So I hate spiders. Like I HATE spiders. They’re my worst nightmares and the scariest horror flick all rolled into one. I can’t take all of the legs like toothpicks and the whole liquefying the guts of their victims and sucking it out like an offal smoothie. Can’t take it. I know, I know, I live on a farm and spiders are by far one of the most squashable nuisances, but seriously give me a chicken snake any day. They’re evil and that’s, that.
However, I do have an unspoken agreement with the spiders that live in the ceiling beams of my living room. If they stay out of my way, don’t scare the bejesus out of me, and kill any flying insects that get into the house then they may live. I am their god, a can of Bengal just a moment away if they’re ever in breach of contract. I can handle that. And normally we co-exist in this bastardization of symbiosis. Until recently. . .
Recently, we’ve had a plagues-of-Egypt level invasion of flies and gnats, in addition to our normal invasion of dirt daubers (they get in every year. . . No idea how. . . But my sick sense of humor is vastly entertained by the reactions of guests who think they’re wasps. . . 😳). But seriously, I can’t leave the peppers and tomatoes I’ve harvested from my garden on the kitchen counter, because there’s a swarm of fruit flies on them. They’re flying around in the windows so badly I’ve taken out the Dyson because a flyswatter just won’t cut it. We can’t eat our dinner in peace, because house flies do drive-by’s during which they barf on our meal, zoom off, then stop again long enough to grab a bite (Do flies suck or bite??) and then are off again. The dogs are even going crazy with them, snapping at the air trying to catch them. Our boxer/border collie mix (Chubs) has gotten Karate Kid good at it. Downside is that he bites them and then spits their gooey carcasses out on the floor. Anyway, when the dog has gotten better than the resident arachnids at catching bugs, I’m gonna go ahead and say that’s breach of our unspoken contract.
So if you have any deviant and weird affection for spiders you might go ahead and skip this post, because my days of pretending my worst nightmare isn’t sitting above me, one misstep away from falling on my head, are over. Insect spray was actually going to be my last resort, because I have stains on my ceiling from past bug genocides, so I got out my trusty flyswatter. Now this flyswatter is the equivalent of Excalibur from Arthurian legend, and it might be immodest to say, but I wield that thing with equal skill. The goo of a thousand dead flies lingers in its plastic mesh swatter, and though it looks like hell I’ll never get rid of it. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
I get out my flyswatter and wait for dusk, because that’s when they tend to come out. Right in time for my evening tv. Yup. And there’s one in particular that is the size of my farm girl palm, and I’m not gonna lie, I’ve wanted him gone for a long time. Little did I know that he’d put up a fight. . .
So I’m sitting on the couch watching The Office (the one where Dwight makes the speech at that awards ceremony using lines from Mussolini. . . Hilarious) and Big Boy comes out. I slowly walk over because I don’t want to scare him back into hiding, but I swear he was watching me approach and his stance said, “Come at me, bro.” Swear. There was a moment I considered the Bengal, but again, stains, so I crept forward. Can spiders smell fear like dogs? I’m gonna go with yes, because as I reared back to wield Excali-swatter, he bowed up like a bull dog. I paused, and in retrospect that was my last moment to retreat with dignity. Poor judgement prevailed; however, and I took a swing. People, I missed, but the bigger problem was that the spider was personally offended and launched his horrible, hairy, toothpick-legged body in my general direction. Ever seen Elaine in Seinfeld dance? In my head my reaction was probably a more frenzied version of that. BECAUSE I DIDN’T KNOW WHERE HE WAS. And that, my friends, was worse than staring him in the eye. I’m whimpering with terror and swinging back and forth looking for him, flyswatter in a two-handed grip in front of me.
Now I’ll admit to taking some artistic liberties with some of my stories, but in this case the truth is better than fiction. Right about the time I’m starting to relax, because I’m not seeing the spider anywhere, I feel this little movement on my leg. Nothing more than a tickle. I look down and it. Is. On. My. Shorts. I screamed. I screamed like a thousand demons were trying to drag me into to hell. I screamed like the world was ending in a fiery explosion. I screamed like I was being murdered. My dogs, God bless them, started running around me looking for the threat. My kids are standing in the entrance of the living room with glassy-eyed expressions of horror. I’ve dropped the flyswatter like an idiot and am flailing my hands at my shorts trying to dislodge the spider. He flies a few feet toward the kitchen and lands on the tile. He’s laying there, sort of crumpled up, and I’m starting to think that I’ve inadvertently killed him with my flailing, but my adrenaline is screaming through me at this point so I go for the flyswatter. As I’m reaching for it that spider twitched and started dragging itself towards me. It was like Chuckie after he’s been burned and chopped up but he’s still coming. I jump for the flyswatter and do this spastic ninja roll and come up swinging. I beat that spider into the floor until it was nothing but pulp. I beat it until I was gasping for breath. Honestly, I beat it until it was completely ridiculous, but I couldn’t stop myself. You know, adrenaline and all that.
When it was over, there was dead silence. Nobody, dogs included, moved for a few seconds and then all hell broke loose. My kids are demanding an explanation for whatever it was they witnessed, the dogs are examining what was left of the spider. I’m just trying to calm down after my gigantic overreaction. My son, being the gentleman that he is, wipes up the spider. I say wipes because I’m pretty sure there was nothing solid left. And I make a decision to let bygones be bygones and pretend there are no other spiders in my living room. My only hope is that the ones that are left witnessed the horrible demise of their brave compatriot and develop a better work ethic. And from now on, I’ll save Excali-swatter for killing the flies!
Five Dog Bend 