Little Miss Muffet
Anyone out there afraid of spiders? I remember as a child skipping over a particular page in one of those big Readers' Digest natural history coffee table books because there was a LARGE photo of a spider's head with all the eyes in frightening close-up...
I also remember when I was single and living in my flat in Bristol thinking that I would have to get over my spider phobia, because there wasn't a knight in shining armour waiting in the hallway to rescue me. And lo! A bloody big spider marched across my carpet one evening! So I remembered all the things my mother had told me (when she wasn't berating me for being a scaredy-cat!) about putting a glass over the top of the spider, sliding a piece of cardboard under the rim, and carefully tipping the offending arachnid out of the window. Of course, it all went horribly wrong: I caught some of the poor thing's legs between the glass and the card and they came off, which horrified me so much that I had to up-end a bucket over the top of the glass and lie on the sofa in a hysteric fit. Eventually a (scornful) male friend had to deal with the undoubtedly dead spider later on, but I lived with the bucket in the middle of my living room floor (book on top of bucket just in case the wounded creature had enough strength in its remaining legs to escape!) for a week or more. I was racked with guilt about wounding the poor thing, but I just couldn't do anything about it!
Why am I telling you all this? Given that I am going to a country that 'has more things that will kill you than anywhere else' (thank you, Bill Bryson) and just LOTS of bugs I thought it was about time I learned to deal with spiders. Otherwise what kind of example am I setting to Ella? And more to the point, where will I be able to hide..? I don't want to spend my time having panic attacks - I want to enjoy myself!
So anyway, I've booked myself onto a Bristol Zoo spider-phobics' course. Allegedly some relaxation, some mild hypnosis and cuddling a tarantula will do wonders for my confidence. 21st September is the date - wish me luck - gulp...
I also remember when I was single and living in my flat in Bristol thinking that I would have to get over my spider phobia, because there wasn't a knight in shining armour waiting in the hallway to rescue me. And lo! A bloody big spider marched across my carpet one evening! So I remembered all the things my mother had told me (when she wasn't berating me for being a scaredy-cat!) about putting a glass over the top of the spider, sliding a piece of cardboard under the rim, and carefully tipping the offending arachnid out of the window. Of course, it all went horribly wrong: I caught some of the poor thing's legs between the glass and the card and they came off, which horrified me so much that I had to up-end a bucket over the top of the glass and lie on the sofa in a hysteric fit. Eventually a (scornful) male friend had to deal with the undoubtedly dead spider later on, but I lived with the bucket in the middle of my living room floor (book on top of bucket just in case the wounded creature had enough strength in its remaining legs to escape!) for a week or more. I was racked with guilt about wounding the poor thing, but I just couldn't do anything about it!
Why am I telling you all this? Given that I am going to a country that 'has more things that will kill you than anywhere else' (thank you, Bill Bryson) and just LOTS of bugs I thought it was about time I learned to deal with spiders. Otherwise what kind of example am I setting to Ella? And more to the point, where will I be able to hide..? I don't want to spend my time having panic attacks - I want to enjoy myself!
So anyway, I've booked myself onto a Bristol Zoo spider-phobics' course. Allegedly some relaxation, some mild hypnosis and cuddling a tarantula will do wonders for my confidence. 21st September is the date - wish me luck - gulp...
posted by Sara Bowen at 3:57 pm
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