OF RATS AND MEN

"Something came along, grabbed ahold of me and it felt just like a ball & chain.”- Janis Joplin

It's right and only visible eye resembled a tiny black pearl and was fixed on me, unmoving, and appeared lifeless if not for the spontaneous five to six blinks per minute it averaged with several other of the over two thousand species of vermin known as the order Rodentia. And apart from a couple of domestic breeds and Disney’s resident big cheese, either it nor any of the other representatives of its genus group, classified as Murids, would top anyone’s list of mammals you just can’t get enough of. Still, the one I had cornered here in our backyard, exhausted and terrified, yet still defiant, was unique among its Murid brethren. This one had managed over time to carve out a singularly repugnant reputation for itself that far and away distinguished it from the rest, however prejudicially regarded any of those might be. This one, generally considered more than worthy of the 'scourge to mankind' status assigned to it in centuries past, and doubtless in all those yet to come, was a rat.

We first became acquainted, this particular scourge and I, one evening as I was checking on the two traps I’d set at the base of the eight by ten-foot Home Depot in stashed we'd had installed in our backyard some thirty years before. It came in several prefab sections and was assembled in an afternoon’s time by two seemingly less than interested Depot installers. Its likelihood for a spread in Architectural Digest was a long shot but overall, it’s held up fairly well. The door sticks and the back side has settled a bit after years of rain and drought and rain again, but there was still ample room underneath it or the Manson family of rats who had settled in and were not particularly particular.

There are two types of rat traps popular among the general, rodent loathing public. First, there’s the much larger version of the classic mouse trap that most of us have had some experience with.

It features a rectangular shaped wooden base with a spring loaded ‘arm bar’, the term generally applied to the most lethal element of the device, although I have heard it referred to as the ‘kill bar’, but I assume that label is mostly favored by the more vengeful trappers among us. Setting this baby, however, has for me always been a nerve-racking task requiring a certain degree of dexterity and finesse, neither of which guarantees it won’t detonate prematurely anyway and fracture a finger or two in the bargain.

Next up is what I believe to be the answer to Ralph Waldo Emerson’s claim that if you build a better mouse trap the world will beat a path to your door, and is, not coincidentally, my trap of choice. It’s a nasty little gadget made of hard plastic with interlocking saw-tooth jaws that snap shut viciously when triggered by any uninvited, unwelcome, and unsuspecting shed squatter unlucky enough to find the half teaspoon of peanut butter waiting inside too tempting to resist. And unlike the stress inducing model described above, here you need only press down on one side of the trap, raising the upper jaw on the opposite side into rat chomping position where it locks into place and you’re done, fingers intact. The choice, to my mind, a no-brainer.

There's a gap between the ground and the base of the shed that measures no more than an inch in height, which doesn't sound like much, but it’s plenty of room for a house hunting rat to squeeze through. Upon inspection, I discovered that one of the two saw-toothed traps I’d set appeared to have been sprung with nothing to show for it. These contraptions snap shut in a heartbeat and with 'extreme prejudice', as the infamous expression goes. How anything manages to escape those jaws once they’re provoked remains a mystery to me, but it happens more often than you might think.

Intending to reset it, I squatted down and grabbed hold of its base to slide it away from where it lay, flush up against the shed. I hadn't moved it more than an inch or two when something jerked it back, yanking it from my hand and smacking it back up against the shed again. I stumbled back a bit, a Homer Simpson like shriek escaping my lips, caught myself, and stood up. Staring at the now motionless trap it became clear what it was I was dealing with. A rat had triggered the trap and managed to avoid paying the ultimate price when the the jaws failed to come down on any vital part of its anatomy, more than likely one of its hind legs. The trap was too large for the rat to drag under the shed with it, so it was stuck just a few inches in, trapped, ironically enough, like a rat, and no doubt panicked and confused. Something lethal had attached itself to it and nothing short of it gnawing off whichever extremity was being held in its grasp would set it free.

I considered my options for resolving the situation and concluded I had two. I could go the easy route and do nothing, waiting for the poor thing to die on its own, but that was never a serious consideration. It would take a considerable amount of time and would doom the creature to a slow and unnecessarily cruel death. I can’t imagine even the vengeful trappers I spoke of earlier being in favor of that. The obvious alternative, of course, would be to simply grab hold of the trap, firmly this time, drag the rat out from under the shed and kill it. Having had no experience dragging a rat attached to a trap out from under a shed and killing it, simply or otherwise, put me at a distinct disadvantage and made the odds on the maneuver going precisely as planned only slightly better than the rat coming out on its own with its two little paws in the air and surrendering to me unconditionally.

Procrastination has always been an essential tool in my decision-making process, so I headed back to the house, cracked open a beer and mused on the situation a while longer. Twenty minutes later, armed with a shovel and the childlike hope that the situation had miraculously resolved itself in the time I’d spent stalling in the kitchen downing the beer and solving the New York Times mini-crossword puzzle in a respectable one minute and seventeen seconds, I returned to the shed, only to discover that both rat and trap had disappeared.

