Our dogs got sprayed by a skunk last week.
The smell has permeated everything.
For several days you could smell it wafting all the way from out in the street.
We tried literally everything friends and the Internet said to do.
For days on end, researching “skunk scent removal” was the only thing I did with my free time, which was why my first thought when my husband, Justin, came to me like he did,
was that this had something to do with that, too.
I was sitting reading Amazon skunk spray reviews in the living room, when suddenly he appeared fresh from his shower, without a shirt on, and real out of breath;
His eyes filled with a mix of embarrassment and fear.
“So….I just did a thing,” He began in between heaving.
My mind was instantly racing about what it could be.
My husband has never once been called “boring.”
It could have been just about anything.
Mentally, in this space, I swung everywhere from that he had for some reason stripped the hardwood, to lifted the car, to wrestled that skunk himself.
The scowling and heavy breathing are usually reserved for if he attempts to do a push up,
but there was also a hint of embarrassment to tell me that I was sensing,
so I knew it had to be something I would never think of.
“I am literally sweating,” he huffed,
making me more invested in hearing the end of this tale.
“I went to the garage to get a clean shirt from the dryer….and on the way back in…I tried to step onto the porch…but I missed my step.”
(Here was where he started physically acting out his trauma, and where I almost wet myself, because at this moment, he pitched himself completely in half,
and mimed the whole last part out.)
“When I missed it, all I could think was to do everything I could to not land on my face,
so I used every baby bit of core strength I have, though it is little,
to keep the fastness of my legs winning out over my weight.
My upper body was trying to take me down,
my head was pointed straight to the gravel,
but I just kept willing it to stay up,
and so I kept telling my legs to run faster.
I just kept running like that, trying to stay up, trying to catch myself,
and I ended up running completely across the entire yard with my clean shirt clutched in my hand, like I was playing Capture the Flag all by myself.
I made it all the way to the gravel that way,
and then stood up, and looked all around. I was shocked I hadn’t killed myself.”
He re-enacted parts of the story several times by lumbering head-first across the living room with steps so heavy all the cats ran. The kids came in thinking there’d been an earthquake.
I tried to get a video but never could fast enough.
I would have paid SO MUCH MONEY to have had a front-row view in that yard.
Him casually walking back into the house and then suddenly lumbering, bent in half in a dead sprint with his clean white shirt held up in the air.
He sat five inches from the fan for a long while, heaving to catch his breath as I died.
Justin is VERY good at telling stories.
This kind of physical reenactment is his pride.
Poor guy is not as agile as he once was.
He’s now limping all around, gingerly, saying he’s “really starting to really feel that.”
I just told him I’m happy he didn’t badly hurt himself, and went and got ice to hold on my own possibly torn abdominal muscle from how hard I had just laughed at him.
The absolute best thing in the whole world would have been if our neighbors Dave and Maggie of “Cat trapped in their car” fame, had been watching it all from over the fence.
Somehow we have become the weird neighbors, even though he stands on a hill in the park in a sun-hat every morning, right by the playground, doing Tai Chi.
“He’s stepping…Noooooow he’s bent in half and sprinting,”
never letting his shirt-shaped victory flag leave his hand.
That would have really capped off their view of us, I bet,
what with the cat trapped in their car at 1am,
and them seeing us dust off a pork roast from the trash can and holler to go heat the oven,
Not to mention the fact that our house is now emitting such a strong smell.
We’re doing fine over here, you guys.
Totally fine.
Dave and Maggie,
worry about your own selves.
This article was written by a guest blogger. The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions of Bob Lacey, Sheri Lynch or the Bob & Sheri show.
Mom Outnumbered
Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.
