SPIDER STANDOFF

Now that the weather is turning a bit chilly I'm back on spider watch. I walk around the house with a tissue in my hand just waiting for one to show up so I can squish it before it gets away and hides.

It was early Saturday morning when I heard my son Alex calling me. “MOM! There's a spider in here!”

I rushed down the hall, tissue in hand, and saw Alex standing outside his bathroom door. He pointed in the bathroom, up towards the ceiling. “That thing is huge!” he said.

I looked up to where he was pointing, and he was right, the spider was the size of a quarter.

“Why does everyone call me when there's a bug in the house?” I asked.

“Because you like bugs.” Alex said as he backed away to give me more room to work.

“What are you talking about?” I said as I inched my way into the bathroom, the tissue in my hand ready for battle. “I don't like bugs!”

“Sure you do.” he said as he closed the bathroom door a bit. “You're always talking about the great bug you just found outside, or looking them up on the internet if you don't recognize it.” It sounded as if he were trying to convince me.

“I think they're interesting, but only when they're outside.” I said as I slowly climbed up on the toilet seat, trying to sneak up on him. I was keeping my head down low so if he turned out to be a jumper he wouldn't land in my hair. “I don't want them living in my house touching my stuff or biting me!”

“Oh, my mistake.” Alex said through the crack in the door. “So, did you get him yet?”

By now, my husband Steven had come down the hall. “Get what?” he asked Alex.

“Mom's getting a spider in my bathroom.”

“Oh, she's good at that.” Steven said.

“Hey!” I called as the spider and I were now staring at one another. I moved my tissue to the left the spider moved to the left, when I moved to the right, so did he. “If either of you would like to come in here and help, that would be nice.”

Steven peeked in the door. “There really isn't enough room for two of us in there.” he said as he looked up at the spider I was about to squish. “Wow! He's huge!”

“I know!” I cried. I could feel my legs start to shake as the adrenaline coursed through me. My fight or flight response was kicking in and at that moment, flight was starting to win.

I finally decided to lunge at the spider at the exact same moment the spider decided to jump down from the ceiling and disappear from my sight.

I'm pretty sure the neighborhood could hear my scream as jumped down from the toilet seat and raced to the door. Because the door had only been left open a crack I ran right into it pushing it closed. Now I was in a very small space with a very mad spider. I kept screaming until I found the doorknob, at the same time looking over my shoulder picturing that huge thing coming after me. When I was safely back in the hall, leaning against the closed door I sadly looked at Steven and Alex.

“I didn't get him.” I admitted.

“I was going to take a shower.” Alex said.

“You'll have to use our bathroom.” I called over my shoulder as I went to the linen closet. I got a towel and placed it at the bottom of the bathroom door making sure he couldn't get through the crack by the floor. “We'll let him calm down a bit before I go back in there again.” I said as I sat down on the floor and waited for my heart to stop pounding against my chest and my legs to stop feeling wobbly.