We were awake this morning at 4, listening to the dog
bark. There was a sense of urgency in
her bark, and it was punctuated with growls.
He said “it’s cats….” but I wondered.
Cinnamon barks at cats all the time, but she doesn’t growl….
I went outside to see what she was up to but it was too dark
(it usually is in the middle of the night….).
He brought out a flashlight and, shining it on the potato bush along the
fence, there it was. Not a cat, or cats…..
A possum.
He wasn’t frightened by the light, the dog, or us. He just sat there calmly on the fence and
stared at us. Cinnamon was still barking
furiously, yet she seemed amused that “mom and dad” had joined her in the
backyard. Bark, bark, bark, growl, bark,
growl….
Still, the possum didn’t move. He wasn’t “playing possum”….he was staring at
us, then at the dog, then back at us.
Perhaps he is acclimated to humans?
And dogs? And the four or five
cats that live in our alley?
It seemed rather obvious that the only way to get Cinnamon
to stop barking was to convince the possum to leave….. Have you ever tried that? Neither had I…
So, armed with a hose with a spray nozzle, he aimed it at
the possum and turned it on. The possum
moved from one side of the potato bush to the other, then back again. At one point, he turned around and we got to
stare at his soggy, wet behind
.
And then, he disappeared….
Was he really gone?
Cinnamon was still quite antsy but she had stopped barking. He got a piece of PVC pipe and started poking
it into the foliage of the potato bush.
Nothing. No movement, no sounds
except the rustling of the leaves as the PVC passed through.
Is he gone? Will he
be back?
I “ordered” Cinnamon to get in her bed and miraculously, she
did. She seemed calmer now that the
possum had disappeared. I felt comforted
that she couldn’t smell him, hear him, or sense his presence, so maybe the
possum hunt was over….
I went back to bed but I couldn’t sleep. I kept waiting for Cinnamon to start barking
again, but she didn’t.
There’s always tonight…..
Cali
