When I was growing I had a fascination with death.
I would play with the neighbours 3 houses down the street. They were sisters from an ultra Christian household. Their mom was pretty crazy, and their dad acted much older than he was. Their house was the oldest house on the street and was branded a historical site. I guess we should have thought that would make ample grounds for imaginative play, but we generally met up at my house. I now realize this was simply to avoid their mother.
I was fortunate enough to live in front of a conservation area. This meant that the landscape extended around my house. I suppose my house IS in a conservation area, and the residential additions were essentially renting space from it.
On the property line of my backyard and the Italian neighbours who we'd swear were in the mafia, there was an above ground sewer tunnel. You know, one of those big pipes that water run off came through. The sisters and I would scale down the hill and stand beside the pipe, fascinated by the pond it had started.
One time, we saw what looked to be a cat...or maybe raccoon bundled up in a matted, wet ball beside the pond. The sighting was the most exciting thing we discovered in our 20 home neighbourhood. After we had concluded it was in fact, dead, we immediately wanted to know what it is was. It's tail was long, thin, and tapered. There was no hair on it, and I wasn't sure if it had fallen off, or if it just never had any. It appeared to be scaly.
"It's an armadillo," the eldest sister stated. I'd never seen an armadillo (likely because they are primarily found in Central America), but this unidentifiable form needed a classification. I think we all knew it was more likely a possum, but an armadillo had way more mystique. We stuck with it. We had found an armadillo—washed up and weathered beside the run-off pond.
I wish I could say it just stopped there, but this is the moment where I realize my affixation with post-life. I grabbed a long, broken tree branch. I paused. The girls looked at me. It took every ounce of courage I had to extend the branch, and poke the carcass. I touched it. Then gaining courage, I slid the branch underneath it and rolled it over.
That’s when it all became real. It was once alive, whatever the hell it was. But now it’s dead. Death never seems real when you are young. It’s intangible. Something you are told happens, but you don’t even give it a second thought.
It’s something I realized I had no control over, but watching it was captivating.
I’d go back to the spot every so often, until the fur and flesh and worn away. Until the mass was merely a stack of bones.
