Making Fun of Your Fears

Spiders freak me out. It is not only the wired evolutionary response to a real threat - spiders can kill. I suffer from a severe case of spider-related trauma. When I was about 8, I was tromping through a field of goldenrods taller than me when I stumbled into a clearing with a tight lattice work of spider webs. As I was flailing about, trying to get the webbing off me, I saw at least a dozen of the huge death-mask meadow spiders scurrying right at me. I got bit at least half a dozen times, raising enormous welts and causing blisters on my ears and hands. The black and yellow argiope is a generally harmless spider, so the main damage was to my fragile ego.



The sight of a spider to this day gives me the willies. But I have learned to live and let live, knowing what a valuable role the arachnids play in insect control.

So my strategy is to laugh at the creepy little predators. Mockery is the sincerest form of disrespect.