[Ir]Rational Fears: Arachnophobe to the Extreme

The other day Scott and I were on the boat when a big pocket of dirt fell from the sails. We've been finding a lot of wasps' nests lately, so I had assumed it was the wasps and their home plummeting to certain death. I was behind the wheel so I asked him what the clump was. I got a "Dunno, looks like a bunch of little spiders." Trish: "Really?? Let me come look." Scott: "No, you better not." For once in my life, I was satisfied with Scott’s response and didn’t allow my curiosity to get the better of me just yet.


Let me back up a little bit. I'm scared of spiders. No wait, terrified. Maybe even petrified. There is nothing I've encountered that bothers me more than those little eight legged, eight-eyed things. I remember going to camp as a kid [um, and maybe as an adult] and staying up most of the night because I was certain that a spider was going to eat me in my sleep. Things like that don't really happen, you say? Ohhhh, I've seen Arachnophobia and I beg to differ that those things really do happen.

Arachnophobia the movie was to me as a child what The Birds is to many people. I'm sure if I saw it today I would see it for its silliness, but think I'm really going to subject myself to that psychological torment? Ha! I don't think so. It took me years to get over the thought of spiders spontaneously coming out of the shower head or up from the toilet. I still check my running shoes that have been kept in the garage of that I haven't worn in a while. When we go camping, I try not to go to the bathroom at night and when I do, I have to make sure that I know where every single spider is hiding in the nooks and crannies of the rafters-keeping a constant eye on them to make sure they don't leap from their web and go in for the attack.

Going to the lake is a challenge for me because of the spiders. I'm not sure what it is about the water, but I have never seen such webs! As I walk along the dock I try my best to keep my eyes straightforward and not think about the little cretins furiously spinning their prey into their web of doom. Yes, logically I do know that spiders are MUCH smaller than I am and that theoretically they're much more scared of me than I am of them, but fear doesn't work logically or even theoretically. And I have been making huge leaps as it is now my task to brush the boat of spiderwebs. I do this while holding my breath but trying to act like a big girl in front of Scott, who thinks my fear is entirely irrational.

So as we were getting off the boat the other day, I couldn't help but take a quick peek at the pocket of dirt that fell from the sail. There about a dozen dime-sized spiders. The thought of this many spiders together gave me chills, but they're the size that I'm now brave enough to smush on my own without calling for help. More concerning were the two half dollar sized smushes from the monstrous beast [yes, later found out it was one spider] Scott kindly "took care of" before I could see. I ran all the way down the dock back to the car and could faintly hear Scott's admonishing cry, "I told you not to look!"

What about you? Do you have any [ir]rational fears?




**On a side note, the picture is, I think, from Charlotte’s Web. At least according to the Google Image search parameters I used. My first instinct was to type in “Arachnophobia” thinking I could get a picture of the movie poster. What was I thinking? At first glimpse of the pictures, my armpits began to get tingly like they do when I’m nervous and I closed the browser as fast as I could. Won’t be making that mistake again! I figured “Charlotte’s Web” would yield a little less shudder-inducing results.