Possums need love (and rescue)

Just when you may have thought that you had heard everything possible, you haven’t heard about my blue-blooded-raised-in-society friend who rescues possums.

Yep, that’s right. Those same creatures that most Southerners regard as Number One road kill, the ones that daily decorate Southern roadsides, have an advocate in my friend, Stevie.

“They’re so sweet,” she said with a soft sigh.

Stevie and her family love animals. Their home and its surrounding acreage is a menagerie with a collection of dogs – Basset hounds have always been the family favorite – cats, rabbits, horses, birds and the occasional mother raccoon who takes up in their barn.

Her pantry is filled with enormous jars of peanut butter because she discovered how much hummingbirds love it. Her daily morning routine includes filling the bird feeders while coffee is making.

There are constant animal traumas in their household. There was the rabbit that got loose and chewed through the washing machine hose while the family was out of town. Since the laundry room is on the second floor, it was nothing short of a flood disaster that greeted them upon their return.

Then there was the cat that was minding its own business, asleep in the master bedroom when the three dogs sneaked up the stairs and mercilessly attacked it. An almost blind dog disappeared one night and the family stayed up until 6 a.m. searching in the dark and rain until they found her.

Something’s always happening with the menagerie.

Stevie was born into an aristocratic family, her father being a corporate CEO of a major corporation. The blue bloods were deeply distressed when Stevie fell in love with and then ran off to marry a boy of a humble, rural upbringing. He soon won ‘em over, though. Long before Darrell Waltrip became a racing superstar, Stevie’s family fell in love with the good-hearted, good ol’ boy because he is a quality person, through and through.

It’s always been an interesting match-up to me. When their first child was born, Jessica was beautiful, brilliant, funny and charming which led me to comment to Stevie and her parents one day, “This is pretty impressive if this is what you get when you breed a blueblood with a redneck.”

I just learned the other day that my blue-blooded friend has, over the years, rescued four possums, the latest being one with a head injury that she found wandering aimlessly around in a circle in the street.

“How do you pick up a possum?” I asked, still incredulous on this discovery.

“Well, they will bite so you have to be very gentle and not scare them,” she replied. “But I’ve never been bitten.”

The Waltrips have discovered a non-profit, wildlife rescue organization near their home outside of Nashville, Tenn., so they have become a regular contributor to their stock. In recent months, she had rescued two maimed hawks, a possum and a family of raccoons.

“I never knew anyone who has even touched a possum,” I commented. “It never occurred to me that anyone actually rescued them.”

But really I shouldn’t be surprised that Stevie would be rescuing possums. I shouldn’t find it odd at all.

After all, she is a blueblood who married a redneck. That was pretty bold, too.