Story Archive

When Thinking Beats Reacting

Rachel Borch was jogging near her home in Hope, Maine, when she spotted a raccoon on the trail ahead of her. It was holding its ground, baring its teeth, and then started “bounding” toward her. “I knew instantly it had to be rabid,” Borch said. The path was too narrow to run by it, so she pulled off her headphones and dropped her phone to prepare for the coming battle. “Imagine the Tasmanian devil,” she said. “It was terrifying.” She tried to grab it; it bit her, and wouldn’t let go. That’s when she noticed she had dropped her phone into a puddle. “I didn’t think I could strangle it with my bare hands,” she said, so “with my thumb in its mouth, I just pushed its head down into the muck” of the puddle and drowned it. Once it stopped struggling she ran home, and her mother took her to the hospital. Her father went and got the animal’s body, and tests confirmed: it was indeed rabid. “I’m a vegetarian,” she said. “It was self defense.” (RC/Bangor Daily News) ...In case you wonder why she didn’t eat it.