That smell…
Opossums are not the most attractive animal. They look like a caricature of a rat, only with a crazy tail and wicked teeth. I think they must be some ancient ancestor of the rat and all other rodents, and perhaps that they crawled out of the maw of hell--well, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but they would make a great feature at a haunted house.
I know they are unclean, that they are unsavory in every way. The Minnesota Nuisance Wildlife Control website continues, stating they
"carry diseases such as leptospirosis, tuberculosis, relapsing fever, tularemia, spotted fever, toxoplasmosis, coccidiosis, trichomoniasis, and Chagas disease. They may also be infested with fleas, ticks, mites, and lice. Opossum are hosts for cat and dog fleas, especially in urban environments."
ALL THAT SAID... Once my son and I were trying to track down the origin of the death-stink that was wafting around our farm. He was only 6, but he had seen dead cats, dogs, chickens, snakes, mice, and other creatures. He's very matter-of-fact about it. When we found the dead opossum, it looked to have been deceased some time, as purification/decomposition was well-underway. The corpse was almost flat, fur was detaching and blowing around the area, the skull was bare, the body cavity was torn open as was the back end and the neck. The eyes, of course the first to go, were just holes that creepy death-eating bugs frequently were wriggling in/out of. The mouth was open but the tongue was gone, only those horror movie sharp teeth were still there. Get it? Gross dead animal, and that does not even begin to describe the smell!
There's a peculiar thing about dead animals and me...since I was a kid, I've been fascinated with them. Maybe it's as close as we typically get to death/dying in our culture these days....maybe it's because I always look at life and biology as complicated wetware, cool and gooey machines we are! There is a moment, however, that seems to strike me down to my spinal cord, something so primeval that I don't quite know how to describe it. Here goes: when I'm coming up on such grotesque death, gagging at the smell of it, I am fine until I see those damn carrion bugs, of which there are many types, that root and rummage around in the most disgusting way, completely degrading death of any modicum of decorum. Those bugs are hideous and rude, but then, they do a vital job (that I'd bet no one else in the food chain is begging for). Sometimes they are so careless and gruff in their feeding and deconstruction of a corpse that they actually animate it, making it jostle, making the hide ripple and move. More than once I've thought I've seen a zombie critter, coming back to life.
That leads me back to this incident . The same wobbling around was happening I've seen (and been at the very core of my being repulsed by) before. I did what my son was thinking of doing, himself--though I cannot explain it--I poked it with a stick. Then we looked closer, and we were amazed to find...something inside was hobbling around like a wee little Muppet. I thought it was just another creepy bug or beast disrespecting the dead, but when I leaned in and looked closely I discovered it was in fact...a baby opossum.
Opossums have litters of up to 16, yet this was the sole survivor. It did not yet have eyes open (or maybe the bugs already ate 'em) and it did not have fur on its over-sized ears. It did have the characteristic curl to its pink, bald tail already. Overall, the little bugger was no bigger than a small field mouse, or roughly the size of my thumb. We debated a good long while. I got a shovel. I was going to bury the whole scene, wholesale...but the boy talked me into trying to rescue the baby. I don't think it's alive today, but I'll not be too surprised if it is, I guess, since it lived through whatever killed it's mom, then the ravages of storm, a 90 degree day or two, and the pokings and nippings of chickens, dogs, and insects. It was still kicking, so we tried to honor its survival by putting it a cat carrier and feeding it some egg.
The point of this long long post is to marvel at the opossum and to simply document this encounter with death and life and all that comes between and goes beyond. Even though I was repulsed, that whole tableau taught me some valuable lessons I will keep with me much longer than that stench that won't seem to leave my nostrils.
