It’s hard to believe that it’s been over nine months since we lost our sweet girl last fall.
But stay with me, because I promise this one isn’t sad. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.
Time doesn’t heal, but it does help the pain ease up a little.
We still miss her and always will, but as anyone who has lost their best fur-friend knows, the tears have eased. And in their place, remembrances of sweet stories and laughter. Some of the best days of our lives were with that dog.
And today, I thought we’d share one of our favorite stories. Ever. It’s a good one. Promise.
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It was late that night, when Chloe suddenly erupted into furious bursts of barking, inside our house. The kind that vibrates off the still walls and has the potential to wake a sleeping family. And/or give all those in said house, a tiny heart attack.
The kids were already sound asleep, and I had climbed into bed. Jamin was brushing his teeth. So I rolled over and passive aggressively mumbled something about her, while pretending to be nodding off into dream world. You know, it was one of those last-man-standing handles-the-problems things.
Not that this was anything unusual for her. She would bark quite often. In her defense, though we didn’t realize it at the time, we live less than a mile from an abandoned quarry and it’s practically a wildlife preserve. With giant man eating bats, deer the size of our truck, and everything in between, we have plenty of stories to tell. A doe scattered out of the woods at sunset just yesterday, ran across the street and smacked into our neighbor’s fence. She then promptly turned around, crossed the street again, and returned to her place in the woods. All while we stood there and watched. Good times.
But it was late, and while she usually freaked during the day at the mailman, a jogger and/or the occasional door to door evangelist {I hide like a ninja from all of the above – hello, they could all be serial killers} this time she was standing in the studio and barking her head off. Into the back yard.
We have our levels of barking. Especially since there were weird cat noises coming from the side of our house, it must have been the cat again.
And not just any cat. Our neighbor’s cat. Who likes to habitually climb into our yard and hang for a while. Sometimes he’s useful and grabs snakes. And sometimes, he steals baby birds from their nests. I also think he brings beers and asks his other cat bros 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. We’re almost one hundred percent sure that’s what happens.
I love animals. I have a long history punctuated with certain adventures in rescue attempts. See me with a rogue turtle on the side of the road. Boundary issues. So I have to love cats because I love animals. It’s like that oath doctors take. But love is a very liberal statement. Sometimes their weird human noises freak me out a little. Then there’s the 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. You’re either a cat person or you’re not. I’m not. But I would save one from distress. And stuff.
So a few moments later, when Jamin went back to the door to let Chloe in, there was a loud, girl-like squeal. It was several octaves higher than I ever thought possible. How the kids weren’t awake yet, I have no idea. But of course, I clambered out of bed to see what was going on.
Jamin squealed like a girl, because Chloe came back to said 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?
There’s nothing wrong with squealing like a girl. But it’s especially hilarious when your tall, dark and handsome significant other does it. Only Chloe had been so startled by the squealing like a girl thing, and didn’t really appreciate the door being slammed in her face. So she had dropped the animal-gift, and it was now wedged in the doorway.
Ew.
And she was over it. She’d scampered back into the yard, as if 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 in the dark.
And I wasn’t about to actually open the door. This is like one of those scenes from the horror movies {we’re now officially too old to watch because I can’t handle them anymore} where something creepy was blocking the door. Just waiting for us to look. Or touch. Or move. We would die if we did any of those.
I felt sick, deep down, and all things ridiculous aside, 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: She caught it. She caught that darned cat again! And then… This never happened. Oh no. Seriously this can never have happened. Cover the evidence! Bury it!
I couldn’t bare to tell our neighbors that our dog had brutally murdered their cat.
But chloe’s bark was all bark. She’d never hurt another animal. In fact, she’d caught the same cat before, but in our front yard, and we’d found her waiting at the door with the cat in her mouth, holding it by the scruff of it’s neck like a puppy. Waiting to come inside with her new addition to our family. The cat just wobbled there in her mouth, gazing at us with it’s defeated expression. And when we told her to drop it, she did. It scampered back home, unscathed, maybe with a hiss and a promise to make it up to her with more beer bottles the next night. And we couldn’t help but laugh.
So we were quite shocked by the discovery of her murder victim. Things must have escalated quickly. Or something. And here it was. This ball of fluff sitting in our doorway.
I hissed at Jamin to grab a flashlight, as we still couldn’t see exactly what it was without opening the door. I stood there and waited, crouched like a football player, not sure which direction I would run if it started to stir.
