Last night, Chloe was barking her head off. I had already climbed into bed, and Jamin was brushing his teeth. So I rolled over and passive aggressively mumbled something to Jamin about her, while pretending to be asleep.
Not that this is anything unusual for her. She tends to bark quite often. I think it has to do with the woods nearby. But it was late, and while she usually spazzes during the day at the mailman, a jogger and/or the occasional door to door evangelist, {I’m all, dude. Not going to switch over. We’re paid. Thanks.} this time she was standing on the veranda and barking her head off, into the back yard.
This usually means, that she’s barking at a cat.
And not just any cat. Our neighbor’s cat. Who likes to habitually climb into our yard and hang for a while. I think he brings beers and asks his other cat buddies to join him for a romp, while they sit on the edge of the fence and Chloe barks, so they throw bottles at her head. Just sayin.
I love animals. I have a long history punctuated with certain issues in trying to rescue them. And I have to love cats because I love animals. It’s like that oath doctors take. But love is a very liberal statement. I personally think they’re creepy with their weird human noises and their hissing and their hair dander that make my eyes swell to eternity and back. There’s a fine line. But I don’t wish them harm.
So a few moments later, when I heard Jamin squeal like a girl, I clambered out of bed to see what was going on. Jamin squealed like a girl, because Chloe had come back to the door with a very large animal in her mouth. And he’d squealed, like a girl, and slammed the door in her face. Did I mention that he squealed like a girl? Only Chloe had dropped the animal, and it was now wedged in the doorway. Chloe was over it. She had scampered back into the yard, and was waiting for our response to her new chew toy. All we could see was fluffy hair, as our view was blocked through the window by the bottom of the door.
And I wasn’t about to open the door.
I felt sick, deep down, and I was horrified that this was none other than our neighbor’s cat making a guest appearance in the afterlife. My thoughts were digressing quickly: “This never happened. Cover the evidence! Bury it!” But chloe’s bark is all bark. She’s never hurt another animal, so we were quite shocked by the discovery of her murder victim. And here it was. This ball of fluff sitting in our doorway. I will now take a moment to note that Jamin stood back behind me in the room, and waited for me make the first move and discover what the animal was. He wasn’t getting any closer, so I grabbed the flashlight from him and shoved it into the crevice.
The ball o’ fluff was much too grey to be our neighbor’s orange tabby cat. I opened the door a smidgeon and felt a strange combination of relief and disgust. Our nighttime visitor was a giant, ten pound possum. And if it was a possum, the next rational thought would be that there was a possibility sucka wasn’t dead. We’ve had quite a few animal issues around here, for years. Ever since we moved in. Our residential neighborhood is all, Over the Hedge a-la swiss family robinson meets snakes on a plane. We’ve had giant deer, snakes, squirrels with mutated heads, attacking frogs, caterpillar swarms, lady bug armies, rabbits, giant wombats from satan’s lair, dead birds, owls, mice….you name it. We’ve had it. Seriously.
looks a lot like our intruder. with the exception that ours was crusty and dead. Yay!
We knew what had to be done, so with a giant sigh, Jamin dutifully shook off his girly fears, and with his head lantern and a shovel, went around the house to scoop up our victim. When he rounded the corner of the house, I felt safe to open the door a little. There he was. This “dead” possum, with a small injury grossly paired with gaping eyes and mouth. Jamin tried to scoop him up but he wouldn’t go on the shovel. “Jamin,” I prodded, ever so non gently, while I watched him push the body across the concrete, “He’s not dead. Don’t hurt him. Let’s put him in the lot across the street.” I was jumpy, because I pictured this thing springing up, last minute and biting our faces off. Or turning us into rabies zombies. I’ve had enough accidents regarding my face as of late. All I knew, was that if it came back to life and jumped on Jamin’s neck, I was totally closing the door.
Jamin, with his head lantern, pajama pants and shovel, dutifully nodded, and carried the animal across the street. Little did he know I’d be ready to abandon him in a moment if it meant taking one for the team. {I just have to reiterate here, again, that he was wearing a head lantern.} And there we waited, with a clear view from our dining room window. It took a good ten minutes, but our intruder finally rose from the dead, and waddled back to our house.
And towards the garbage.
So we chased him off, again.
Here’s what we think happened: Mr. Possum and the alcoholic tabby cat, totally got into a scuffle. He was all, “Dude. Back off mah gurl.” And they were duking it out on the fence. Chloe heard the fight and was ready to jump in, because she was all, “What’s going on guys? OOhhh a wrestling match? Can I play? SQUIRREL!” Tabby scattered, Possum played dead, and Chloe brought him to our back door. A beautiful gift procured just for us.
This morning, when I asked Jamin why he was so scared of animals, he quickly corrected me. “If you recall from last night, I totally saved you.” I was so glad to be reminded, and in all fairness, I wasn’t getting out in the back yard. I would have built a giant wall of furniture at the back door, blocking the entry while I waited for the thing to wake up and scamper off. I digested that one for a moment, while he continued, “I’m not scared of snakes. They just need to die. But when something like a frog comes into the house, I have to save it” {cue mocking tone and gigantic air quotes around the “save it” part.}
“Oh really?” I responded over my coffee. “Because if I didn’t interfere, you’d pop a cap?”
Jamin, newly enraptured by his near death possum experience, smiled a wiry smile, suddenly brave in the light of day.
“YEP.”
Right.
