So... my uneventful Saturday changed.
My friend Sherri sent me a message saying that an opossum with babies was trapped in a pipe at her work. The cops nor the fire department would come out until Monday. 🙁 That was just not good enough so I went to see what I could do.
The pipe was long and kind of narrow. It was longer than my arm and I was pretty sure I could not reach her. I took the towel I'd brought and cut it into strips and dropped it down thinking she'd climb up. I know it wasn't a long time, but I waited quietly for an hour and she never came. So, I started to get worried that she was really stuck.
I put on a glove that Sherri had in her car and tried to reach down. I could barely brush her nose with my hand and only because she was smiling up at me. Anyone who knows about opossums knows that they are usually gonna open their mouth real big and show you all of their teeth. What most people don't seem to understand is that it's all show.
I felt like I was running out of options so I did the only logical thing I could think of: I stuck my hand in her mouth. When I found her top fangs I put my thumb over her nose and tried to pull. She barely budged. 🙁 I wanted to cry.
We tried few other things to get her out, but nothing worked. So I mustered up my balls and reached in again. I braced myself against the ground, stuck my hand in her mouth, and PULLED. Slow, but firm. And I got her. 😃
I feel really shaken because I felt like I had to be hurting her, but I'm surely not as shaken as she is.
She is resting now in a cat carrier inside my bathroom. I've given her a towel and some wet cat food and water. She needs to be warm and get dry and just rest. I don't know how long she was down there, but I'm gonna hold on to her for a few days and make sure she and the baby (or babies!) are ok.
Speaking of babies - I was really concerned that I might have lost a few down the pipe so I went all MacGyver on this shit and rigged a mirror on a pole to make sure I couldn't see anyone else down there. As far as I could tell the pipe is now empty. I would NOT have been able to sleep tonight if I hadn't checked.
P. S. I'm not saying that anyone should go and test this out, but when I put my hand in her mouth she turned her head. She did NOT bite me. This scared, hungry, damp mama opossum did NOT bite me. They are so docile. They get such a bad wrap because they are convincing actors, but seriously, please don't ever hurt one. They wouldn't hurt you.
