Playing Possum

(Please welcome fallible’s guest blogger, Deb Raney. If you’ve never seen the movie “A Vow to Cherish,” based on Deb’s book, do! I bawled my head off.)

I live with my husband and teenage daughter in a sleepy little Kansas town. We like it sleepy. But we had a little excitement at our house a few weeks ago—the kind of thing that will probably make it into a novel someday.

This particular incident involved the police. Let me tell you, when they finally drove away from our house, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. They had caught the perpetrator and hauled him away in the back of the patrol car—the trunk, to be precise.

It happened like this… Our daughter went out the back door around 8 p.m. to feed our two cats. Frosty and Cleo have the run of the backyard, but these cats prefer to hang out on the deck where they can keep an eye on the activities in our kitchen, and squeak their paws across the window if they think we’ve forgotten their chow time.

Our daughter hadn’t been gone two minutes, when the sliding door flew open and Tavia shot into the kitchen and pronounced as only a teenage drama queen can: “There. Is. A. HUMONGOUS. Possum. Out. There!”

I put on a brave face and went out to investigate, with Tavia hanging onto my shirttail. Staring up at us from under the gas grill at the bottom of the steps was the biggest opossum I have ever laid eyes on. And I’ve seen a few in my day.

He sat there glaring at us, a true ROUS (Rodent Of Unusual Size, for those of you unfamiliar with the The Princess Bride). It gave me the willies!

I stomped on the deck and commanded him to “git!” He responded by glaring a little longer, then casually waddling underneath the deck where I could hear him munching on bits of cat food that had fallen through the boards of the deck.

Our kitten, Cleo, was nowhere to be found, and our older cat was pacing nervously. I went inside to google “opossum” and was relieved to discover that, while cat food is high on the opossum’s list of delicacies, cats themselves are not.

Sure enough, when we looked out a few minutes later, there sat Cleo. The stupid possum was under the grill again, staring at the cats. Again, he ignored our efforts to shoo him from the yard.

Finally, I took action and did what any self-respecting small town girl would do. I called the police. Of course, being in a small town, the police department keeps regular business hours and they were closed for the day. But the recording said they could be reached by calling 911.

Praying I wouldn’t get chewed out for…I was going to say “crying wolf,” but maybe “playing possum” is more apropos…I dialed those three numbers one always hopes one will never need. I immediately informed the 911 dispatcher that this wasn’t a real emergency, but could they tell me who to call for animal control?

“That would be the local police,” she said. “We’ll be happy to send them right out.”

Sigh of relief. Within minutes a patrol car cruised up our street and parked in front of our house. The muscular young officer strode to our door armed with a heavy-duty flashlight. We opened the side gate and ushered him into the backyard. My daughter and I scrambled onto the deck and clung to each other while we watched the chase that ensued.

The officer managed to lure the critter out from under the deck, but when he tried to capture it, the opossum took off running. It raced around the perimeter of the fenced-in backyard, with the cop on foot in hot pursuit. This cop was slender and in fine physical shape, but he was no match for the roly-poly possum!

Finally the animal went through the gate we hadn’t had the presence of mind to close, and darted across the front yard. The cop was getting a workout, but he managed to stay close on Mr. Possum’s tail.

By now, of course, porch lights are flipping on up and down the street and the neighbors have started to peer from behind curtains, wondering, I’m sure, what heinous crime the Raneys have committed that warrants a nighttime visit from law enforcement.

Finally the officer herded the possum up onto our front porch. It was the stunning blow. The possum was so fat he promptly got stuck between the rails of the porch. The cop calmly grabbed its long rat-like tail and hauled it up in triumph (barehanded!) Carrying Mr. Opossum upside down by the tail, the officer transported him to the back of the patrol car where he popped the trunk, stuffed in the culprit and slammed the lid shut.

The policeman’s parting words as he drove off to release the possum “a few miles outside of town” were “Thanks a lot, folks.” We pondered for a while the oddity of him thanking us before deciding we must have provided some much needed excitement in the life of a small-town cop.