"My shit’s fucked up, and I don’t see see how, but the shit that used to work won’t work now.” - Warren Zevon

On a sunny, Saturday afternoon three months prior to my adventure with the rat, sitting on a bench outside the Safeway supermarket in the small, northern California town of Lafayette where my wife, Claudia, and I raised two kids and still live today, I learned I had an aggressive form of prostate cancer.

I had slipped away from a small family gathering in our backyard, having been assigned the task of picking up a couple of baguettes to go with the lasagna dinner planned for later that evening. I was thinking I might also splurge on a few of those expensive mylar birthday balloons to celebrate my son in-law's thirty fourth year. The automatic door had just begun to swing open in front of me when my cell phone rang and for reasons that are never entirely clear when you do something instinctually, I opted not to take the call inside the store. Taking the phone out of my back pocket, I did an about face and walked to the bench just past the patio furniture and other summer seasonal items on display outside and sat down.

The first eight digits of the incoming call I recognized as the area code, prefix and first two numbers of our healthcare provider, having dialed it more times in the last few months than in all eight years I’d been a card-carrying member. The last two numbers, however, were not familiar meaning it was someone other than the person I ordinarily speak with just before being placed on hold and forced, again, to listen to a thirty-two second, looped, Kenny G inspired Muzak nightmare for what seems like an eternity but only if that eternity was somehow even longer than the standard, universally accepted version of eternity. I pushed the little green accept button, greeted the person on the other end and immediately wished I'd let it go to voicemail.

It was Dr. Rosenbaum, my urologist, calling no doubt with the test results from a biopsy I’d had earlier that week. I read somewhere that if your doctor calls you with test results rather than informing you of them in a less up close and personal way, it was probably bad news. If he called on a weekend it was most definitely bad news. Needless to say, I was less than thrilled at the prospect of having a possibly life altering discussion while sitting in the Safeway parking lot surrounded by a small squadron of Weber grills and a blissfully unaware and uncaring public. Still, I managed to resist the urge to disconnect and claim later that my phone had died.

Dr. Rosenbaum had encouraged me to get the biopsy after a high PSA level had indicated a cause for concern. I now know all too well that PSA in urological terms stands for prostate specific antigen, a protein produced by the prostate, elevated levels of which may indicate cancer. In the past I had always associated those initials with the now defunct Pacific Southwest Airlines and the haunting, front-page photo of a 727 Boeing jet nosediving at a frightening forty-five-degree angle with an engine ablaze, just moments before it plummeted into a populated San Diego neighborhood. The airliner had crashed after colliding with a Cessna 172, killing all one hundred thirty-five persons on board, the two on the Cessna and seven on the ground.

Now, however, and with all due respect to the people who perished on that day, I’m no longer reminded of that tragic event when I hear that all too familiar acronym. That disaster has been replaced by one of my own, albeit a somewhat less spectacular one. No headline grabbing story in the Times detailing my diagnosis or dramatic front-page photo of me going down in flames, figuratively speaking, would be forthcoming. The only available account of my catastrophic event would be limited to one email containing a half page of positive test results and a somewhat less than riveting MRI of my pelvic region.

The conversation with Dr. Rosenbaum began deceptively upbeat. He inquired as to any issues I might be having as a result of the biopsy and was pleased when I assured him that I was, so far, anyway, not suffering any seriously negative side effects. I deliberately neglected to include any short-term psychological damage I might have sustained from having something akin to a slightly undersized cattle prod be the standard instrument utilized in the procedure. Its avenue of access, if not already familiar to you, will leave to your imagination.

Dr. Rosenbaum’s cheerful, casual tone had managed to lull me into an uncharacteristically optimistic frame of mind. As an ardent believer in the power of negative thinking, I will often dwell on the worst possible outcome of any given situation as an irrational kind of protection against that very outcome. Expect the worst and it can’t sneak up on you has long been a steadfast while utterly unsubstantiated theory of mine.

Dr. Rosenbaum went on to describe how the biopsy results were evaluated by examining the twelve core samples taken from the prostate and determining the volume and aggressiveness of any cancer cells present in each. I wouldn’t go as far as to say his tone had become grim as he explained all this, but it suddenly sounded decidedly more businesslike, and it was then that I realized I had foolishly ventured too far into the land of hope with no chance of retreating back to my safe haven of pessimism and doubt in time to alter the diagnosis now surely to come.

“You have an aggressive, high-risk cancer that has metastasized,” he said, finally.

Apparently, I’d racked up a solid nine out of a possible ten on what is known as the Gleason score, a scale used to assess the severity of your cancer.

And so, there it was. If not the worst possible outcome, something pretty fucking close to it had just snuck up from behind, nice as you please, and sat right down next to me on that bench outside the Safeway next to the Weber grills.

