By Berna (Swain) Michell – Melfort, Sask.
I had my first teaching job in a rural school in the Tompkins, Sask., district. I lived in two small rooms added onto the side of the school and was responsible for doing the janitor work. This included running the big coal/wood furnace.
It was my first experience with a furnace of any kind. In the winter, rather than taking a chance on the fire burning out before morning, I would go through the classroom to the basement once each night to add fuel.
The doors of my living area had basic locks on the outside door and on the door between it and the classroom. The outside school door had no lock. I finally decided there was no point in locking my door, only to have to unlock it to go feed the furnace.
It was only mid-winter and it seemed to have been cold forever. There was no sign of it warming up. Some students came rushing in during recess one day, telling me there was a skunk in the barn. The barn was no longer used as such, and apparently this skunk had chosen it for shelter.
Behaviour was unusual
The students assured me that this skunk did not stink and since I was unable to detect even the slightest skunk odour, I believed them, so I went along to see their find.
It was indeed a full-grown skunk that seemed undisturbed by the fuss around him. He looked healthy, but I stressed they needed to leave him alone because his behaviour was certainly unusual. We wondered if he had been somebody’s pet in the past.
He was gone from the barn the next day and we decided he’d moved on. A couple of days later, we caught a glimpse of him in the school basement. There was a coal chute for unloading coal from the outside into the basement coal bin and he could have come in through it.
We saw him only once and decided he had made his way back outside and had gone on his way. The cold spell lingered and I continued to make my nightly trip to the basement to feed the furnace. I left the doors open from my living area into the schoolroom and to the basement, partly to make my trip easier and quicker, and partly to let heat into my rooms.
No place to hide
On this particular night, I had nicely cuddled back beneath my covers when a noise caught my attention. The sound began to take on a definite swish-plop, swish-plop rhythm and was coming from the school room.
It was also coming nearer and nearer my territory. I kid you not when I say my hair stood on end. It was easy to attach all sorts of threatening images to the sounds which resembled human footsteps, perhaps with one leg dragging a bit.
I had no weapon, and there was no place to hide. I was literally scared stiff. The sounds progressed to my kitchen, only steps from where I lay under my covers. Finally I realized that the sounds were different. They had changed to rattling and scurrying – almost like a cat playing with something.
As I listened to the action, I began to feel less threatened, my heart climbed back inside my chest and I could actually wiggle my toes. I gathered my courage enough to reach for the flashlight I kept by the bed and shone it into the kitchen.
Stared unconcerned
Staring back at me were two shiny black eyes. I could see that the invader was my friend the skunk. He stared at me for a few seconds, then continued, unconcerned, chasing a spool of thread I had dropped on the floor earlier, swatting it, then scrambling after it. A video of that would have been priceless.
I enjoyed the show for a few minutes then clapped my hands and yelled at the skunk for scaring me nearly to death. He ambled off, back to the basement and I never saw him again.
I have to admit that through some of those long winter evenings with no TV, no car, and limited radio, I wished he’d come back for a visit!