Deborah Raney’s first novel, A Vow to Cherish, was the inspiration for World Wide Pictures’ film of the same title. It will be re-released this spring, the ten-year anniversary of its first publication. Deb’s novels have won the RITA Award, the National Readers Choice Award, and Playing by Heart was a Christy Award finalist. Her newest release is Over the Waters. Visit her Web site at http://www.deborahraney.com.

Posted by Katy on 01/11/06 at 04:15 PM

Fallible Comments...

Great story, Deb! What I love about living in the pseudo-country (the city edges closer to our house each day...) is the way the "wild" animals become almost domesticated. I'll never forget the morning I awakened to find a young deer asleep directly under my kitchen window. As if it thought it was a cat, or something! Fun, huh?
Posted by Katy on 01/12/06 at 09:34 AM
Deb,
I found a possum curled up on the step of our patio one night, with our 74-lb. dog sleeping not three feet away.

<I>Loved</I> your story!
Posted by Macromoments on 01/12/06 at 09:37 AM
Oh, I can just picture that 74-lb. dog curled up by the possum. : ) Katy has a "dog" story that I hope she's going to tell one of these days. Right, Katy? : )

Deb
Posted by Deb Raney on 01/12/06 at 10:32 AM
Anybody else thinking maybe instead of a little small town excitement the cop was offering up thanks for his upcoming Sunday dinner?
Posted by Michael O'Connor on 01/12/06 at 12:57 PM
Deb, thanks for the fun story. At least you're in an area where the authorities will show up when called. Our neighbor fell from a ladder while painting the second story of their house, breaking ribs and puncturing a lung. It took nearly an hour for an ambulance to arrive. Maybe if they had tried the old "possum under the deck" routine, help would have come more quickly.
Posted by Doug Raymond on 01/12/06 at 12:57 PM
Michael has an excellent point! Doug has totalled two of our cars hitting deer. It's illegal here for a passerby to scoop up the fresh roadkill, but "out in the county" we play the game by our own rules.

When the guys in the pick-up truck driving behind Doug witnessed the accident, they jumped out of their truck and ran to make sure he was all right BEFORE they scooped up the meat and threw it in the back of their truck.

And then they hightailed it out of there before the sheriff showed up. Come to think of it, it was a Sunday, too. Mmm...mmmm.
Posted by Katy on 01/12/06 at 01:04 PM
That's hilarious, Michael! You know...come to think of it, it was around Thanksgiving when this happened! Hmmm... ; )

And amen, Doug, this is one wonderful thing about small town life. Even though the police office shuts down at five, if you need help, it arrives in a flash. And I should have added that after the policeman drove off with his Thanksgiving dinner...er, I mean, the possum (heh-heh) the neighbors came out on their porches to make sure everything was okay at our house.
Posted by Deb Raney on 01/12/06 at 01:05 PM
And some think small-town living is dull! Not with Deb!
Posted by BJ on 01/13/06 at 02:13 PM
Too funny, Deb! I can't imagine small town living, but wildlife do manage to explore our backyard now and then. We've had rabbits get caught in the fence (boy can they squeal!), and ducks bathing in the pool, and squirrels playing catch-me-if-you-can around the tree trunks. Both times the rabbits got stuck, Randy pulled them out from behind (wearing heavy gloves) and let them go. Never saw an animal run so fast!
I think God gave us animals to keep life entertaining.
Posted by Jill Eileen Smith on 01/13/06 at 04:56 PM
It raced around the perimeter of the fenced-in backyard,with the cop on foot in hot pursuit.
Posted by Granite exporters in india on 10/30/10 at 12:43 AM

