I would like to think that I am strong and not afraid of anything. That I have the strength to build a home for my family, and the courage to protect my wife and kids from anything and anyone. That’s a real man, right? But here’s the truth, I freakin’ hate spiders!
It probably started when I was a teenager. I worked on an avocado ranch and the spiders that hung out in the avocado trees were huge! I would be walking through a grove and all of sudden my face would be covered in a giant nasty spider web. I just knew some big fat brown spider was crawling up my back to bite me in the neck. I had never-ending nightmares about those creepy, nasty, ugly, little beasts.
In my twenties, I rode dirt bikes, and often went on camping trips to the desert and Mexico. On one trip to Guadalupe Canyon, we slept on the ground in sleeping bags. But I woke up in the early dawn with a severe earache. It was so bad, I had to load my bike into my truck and head back to the US. When I arrived, I went straight to urgent care where they gave me antibiotics for an ear infection. But by midnight, I was in extreme pain. One half of my face was paralyzed, I couldn’t see very good, and I couldn’t hear. So I was freaking out. I somehow managed to drive myself to the hospital, where I was given antitoxins because they said I had been bitten four times inside my ear by a brown recluse spider. Like I said, I hate spiders!
Throughout most of my life, I have been involved with lighting maintenance, electrical work, and pole inspections. In all three of those endeavors, I encounter spiders everywhere I go. They hide inside light fixtures, junction boxes, ground vaults, and underneath pole base covers. I just can’t seem to avoid those nasty eight legged creatures, so I am trying to accept it and deal with it. But I gotta say, I still hate ‘em!
Until yesterday morning that is. I was taking a shower and as I reached up to grab the shampoo, I saw a huge brown “Daddy Long Legs” spider just inches away from my hand. That scared the holy crap out of me and to make it worse, he had a large web with a ghostly brown glob of something in the middle that he was guarding. My first thought was to spray him with water and wash him down the drain. But then I noticed something… there was a tiny little baby “Daddy Long Legs” spider scurrying up the web to back to Papa. I stood there for a moment, looking at that big spider, the ghostly glob of goo, and the little guy running like a demon to get back to the web. And I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t kill them. For some reason, all I could think of was the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.
And that got me thinking… It really is stupid and silly to be afraid of spiders because, in a way, they are just like us. They have to create a home, and they have to protect their wife and kids. I can so relate!
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