alabamaalan
<font color=green>Alan, you can run, but you can't
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2002
- Messages
- 10,912
I have to celebrate a wonderful discovery I made yesterday; I can survive spider contact!
Like others on this board, I have never been fond of being in close proximity to spiders.
Once as a teen, I was walking through some tall grass near a creek. I saw a snake slithering past as I was about to place my foot on it. Sure, my heart stopped for a minute and my skin grew cold, but I was undaunted as I chose to return to my bicycle and explore some other time. As I was leaving I glanced down and noticed a spider on my leg.
This was not a Hi, Im a friendly part of the ecosystem that eats those insects that annoy you kind of spider; this was a garden spider.
You know those huge black and yellow spiders that have the cool designs in the center of their webs?
Snake I calmly turn and leave.
Spider I scream like a little girl and slap that sucker off my leg without thought and flee back to my bike as fast as I can.
I havent been back to that creek since; it was just for exploring under a highway bridge anyway. The creek that I used for swimming did not have nasty garden spiders.
It had an alligator.
We had an encounter one day, which happens to be the last day I ever swam there.
It still didnt scare me as much as the spider.
Fast forward to me as an adult man; now Im Daddy. Daddy lives with a blind wife and two small girls.
Daddy is the designated bug killer of the house. Ive learned to live with it. The household spiders are small anyway and I can kill them without hesitation or guilt.
I leave those in the webs on my porch alone unless they get too low because I hate flying pests more than I do spiders. Inside is my territory, but I generously allow spiders to have free reign in my yard.
Until yesterday.
DW and I were sitting in lounge chairs under a shade tree as our girls played in and around the front yard.
At one point my oldest daughter screamed and slapped at her shirt. She said that a black spider had been jumping on her.
I chuckled and told my wife I understood. I knew the black and white spiders she meant..waving their little white fangs about and leaping all over the place. Still, they are small and not that much to worry about.
You would think a man would know better than to temp fate.
It wasnt long before I felt something on my neck running down quickly. Sure enough, as I tugged at my collar, I saw a black and white spider down my shirt! Somehow, the spider was bigger than I had assured my wife and daughter they are.
I didnt want to slap at it while it was in my clothing. After all, its last great defiant act may be to give me the mother of all spider bites. Instead I leapt to my feet and shook out my shirt. I wisely decided against the shirt removal idea because it would no doubt have lodged the spider in my hair or up my nose.
I saw it near my legs, but it was no longer attached to me which was a good thing. However, it wasnt on the ground either, which was a bad thing. This means that it was dangling from a web and was now quickly pulling itself back up towards my shorts.
This was a very bad thing.
Had that spider made its way into the leg of my short pants, I would have danced in a way that I would be asked to leave my Baptist church and never return. In fact, I suspect my family would have been forced to leave our neighborhood and start a new life somewhere else.
Fortunately, a quick shake of the leg dislodged the invading varmint.
I was very pleased with the way I handled the situation. I did not scream, faint, or even flail about like a madman, although I did very understandably leap from my chair as I was dislodging it.
I returned to my chair feeling very proud of myself as I described what had happened to my wife sitting next to me. She said it would have been the death of her, had that spider landed on her like that.
Silly female; its a good thing that it chose to attack me, that rational Daddy of the family.
Then I looked down.
It was back on my foot.
At this point, I kicked it off and stomped that sucker flat with my flip flop until I could verify its lifeless little body in the grass.
I may no longer be terrified of spiders, but I dont want to bond with them either.
Like others on this board, I have never been fond of being in close proximity to spiders.
Once as a teen, I was walking through some tall grass near a creek. I saw a snake slithering past as I was about to place my foot on it. Sure, my heart stopped for a minute and my skin grew cold, but I was undaunted as I chose to return to my bicycle and explore some other time. As I was leaving I glanced down and noticed a spider on my leg.
This was not a Hi, Im a friendly part of the ecosystem that eats those insects that annoy you kind of spider; this was a garden spider.
You know those huge black and yellow spiders that have the cool designs in the center of their webs?
Snake I calmly turn and leave.
Spider I scream like a little girl and slap that sucker off my leg without thought and flee back to my bike as fast as I can.
I havent been back to that creek since; it was just for exploring under a highway bridge anyway. The creek that I used for swimming did not have nasty garden spiders.
It had an alligator.
We had an encounter one day, which happens to be the last day I ever swam there.
It still didnt scare me as much as the spider.
Fast forward to me as an adult man; now Im Daddy. Daddy lives with a blind wife and two small girls.
Daddy is the designated bug killer of the house. Ive learned to live with it. The household spiders are small anyway and I can kill them without hesitation or guilt.
I leave those in the webs on my porch alone unless they get too low because I hate flying pests more than I do spiders. Inside is my territory, but I generously allow spiders to have free reign in my yard.
Until yesterday.
DW and I were sitting in lounge chairs under a shade tree as our girls played in and around the front yard.
At one point my oldest daughter screamed and slapped at her shirt. She said that a black spider had been jumping on her.
I chuckled and told my wife I understood. I knew the black and white spiders she meant..waving their little white fangs about and leaping all over the place. Still, they are small and not that much to worry about.
You would think a man would know better than to temp fate.
It wasnt long before I felt something on my neck running down quickly. Sure enough, as I tugged at my collar, I saw a black and white spider down my shirt! Somehow, the spider was bigger than I had assured my wife and daughter they are.
I didnt want to slap at it while it was in my clothing. After all, its last great defiant act may be to give me the mother of all spider bites. Instead I leapt to my feet and shook out my shirt. I wisely decided against the shirt removal idea because it would no doubt have lodged the spider in my hair or up my nose.
I saw it near my legs, but it was no longer attached to me which was a good thing. However, it wasnt on the ground either, which was a bad thing. This means that it was dangling from a web and was now quickly pulling itself back up towards my shorts.
This was a very bad thing.
Had that spider made its way into the leg of my short pants, I would have danced in a way that I would be asked to leave my Baptist church and never return. In fact, I suspect my family would have been forced to leave our neighborhood and start a new life somewhere else.
Fortunately, a quick shake of the leg dislodged the invading varmint.
I was very pleased with the way I handled the situation. I did not scream, faint, or even flail about like a madman, although I did very understandably leap from my chair as I was dislodging it.
I returned to my chair feeling very proud of myself as I described what had happened to my wife sitting next to me. She said it would have been the death of her, had that spider landed on her like that.
Silly female; its a good thing that it chose to attack me, that rational Daddy of the family.
Then I looked down.
It was back on my foot.
At this point, I kicked it off and stomped that sucker flat with my flip flop until I could verify its lifeless little body in the grass.
I may no longer be terrified of spiders, but I dont want to bond with them either.