And I will now take a moment to note that Jamin had slowly shuffled and repositioned himself to stand behind me in the room, after he’d retrieved the flashlight. He wasn’t getting any closer. So after swatting at him for a moment to go look, trying unsuccessfully to inch behind him {whilst he kept shoving me forward}… I gave up. I grabbed the flashlight from his hand, and shoved it into the crevice.
The ball o’ fluff was much too grey to be our neighbor’s orange tabby cat. Was it a grey cat? An old cat? A scary rabies infested something else? So much confusion. I opened the door a smidgeon and felt a strange combination of relief and disgust.
Our nighttime visitor was a giant, ten pound possum.
At least ten pounds. In my head, it was bigger, maybe even fifteen. Borderline obesity possum. And I’m pretty sure he’d been munching on our neighbor’s garbage.
And if it was a possum, the next rational thought would be that there was a possibility sucka wasn’t dead.
Oh wait. Here we are. Except bigger. And awkwardly wedged in our back door.
Both images from Wikipedia. And apparently I’m supposed to write Opossum. Thanks no thanks.
We knew what had to be done, so with a great sigh of resignation, Jamin dutifully shook off his girly fears. He busted out his head lantern {and shovel} from his glory days of spelunking and camping and other manly things he no longer does because we’re old and married… and exited stage left. 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. Chloe just stood back in the yard, wagging her tail as if to say, “But look what I brought you! It’s my new toy Aren’t you proud?!”
There was that awkward moment of what to do next: 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 awkwardly across the concrete for a good three feet, afraid to touch it “I’m pretty sure he’s not dead. Don’t hurt him. More… Let’s put him in the lot across the street.”
I was jumpy, because I could see it springing back to life and going for both of our corroded arteries. And because rabies.
All I knew, was that if it came back to life and jumped on Jamin’s neck at the beginning of some dumb horror movie to document the apocalypse, I was gently closing the door and walking away.
You know, to protect the kids.
Priorities.
So there was Jamin, with his head lantern, paired oh so expertly with pajama pants and shovel like something out of a weird L.L. Bean photo shoot. And instead of that token golden retriever, there was Chloe, inching ever so carefully forward in the play position, and then springing back with her wagging tail to watch what he’d do.
He dutifully nodded, and carefully carried the animal across the street to our open park. In a little bit of that weird, shovel-extended-as-far-as-possible, just-in-case-it-came-back-to-life-and-bit-his-face, body language. And when he returned to the house, 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 slowly waddled back to our house.
Right to our garbage.
So we chased him off, again.
Here’s what we think happened: Mr. Possum and the drunken 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 plays? SQUIRREL!” Tabby scattered. Possum played dead. And Chloe collected her winnings, bringing him to our back door. A beautiful gift procured just for us. So proud.
The next morning, when I asked Jamin why he was so scared, he quickly corrected me with a good healthy dose of Monday morning quarterback:
“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. That was Mr. Headlantern’s duty. 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,
“…and I’m not scared of snakes. They just need to die.” He added, cutting me off at the pass of where he knew I was going with this argument, next. Because of the last few times I’d made him not murder the snakes. Jamin is to what Indiana Jones is to snakes… “But when something like a frog or moth or lizard 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 do what? Teach it a lesson and pop a cap?”
Jamin, newly enraptured by his near death possum experience, smiled a wiry smile. Suddenly brave in the light of day, he puffed out his chest.
“YEP.”
Right.
And as if on cue, Chloe laying on the kitchen floor beside us, gave a huge, exasperated sigh.
Because there were many more girl-squeals to be had in our future over things that go bump in the night.
From both of us.
JT Cool says
I loved your story… I actually laughed out loud, which I really needed! Thanks
Lori says
Ah dogs. A few years ago our dog was barking at our lawnmower that was on our deck in the back yard. It was one of those late at night weird barking moment and we thought our dog was crazy. He wouldn’t leave the lawnmower alone, so my husband moved the lawnmower and underneath it was a possum “playing dead.”
Loved your story, and giggled a bit with the autocorrect of “corroded” arteries. hahaha
Rose L. says
EW! I hate possums, such scary looking creatures. We had one come into our garage, unbeknownst to us, and had babies in our boat when covered for the winter. By the time we discovered the family the boat was a stinky mess! My husband had to drag the boat out into driveway and left it there over night as they were inside! They disappeared overnight and the cat door was closet forever!
Denise Thadathil says
Loved the story!
Kerri KC says
Best. Story. Ever. đ