Last week as I was mowing my lawn, my nose kept stumbling upon the smell of decay. I’d be mowing along when all of a sudden I’d get a really overpowering whiff, which would cause me to stop mowing and start sniffing vigorously around the yard trying to find whatever it was that had died back there. Ultimately I gave up and continued mowing, but kept smelling it off and on.

The next day D told me that she thought something must have died under the porch, since it smelled bad and there were lots of flies. One of the first places I had sniffed around the day prior had been the porch, so I was doubtful, but sure enough, there was a small area in the middle of the deck that was swarming with flies. By watching the flight and landing patterns of the flies, I could see a clear outline on top of the deck showing me pretty clearly what was underneath the deck — or at least where under the deck it was.

A few minutes later I was removing boards from the deck with my trusty electric screwdriver, exposing the corpse of a young dead possum. I’m not sure why it died, it seemed to be in pretty good shape — if you put aside the fact that it wasn’t alive any more. Because of the extreme smell, and the long amount of time until garbage day, I decided that the best way to rid myself of this poor dead possum would be to dig a hole and let Mother Earth take care of the smell-removal duties.

(Oh yeah: In case it isn’t clear, this particular incident inspired my little story extolling the virtues of Icy Hot. It really does work quite well, even in hundred degree weather with a rapidly decomposing possum.)

The possum is long sealed away beneath a protective layer of dirt for over a week now, but the smell lingers on, if only inside my nose. I’ll just all of a sudden catch a whiff of something dead in the most unlikely of places, not the least disturbing of which is the bakery section of my local grocery store. “Mmm, muffins, donuts, cakes, death, scones..”

I really hope that the smell is somehow just trapped in my nose, rather than being indicative of a newly awakened psychic ability. Seeing dead people is bad enough without having to smell them too.