I took up jogging yesterday. Not on purpose. I saw a spider.
Anyone who really knows me knows that I’m not a fan of spiders,
and if we’re going to keep score, I’m not truly crazy about
cockroaches, flies, mosquitoes, mites, ticks, grasshoppers,
crickets or dragonflies. Well, lady bugs are kind of cute, from a
safe distance, like if I’m in the car with the windows closed.
I took up jogging yesterday. Not on purpose. I saw a spider.
Anyone who really knows me knows that I’m not a fan of spiders, and if we’re going to keep score, I’m not truly crazy about cockroaches, flies, mosquitoes, mites, ticks, grasshoppers, crickets or dragonflies. Well, lady bugs are kind of cute, from a safe distance, like if I’m in the car with the windows closed.
But I digress. So, yesterday, I was in my bathroom, almost about to weigh myself, when I came up with yet another good reason to hate scales. A spider – a very evil looking one – was lurking just under it, and it had the nerve to come up crawling onto the scale, just as my bare foot was about to touch it.
I was brave. That is, I didn’t crash through the closed door, and I didn’t do what I usually do – jump into the bathtub, curling up into a ball. Instead, I simply ran through the house screaming, and I stopped in the living room. Unfortunately, it was a living room about three blocks away.
OK, I know what you’re thinking. You’re wondering why any educated, self-respecting grown-up would be afraid of a little spider. Lions, bears, tigers, an IRS audit, maybe, and, sure, we’re all worried that one of these days, our name will fall off the Do-Not-Call list and telemarketers will start stalking me once again, until I remember to take myself off again. But a spider? A tick? A butterfly? (Well, they were beady-eyed caterpillars once.)
I know all about “Charlotte’s Web.” In fact, my children and I went to see the movie recently, and most of the way through, I refrained from hiding under the seat, but that’s mostly because it was kind of gross among the popcorn and spilled soda, and I was worried a real spider might come crawling by. But, um, what was I saying?
Oh, yes, children’s literature. There’s Charlotte and “The Cricket in Times Square.” Bugs can write and play music, and I have to admit, I couldn’t help but like that dragonfly in Disney’s “The Rescuers.” But, of course, that was a cartoon, and so I felt pretty safe. And we all know that bugs are important to the planet. But I don’t care. Have you ever watched CSI? Do you know what bugs do to some of the poor unlucky folks on that show?
So, yes, I’ve taken up jogging again, and until cooler heads intervened, I had considered taking up hunting for a new home. Besides, as my son pointed out to me, every house has some bugs. “There are probably millions, maybe trillions, hiding in the walls and under the floors,” he told me. “And just think of all the bugs outside in the yard that you don’t see.”
“You’re grounded,” I said.
A little later, I decided I was a little harsh, so instead of grounding him for throwing logic at me, I sent my 11-year-old son into the bathroom to make sure the spider, and any other tiny insect, was gone. It took a while, but he found the spider, up in the corner of the bathroom ceiling, clearly lying in wait, hoping to attack, and I’m sure it would have too, probably once I had disrobed and headed for the shower, jumping out at me like some arachnid Norman Bates.
“Isn’t there any bug you like?”
“Fireflies,” I said after thinking about it for a long time. “They’re kind of cute.”
“Yeah,” my son said, brightening, “and they’re neat. The female firefly, if she’s hungry, will sometimes flash a light to attract a male firefly, and then she’ll eat him.”
I hate bugs. Have I mentioned that?
Debbie Farmer is a humorist and a mother holding down the fort in California, and the author of “Don’t Put Lipstick on the Cat.” You can reach her at
fa********@oa***************.com
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