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Personal blog of christian writer & fallible mom Katy McKenna Raymond in Kansas City, Missouri Katy is represented by Greg Johnson at WordServe Literary Read more Katy at LateBoomer.net Follow Katy on Twitter Follow Katy on Facebook 123 Recent Posts Try Becoming Brenda Starr Off Beat Scattered That’s It So I’ve Finally Signed With An Agent. Now What? The Spoon Sciatica Sweetheart A Woman’s Train of Thought Has No Caboose However much we own, we are all still living on borrowed time After all, when restaurants shrink portions, they don’t shrink prices. As with everything in life, balance is key. Slow down, you move too fast… Yeah, I know. I have issues. Search Advanced Search Syndicate Login E me at katy @ ngenius.com	Playing Possum (Please welcome fallible’s guest blogger, Deb Raney. If you’ve never seen the movie “A Vow to Cherish,” based on Deb’s book, do! I bawled my head off.) I live with my husband and teenage daughter in a sleepy little Kansas town. We like it sleepy. But we had a little excitement at our house a few weeks ago—the kind of thing that will probably make it into a novel someday. This particular incident involved the police. Let me tell you, when they finally drove away from our house, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. They had caught the perpetrator and hauled him away in the back of the patrol car—the trunk, to be precise. It happened like this… Our daughter went out the back door around 8 p.m. to feed our two cats. Frosty and Cleo have the run of the backyard, but these cats prefer to hang out on the deck where they can keep an eye on the activities in our kitchen, and squeak their paws across the window if they think we’ve forgotten their chow time. Our daughter hadn’t been gone two minutes, when the sliding door flew open and Tavia shot into the kitchen and pronounced as only a teenage drama queen can: “There. Is. A. HUMONGOUS. Possum. Out. There!” I put on a brave face and went out to investigate, with Tavia hanging onto my shirttail. Staring up at us from under the gas grill at the bottom of the steps was the biggest opossum I have ever laid eyes on. And I’ve seen a few in my day. He sat there glaring at us, a true ROUS (Rodent Of Unusual Size, for those of you unfamiliar with the The Princess Bride). It gave me the willies! I stomped on the deck and commanded him to “git!” He responded by glaring a little longer, then casually waddling underneath the deck where I could hear him munching on bits of cat food that had fallen through the boards of the deck. Our kitten, Cleo, was nowhere to be found, and our older cat was pacing nervously. I went inside to google “opossum” and was relieved to discover that, while cat food is high on the opossum’s list of delicacies, cats themselves are not. Sure enough, when we looked out a few minutes later, there sat Cleo. The stupid possum was under the grill again, staring at the cats. Again, he ignored our efforts to shoo him from the yard. Finally, I took action and did what any self-respecting small town girl would do. I called the police. Of course, being in a small town, the police department keeps regular business hours and they were closed for the day. But the recording said they could be reached by calling 911. Praying I wouldn’t get chewed out for…I was going to say “crying wolf,” but maybe “playing possum” is more apropos…I dialed those three numbers one always hopes one will never need. I immediately informed the 911 dispatcher that this wasn’t a real emergency, but could they tell me who to call for animal control? “That would be the local police,” she said. “We’ll be happy to send them right out.” Sigh of relief. Within minutes a patrol car cruised up our street and parked in front of our house. The muscular young officer strode to our door armed with a heavy-duty flashlight. We opened the side gate and ushered him into the backyard. My daughter and I scrambled onto the deck and clung to each other while we watched the chase that ensued. The officer managed to lure the critter out from under the deck, but when he tried to capture it, the opossum took off running. It raced around the perimeter of the fenced-in backyard, with the cop on foot in hot pursuit. This cop was slender and in fine physical shape, but he was no match for the roly-poly possum! Finally the animal went through the gate we hadn’t had the presence of mind to close, and darted across the front yard. The cop was getting a workout, but he managed to stay close on Mr. Possum’s tail. By now, of course, porch lights are flipping on up and down the street and the neighbors have started to peer from behind curtains, wondering, I’m sure, what heinous crime the Raneys have committed that warrants a nighttime visit