I was about ten at the time. My sister and our neighbors are a few years younger than me. We were playing outside doing whatever 10, 8, 7 and 5 year olds do, running around in our neighbors yard and playing. We raced into my backyard, the three other kids behind me. It was mid-afternoon and the sun shone bright and warm through the very few, tall, pine trees into the open backyard. That’s when we saw the animal. Right in the middle of the yard where the sun shone unblocked by trees was a scraggly grayish animal. The bright summer sun was like a spotlight showing the main character of a play. At first we couldn’t tell what it was but we knew it wasn’t supposed to be there. All four kids looked at the animal for a minute then looked at each other trying to decide what to do. I decided to tell my dad what was happening, he would surely know what to do. 

“Dada!” I ran into the house looking for him, “Dada! There’s something in the yard. I think it’s a possum or something!”

He got his shoes on and we ventured out to the yard together. The possum hadn’t moved since I saw it a minute before. My sister and the neighbors were on the other side of the fence still staring at the creature. My mom who had come out onto the deck, motioned them as well as me over to the deck with her to watch what was happening. My dad walked as close to the possum as he could without risk to try to see what it was doing. He concluded that it was sick with something because possums are nocturnal mammals and it was the middle of the afternoon. He also decided he should take care of it.

Crunch. The sound of the pitchfork piercing through the possum was something that was hard to forget. No reaction. The possum just laid there like nothing had happened. Like there wasn’t a pitchfork sticking through its entire abdomen. We looked down from the deck stunned. My sister was closing her eyes, she never liked gory things. My dad just looked at the possum, obviously expecting something to happen. He walked back to the shed, the possum still pinned to the ground with the pitchfork. My dad came back with a shovel in hand. I fully was not expecting what was going to happen next. Soon I saw the shovel high in the air and just a second later, coming down on the possum's head. Bang! The shovel hit the possum’s head so hard it made a sort of ringing sound as if it were a terrible gong. Once again, no reaction. Not even a flinch. So once again my dad raised the shovel and hit the possum’s head. This time there was a reaction. A flinch, still not much considering it had a pitchfork through its body it’d be hit with a shovel multiple times. My dad continued to hit the possum until it eventually got knocked out. Each hit made a loud bang that echoed through the spacious backyard. After the possum was surely deceased my dad carried it out of the yard with the pitchfork. The possum dangled from the pitchfork as all of us kids stood on the deck in shock. 

Every so often I see the pitchfork in our shed and it all comes back to me. The sound is the thing that stuck with me the most. Still to this day I think of the possum. I remember the nonexistent struggle with the pitchfork. Ever since that day I don’t look at possums the same way.