I hardly moved for five minutes or so, somewhat numb I guess you might say, that being the adjective commonly attributed to one’s initial reaction to news of that kind and a fairly accurate one as it turns out. I stood up, approached the swinging doors again and entered the store, my body on autopilot, navigating my movements. The store was fairly crowded, but I was no longer the keen observer of my surroundings and the people occupying them I like to think myself to be. Anyone I did happen to focus on for a moment or two seemed to be living in a different reality, which, of course, they were. They were in that other reality, the one where you go out on a quick errand to the grocery store and come back the same person you were when you left. The one where you hadn’t just been told you had a particularly potent variety of cancer. The one I'd left behind forever not fifteen minutes ago. I made my way to the bread aisle and collected the two baguettes, foregoing my usual ritual of squeezing each one before choosing the absolute freshest, then headed to the opposite corner of the store to select a fistful of "Happy Birthday" balloons. Jesus.

"Many rivers to cross, but I can't seem to find my way over." - Jimmy Cliff

Upon discovering the rat and trap had gone missing from where I’d last seen them, locked in a stalemate at the base of the shed, I scanned the immediate area and found no trace of either. But the sun was almost down, and I wasn't about to go poking around the bushes with a flashlight looking for a seriously wounded, possibly rabid, and undoubtedly pissed off rat. I regretted not having somehow resolved the situation while I had the chance and was a bit surprised to find myself feeling sorry for something I had always held in such contempt. It was, after all, just a rat.

I returned to the house and spent the evening on my cell phone indulging what had of late become a slightly obsessive preoccupation with acquiring as much information as I could on any negative side effects I might expect from the assortment of taking for the foreseeable future, then checking the side effects of the meds prescribed to control the side effects of those meds.

I soon found myself weeding through an information overload of disease related community forums crowded with people eager to share their stories or 'journeys', the preferred term nowadays for any supposed inspirational struggle a person might be engaged in, from manic depression to athlete’s foot. My inspiring journey currently involves a visit each morning to the same closet sized room at the Dublin Cancer Center, a half hour's drive away, where I and a few other prostate challenged patients dressed in matching hospital gowns, our bladders full for procedural purposes, try not to piss ourselves while awaiting our turn on the radiation table.

Lying in bed later that night, winding down my search of worst possible outcomes, side effects wise, Claudia complained that the glow from my phone's screen was keeping her up. I was tempted to point out that when I'd entered the bedroom, she’d been sound asleep with the TV glowing a thousand times brighter and its volume level at a deafening, Spinal Tap eleven. But having been married nearly forty years now, I’ve found that pointing things out is more often than not an unrewarding indulgence. I put the phone down and went to sleep.

I awoke in a panic at around five the next morning. I hadn’t considered the very real possibility that Cash, our beloved German Shepherd, might discover the rat during one of his usual late-night excursions to the backyard. He had his own doggie door and usually made several trips outside for the reasons you might expect and for others known only to him. And even though he outweighed our missing Rodentia representative by a hundred pounds or more, and his namesake was, in fact, Cassius Clay, the confrontation could have ended badly for our boy. To say I was relieved at finding him safe in his bed having avoided whatever worst possible outcome that encounter may have produced would be a substantial understatement. And if my grateful rubs to his head seemed odd to him at such an unusual hour of the morning, he didn’t show it.

It was way too early to go rat hunting, to say the least, but falling back to sleep now seemed unlikely, so I got dressed, drank a cup of coffee and headed back to the shed.

My tracking skills are hardly on a Navajo level, but I was hoping there might be some indication of which direction my quarry had taken. Finding nothing, I picked up the shovel I'd left there the night before and circled around to the back of the shed but there was barely two feet between it and our backyard fence and nowhere for a trap-dragging fugitive rat to hide. I followed the fence back to the far corner of the yard where our two smaller redwoods stood, checking under each bush along the way. I turned the corner, inching my way along the back side of the fence that borders the garden, intent on finding the surely, by now, desperate animal, while simultaneously entertaining a half-hearted hope that I wouldn’t. A squirrel running along the top of the fence got my attention momentarily and when I looked down again, there was the rat, nestled among some mint and herb plants, but out in the open, as if wanting to be discovered. Its right side was facing towards me at a bit of an angle and the black pearl eye was taking me in for the first time. It appeared to have rolled itself up into a ball, its tail hidden, and reminded me of a cute little chinchilla I'd seen recently at the pet store where Cash gets groomed. What a difference a tail makes, I remember thinking. I shifted my position slightly and could see both eyes now, the ears pulled back against its head, its breathing labored from fear and exhaustion. The saw-toothed trap had come into view also, its jaws still clamped tight on the rat's left hind leg, dried blood and hair between its teeth. The unexpected empathy I'd felt the night before was back. The rat had suffered for some time now, tormented by a mindless and tireless entity indifferent to its suffering. I raised the shovel high above my head, brought it down hard, and ended it.

Tomorrow, I return to the closet sized room at the Dublin Cancer Center for the remainder of my twenty-eight radiation treatments, followed by two to three years of several potent meds, all with no guarantees. But I can’t complain, really. Things could be worse. Who’d know that better than me?

Doug McCarthy: I live in the San Francisco Bay Area with my wife, Claudia, and our German Shepherd, Cassius. I’m retired and recently received a cancer diagnosis. I had an unlikely encounter shortly after that diagnosis and this essay grew out of that experience. I very much enjoyed, and miss, the time I spent writing it.