from law enforcement. Finally the officer herded the possum up onto our front porch. It was the stunning blow. The possum was so fat he promptly got stuck between the rails of the porch. The cop calmly grabbed its long rat-like tail and hauled it up in triumph (barehanded!) Carrying Mr. Opossum upside down by the tail, the officer transported him to the back of the patrol car where he popped the trunk, stuffed in the culprit and slammed the lid shut. The policeman’s parting words as he drove off to release the possum “a few miles outside of town” were “Thanks a lot, folks.” We pondered for a while the oddity of him thanking us before deciding we must have provided some much needed excitement in the life of a small-town cop. Deborah Raney’s first novel, A Vow to Cherish, was the inspiration for World Wide Pictures’ film of the same title. It will be re-released this spring, the ten-year anniversary of its first publication. Deb’s novels have won the RITA Award, the National Readers Choice Award, and Playing by Heart was a Christy Award finalist. Her newest release is Over the Waters. Visit her Web site at http://www.deborahraney.com. Posted by Katy on 01/11/06 at 04:15 PM Fallible Comments... Great story, Deb! What I love about living in the pseudo-country (the city edges closer to our house each day...) is the way the "wild" animals become almost domesticated. I'll never forget the morning I awakened to find a young deer asleep directly under my kitchen window. As if it thought it was a cat, or something! Fun, huh? Posted by Katy on 01/12/06 at 09:34 AM Deb, I found a possum curled up on the step of our patio one night, with our 74-lb. dog sleeping not three feet away. <I>Loved</I> your story! Posted by Macromoments on 01/12/06 at 09:37 AM Oh, I can just picture that 74-lb. dog curled up by the possum. : ) Katy has a "dog" story that I hope she's going to tell one of these days. Right, Katy? : ) Deb Posted by Deb Raney on 01/12/06 at 10:32 AM Anybody else thinking maybe instead of a little small town excitement the cop was offering up thanks for his upcoming Sunday dinner? Posted by Michael O'Connor on 01/12/06 at 12:57 PM Deb, thanks for the fun story. At least you're in an area where the authorities will show up when called. Our neighbor fell from a ladder while painting the second story of their house, breaking ribs and puncturing a lung. It took nearly an hour for an ambulance to arrive. Maybe if they had tried the old "possum under the deck" routine, help would have come more quickly. Posted by Doug Raymond on 01/12/06 at 12:57 PM Michael has an excellent point! Doug has totalled two of our cars hitting deer. It's illegal here for a passerby to scoop up the fresh roadkill, but "out in the county" we play the game by our own rules. When the guys in the pick-up truck driving behind Doug witnessed the accident, they jumped out of their truck and ran to make sure he was all right BEFORE they scooped up the meat and threw it in the back of their truck. And then they hightailed it out of there before the sheriff showed up. Come to think of it, it was a Sunday, too. Mmm...mmmm. Posted by Katy on 01/12/06 at 01:04 PM That's hilarious, Michael! You know...come to think of it, it was around Thanksgiving when this happened! Hmmm... ; ) And amen, Doug, this is one wonderful thing about small town life. Even though the police office shuts down at five, if you need help, it arrives in a flash. And I should have added that after the policeman drove off with his Thanksgiving dinner...er, I mean, the possum (heh-heh) the neighbors came out on their porches to make sure everything was okay at our house. Posted by Deb Raney on 01/12/06 at 01:05 PM And some think small-town living is dull! Not with Deb! Posted by BJ on 01/13/06 at 02:13 PM Too funny, Deb! I can't imagine small town living, but wildlife do manage to explore our backyard now and then. We've had rabbits get caught in the fence (boy can they squeal!), and ducks bathing in the pool, and squirrels playing catch-me-if-you-can around the tree trunks. Both times the rabbits got stuck, Randy pulled them out from behind (wearing heavy gloves) and let them go. Never saw an animal run so fast! I think God gave us animals to keep life entertaining. Posted by Jill Eileen Smith on 01/13/06 at 04:56 PM It raced around the perimeter of the fenced-in backyard,with the cop on foot in hot pursuit. Posted by Granite exporters in india on 10/30/10 at 12:43 AM Page 1 of 1 pages Commenting is not available in this weblog entry. Next entry: Getting Ahead Of The Game Previous entry: The Lowest Form Of Competition << Back to main


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Playing Possum

Personal blog of christian
writer & fallible mom
Katy McKenna Raymond
in Kansas City, Missouri