At the edge of a town, in a small house, there lived a painter. He painted pictures and various posters. And all he painted were animals. In some of his pictures, a cat with boots was proudly striding along, in others there were hedgehogs with apples, and in another, he painted a mouse with cheese. All of the painter’s pictures and posters were hanging on display in his garden.
One day the mouse with cheese from the poster decided to go for a walk and look around. Perhaps she might even meet a real animal. And so she went. She jumped down from the poster onto the ground and set out to look around her surroundings. She brought along the cheese which was painted in the poster with her.
After a while, the painted mouse met a real mouse. “Hi, I’m so happy to meet someone. What’s your name?” the mouse from the poster asked.
The real mouse looked her over and then said: “I’m a mouse from the painter’s house. I live in the attic there. And I know you. You’re the mouse from the poster, right? I saw the painter drawing you. Do you have your cheese with you too?”
“Yes, it’s me. The mouse with cheese from the poster. You don’t have any cheese? Why not?” the painted mouse asked curiously.
“That’s because real mice don’t like cheese. In fairytales and in pictures, all mice love to eat cheese, but us real mice like other things. Sweeter things. Maybe a piece of chocolate, a nut, or some breadcrumbs. We even think that some cheeses smell bad,” the real mouse explained.
“Oh, I didn’t know that. And could you go to my painter and explain to him how things actually are? Maybe he could paint something else next to my cheese. Perhaps a nut,” the mouse from the poster asked the real one.
And so they went to the painter together. At first, he was astonished when he saw his visitors. And he was very surprised that both the painted mouse and the real mouse were able to speak to him. He listened intently when the two of them explained everything. And then he decided to grant them their wish.
He added a beautiful nut and a piece of chocolate into the poster. The painted mouse happily stepped back into her poster next to her treats, pleased that she was like a real mouse now. With treats that real mice enjoyed. So that everyone who was passing the painter’s garden could see how things really were with mice.
