I’ve had several encounters with raccoons over the years. The first time was in Northern Wisconsin, when I was maybe 13 or 14. We would go with another family to stay at that family’s cabin in Eagle River so we could go fishing (well, they could go fishing; it wasn’t my favorite activity, so I’d keep myself occupied during the day). Some of us found a baby raccoon, which was first named Charlie, then Leo-guy. We’d go out first thing in the morning and Leo-guy was waiting for us. Our mothers warned us not to get too attached, because we were not bringing a raccoon home with us. We finally decided the raccoon had to go when he got hold of the fish that they had caught, and Leo-guy went back to living with his mother.

We grew up near Loyola University on the North Side of Chicago, and when…