The concept of “being the man of the house” feels archaic in today’s equality-driven society, but in our home, that role comes with one unescapable duty: protect the occupants from bugs and critters.
That’s why I found myself doing battle in the middle of the night in my underwear with a little brown bat.
We moved to Lilburn, Georgia, from Macon in March of 2003. We were fortunate to find an affordable home with enough space to accommodate our growing family. It was located in a good school district and was only a 30-minute commute from my office. Built in 1973, the home had been updated in some ways and needed aesthetic improvements in others. One of the home’s best features was a large bonus room that had been converted from the garage. There were two huge closets, one we used for our computer desk and one that held all of our toys. It was the perfect playroom, and with a two-year-old, we spent most of our time in that room with a “Thomas the Tank Engine” DVD playing on the television.
The house also came with a big, tree-filled back yard. Developed in the 1970s, the neighborhood allotted a full acre per lot, and the huge, 30-plus-year-old pine trees in the back yard provided plenty of shade. The trees, including a huge magnolia and two silver maples in the front yard, also provided a habitat for a number of unwanted guests in our home. Those invaders helped us form a strong and long-lasting relationship with “Mr. Craig the Bug Man” to help keep our home bug-free. Because of Mr. Craig’s strong chemical defense, fulfilling my duty to serve and protect usually meant putting bugs out of their misery as the poison slowly took effect on their twitching carcasses or harvesting the stiff remains in the early morning before anyone else awoke to see the unpleasantness. I had not previously been called on to do hand-to-hand combat.
Our trees also provided ideal roosting spots for other potential unwanted guests in our home. At dusk in the spring and summer, I frequently saw bats dipping and diving, chasing mosquitoes and others flying insects. Not only did I admire their aerial maneuvers, but I appreciated their patrolling the skies around our house and eliminating pests. The eaves on our house had wire mesh screens covering the vent slats leading into the attic, but I never gave much thought as to why that was necessary. I certainly didn’t suspect that I would have an up-close encounter with the flying mammals.
We didn’t have an alarm system until our first home in Macon was burglarized. Thieves took some of Carla’s family heirloom jewelry and our two VCRs, but as with all break-ins, the biggest loss was our sense of security. Within a couple of days of the incident, we had an alarm system installed, complete with window-break sensors. These tricky devices set off the alarm every time we dropped a book, slammed a door or otherwise made a loud noise. The sensitivity of those sensors caused to me question our purchase every time they went off. Our experience with security systems on our Macon house taught us what to avoid, so when we moved to Lilburn and had an alarm system installed, we shifted from glass-break sensors to motion sensors. This seemed to be a good move until one night a few months after we moved in. We were tucked in our beds sleeping soundly when the house alarm was triggered by a balloon floating through the playroom.
The control panel was in our bedroom, and it revealed the source of the offending motion. The playroom was a natural point of entry since it was the first room you entered from the parking pad. We got used to the stuff in the playroom setting off the house alarm. So one spring night after a year or two of being lulled into complacency, I immediately suspected a balloon or some other similar offender when the alarm went off, and the playroom zone indicator light flashed. I got up, turned off the alarm, reset the system and stood there, waiting to see if this was not a drill. Less than a minute later, I got my answer. The alarm went off again. My heartbeat accelerated, and I thought, “This could be the real deal.”
Even though we possessed a handgun, given to us by my father-in-law after we got married, I went downstairs unarmed to investigate. I felt anything but brave as I knocked around and called out “Who’s there?” adopting the tactic of scaring an intruder away. I suspected something had fallen over in the toy closet, causing the door to open and setting off the motion sensor. I slowly navigated the back hall from the kitchen to playroom, flipped the light switch and scanned the empty playroom. Everything was in its place and the closet doors were still shut. The door was closed and dead bolted. The windows all appeared secure. I began to think we had a malfunctioning sensor on our hands.
That’s when it attacked.
Movement to my right caught my eye, and I instinctively ducked as something flapped past my head. It settled into the far corner of the room, resting on the upper molding. The little furry, winged creature stared back at me, likely as frightened as I was. My mind raced. How in the world was I going to get that thing out of my house?
I opened the back door and hoped he would find his way out. By this time, Carla had descended the stairs and called to me from the front of the house. I ducked back into the hallway and yelled back, “It’s a bat!” My worst fear wasn’t being bitten by a potentially rabid bat. No, hearing Carla’s voice made me realize I was truly I afraid the bat would escape the playroom and go exploring our home. There wasn’t a door to shut off the playroom from the rest of the house.
The bat remained in the corner for several minutes before I decided I had to take some action to encourage it to fly out of the open door. I retreated upstairs, went to my closet and emptied the dirty clothes from the laundry basket. It was the best I could come up with to use as a shield or a net. I went back downstairs and grabbed a broom from our closet of cleaning supplies just off the playroom. The bat hadn’t moved. My hastily conceived plan was to somehow trap him in the laundry basket using the broom. Once in the basket, I would keep the basket up against the wall or floor and move him to the back door where I would tilt the basket and release the bat into the night. Like I said, it was hastily conceived.
I approached the corner warily, laundry basket in my left hand, broom in my right. I was wearing only my boxers and realized if my neighbors were awake, they were getting quite a show.
When I got close enough to the bat, I triggered its motion sensors, and it took off again, flying to the opposite corner of the room. We played this zig-zag game of tag for about 10 minutes before the futility of my plan became apparent. That’s when the old cliché “blind as a bat” came to me. I had blinded him when I turned on the light. I knew if I turned off the light, the bat would have the upper hand, but it was more important for me to see him and know where he was at all times.
As the encounter dragged on, I decided I would have to risk a sneak attack and turn off the lights. The back-porch light was on, and moths and other flying bugs were doing their nightly dance around it. Hopeful the bat’s echolocation would click on in the darkness and the prey would catch his attention, I turned the playroom lights off and stood in the doorway to the hall with the laundry basket raised in front of my face to create a barrier to the rest of the house. After all of my vain attempts to dislodge our unwanted visitor, I finally turned to prayer.
Almost immediately the prayer was answered. I heard the now familiar rustle of furry wings move across the room and out the door. I quickly closed the back door and locked the deadbolt, as if that was necessary.
I flipped the lights back on and scanned the room again, finally lowering my broom sword and basket shield. With the adrenaline of the hunt still pumping, I took several deep breaths to slow my heart rate and calm down. Carla called out from the staircase asking if it was safe to inspect the scene of the intrusion for herself. I told her it was.
I had successfully defended her castle, proving myself worthy as the man of the house.
New South Essays 