Spider Slayer

It has always fascinated me how we as women are constantly preoccupied with anything tiny. It seems that if it is tiny, it is adorable. Anything from boxes to paperweights is universally charming when it is small. Even things that are already cute, like dogs and cats. A dog will never be as cute as it was when it was a puppy. My friend believes that it is some sort of natural instinct. Mother Nature’s way to make sure that the female part of the species has the mothering instinct to take care of things that are tiny and helpless, thereby furthering the species.
Whatever the reason, I’ve found that there are two things that under almost any circumstances should never be small. One is the portion size of chocolate. If a woman loves chocolate, she love’s a lot of chocolate more than a little. The other is bugs. Some women may add to this list Diamonds, but that’s really on a case by case basis.
Now, when I say bugs should never be small, what I really mean is that being small will not help them. By and large it is better to have a small bug then a big bug, but no critter I ever saw was proclaimed cute because it was small and relatively helpless. In fact, the way some women carry on, you’d think that the moth that got in was dropping bombs, or that the cricket over in the corner was armed with mustard gas and a bazooka. For a grasshopper to show its face inside the house of any woman is to sign his death sentence.
I myself am somewhat of an anomaly, I suppose. I have always kind of liked insects. I think moths are interesting, I catch crickets and put them back outside, and in the fourth grade I was among a group of people who would catch grasshoppers and keep them as pets. A geek to the core, that’s me. But there are some things that I cannot abide. Blood suckers (you know, ticks and leaches) and spiders.
Spiders have the hardest lot in a woman’s house. A cricket may be saved by a kind husband or child, but there is no forgiveness for the spider. The orders are to kill, there will be no mercy. It’s really rather sad considering how helpful spiders really can be, I even feel a little guilty about the destruction of spiders. But, like most of us, I am at times filled with my own fear and ignorance. Therefore, spiders have to go. I think this goes into another instinct that we have. Survival.
Over the years, I’ve gotten better at handling spiders. Little one’s used to really frighten me, now I can battle them on my own…one at a time. There came a point when I realized that there was no one to get rid of the spider for me (My dad was usually asleep before they started to come out) so I was going to have to do it myself.
I go to school in Utah. A nice place when you aren’t freezing. Often times I would be sitting in the other room, only to be suddenly roused from my quiet activity by the shriek of a roommate. Rushing into the other room to see what was wrong, I was met with cries of: “Oh my Gosh, it’s huge! Kill it!” Scanning the floor with my nearsighted eyes, I would finally locate the little beast which was not even the size of my pinky nail.
“It’s not huge,” I protest. My roommate insists that it is, but I know better. I know better, because I live in Arizona. We get spiders here the size of quarters crawling into the house. Those one’s still strike a certain amount of fear into my heart, but it was dealing with these that led me to my current semi-independent state.
It was late one night in the summer. I was up watching TV when one of these gargantuan brutes caught my eye, crawling across the floor. I did what any reasonable young girl would do.
I panicked.
There was a spider in my house. Not just any spider, but one that I was certain could devour me whole if it wished. Logically I of course knew that this was not so, but the way it moved across our beige carpet put all reason aside. My dad was sound asleep and waking him would do no good. I woke up my mother, asking her what to do. I think that she told me where the bug spray was.
So, forced to face the fiend forlorn, I put on my battle gear. Armed with a broom in one hand, and a can of raid in the other, I searched for where the villain had gone. My hiking boots covered the cuffs of my pajama pants as I pushed aside the ottoman. Finally, I found it there behind the leather armchair in our living room. Through a combination of spraying and whacking, adding to that, the moving of several pieces of furniture, I was finally able to conquer. The beast was slain, I was victorious.
This process was repeated many times throughout the summer. I was no longer Kimberly Bennett, the helpless. I was transformed. I am woman, I am strong, I am the SPIDER SLAYER.
The challenge of battling scorpions was my next trial. How do you go about conquering an enemy so cunning and dangerous as this? With a tale that moves like lightening, with a sting just as fierce, how could one depend on victory? How to defeat it?
My first experience with scorpions was at my brother’s house when I practically put my hand on one. I was house/dog sitting and making some extra money by cleaning the house. The one reason that I wasn’t stung was because it was just as surprised by me as I was by it.
I recoiled. I ran. I called my mom.
So, in answer to the question “how does one defeat a scorpion?” Pretty much the same way you kill a spider. You step on it, with thick soled shoes. If it’s not on the floor, get it to the floor. Just make sure it doesn’t sting you. Facing a scorpion and living to tell the tale, (or at least surviving unscathed as most scorpions can’t kill you, just make you terribly ill at worst) gives one a certain sense of power. Knowing that you can take care of yourself in case of fire or scorpion attack is really rather nice.
But what do we take from all of it? As I said before, I feel a little guilty about killing spiders. Scorpions, well, not as much. They tend to pose an immediate threat. I also don’t feel bad about black widows or brown recluses, or any of those others that can cause you serious harm. But the little ones, the kind just trying to curl up in a dark corner and make a life for itself. Those ones get to me.
I’ve found that, even as I grow as a person, I haven’t grown enough to let even the little spiders be. After all, they aren’t cute, they are still creepy, and they are going to get bigger and multiply. So, I’ve decided on a rule. Inside is my home, no creepy crawlers allowed. Outside is theirs. Unless in immediate danger from the arachnid in question, I will vacate their living space and let them be.
It is said that people fear what they do not understand. Maybe one day, I will understand spiders. Maybe one day the logical part of my brain that says spiders are more afraid of me than I am of them, will agree with the survival instinct part of my brain that says the threat should be eliminated. Maybe one day I will come to respect spiders, to not fear them, and simply place them outside if they aren’t welcome in the house. Maybe one day I will even look at the tiny little things and find their spiny little legs cuddly. Maybe I’ll find them cute.
That’s stretching it a little.
Maybe…but I doubt it.
A lot of people are afraid of spiders, you’d think something was going on. Until the survival instinct and the mothering instinct can reach a compromise, I imagine things will continue much as they are. And maybe that’s even for the best.
Maybe.