouse in the water. As I lowered it further and further it struggled a little and I felt tears at the back of my eyes. Thankfully it didn't struggle for much longer and took a breath. It went limper than it was before.. I brought it out of the water and looked at it's lifeless eyes once more and just began to cry. I mean I really cried, I felt terrible. I'd never taken a life like this before, through an accident and definitely not purposely. It took me some time to fully believe I had done the right thing.
So that's really where I think my interest in this project and the story began. I think maybe my creation of this creature is maybe an over-spill of my way of dealing with taking a life - that perhaps I can create a new one. Perhaps I can bring a soul back. It probably sounds silly, but I think it is one of the core reasons behind this project. I don't want to evoke this story through my project, because it was a deeply personal experience - you can't recreate something like that..
And if you do, what is it? Just a recreation.. No. I want to do more than that. I've always preferred my films to be a lot more open. I just thought this story was important to mention, and important to explain why I want to bring this thing to life. I want to tell some sort of story with it, yes, but one of the reasons it exists is because of this experience.
