My Irrational Fear

I have a severe case of Arachnophobia. And by severe case, I don't mean I'm one of those girls who just thinks spiders are gross. I mean that I am absolutely terrified of the species. I am sharing this irrational fear because I have, just now, killed a spider in my home that was as big as my fist. Okay, so it wasn't that big. But it was atleast the size of a half dollar. Perhaps maybe even as big as a poker chip. It was ginormas and it was in my house trying to kill me. It had made it as far as the entertainment center where, luckily, the dog intercepted it.

I was sitting at my computer when I heard a noise that sounded like dog claw on wood - which is not a pretty sound to someone who still owes money on their furniture. But I have to give the dog credit in this case, she was attempting to save my life. My heart started pumping, my chest started compressing. I made a shrieking sound. I grabbed the nearest shoe and pounded the ground until the bloody thing lay crumpled in a wad. I have no sympathy for them. I have my space, they have theirs. PETA will just have to get over it.

I have two explanations for my irrational fear. My first experience where I can remember being terrified by a spider was when I was about 12-13 years old. In these amazing woods in our neighborhood, my friends and I would pretend to be characters from Star Wars Return of the Jedi fighting the evil droids on the moon of Endor (the woods looked exactly like the Ewok village and I'm once again sharing some insight into my geeky childhood). I remember being high up in a tree when a spider the size of a donut ran across the tree trunk at my eye level. The bloody thing was so big I could hear its joints creak. So what did I do? The girly thing - I fell right out of the tree.

My second spider horror was when I was around the same age, maybe a little older. I was staying in a cabin in the mountains with my grandmother and aunts. We were sitting out on the screened porch playing cards late one night when I noticed a spider above our heads. It wasn't a great big spider - about average size - maybe as big as a cert. I'm keeping an eye on this thing as I didn't trust it being right above us. As I watched, I noticed it had a sack of babies attached. The spider is moving around this sack doing something and I started watching it obsessively. I start commenting to my aunts about the situation - not getting much response. Next thing I know, this sack opens and 8 billion baby spiders start falling out of the sky. Its raining f*%@@@g spiders on my head. I point this out to my aunts, in a not so calm tone, and they laugh it off like I'm the biggest wuse. Call me crazy, but who wants baby spiders in their hair? Eventually we all get up as the little nasties come down to the ground. Some of them died. I killed as many as I could while no one was watching, but many lived on to pass on their progeny and terrify more arachnophobes like myself.