The Spider That Almost Got Me!

I looked up to find him staring at me, and I froze. I knew I had never been so close to a death -- not necessarily my own -- at the hands of a spider, not since the time my best friend was trapped behind the garage next to one. He shouted, "It looks like a black widow!", but he escaped it.

The second time, the spider nearly got ME. Going to bed, I let one get away when I could have killed him. He didn't know that, of course, and thanklessly crawled across my body after I turned off the lights and lay down. His scraping little legs scampered all the way up one arm, across my chest, and down the other arm. A hot flush ran through me as the adrenaline shot into my veins. When I no longer felt the tiny feet, I leapt to a standing position, too terrified to shout or anything. I just stood on the bed in the dark, shaking. Finally, I reached over and turned on the light. The tiny invader was gone, but that was the worst possible situation because now I didn't know where he was!

I leapt to the floor, lucky not to have broken my nose because one foot tangled in the sheet and was stuck on the bed -- in enemy territory! -- while I landed hard on the other foot and nearly fell over. What worried me most, however, was being barefoot. I found some socks and armored my feet with them.

"I can't let him get away again," I thought while cautiously stalking to the other side of the bed, inspecting every inch of carpet. But the carnivore was nowhere to be found. I raised my left foot and stood only on my right. I raised my right and stood only on my left. I stayed on my left foot and kept my balance with one hand on the bed. I watched the carpet near my foot for anything scurrying.

When I first spotted the demon-looking thing, he was huddled in a corner, planning his attack. Without taking my eyes off him, I picked up a shoe. The spider started to run down the length of the baseboard, in the crack between it and the floor. Aided by some prior training in Zen, I was too intent for him and squashed him dead.

But enough reminiscing over past glories! The one facing me this time was different!

His legs were stocky and powerful, I noticed from a distance of about four feet, a distance that seemed safe enough, although one can never be too sure.

He was truly black, unlike any of the others. He had a scanning, alert demeanor and a hungry look. Yellow bands circled all of his legs. He had yellow spots on his back. His legs clung to the material of my curtain. He fiercely leaned forward -- downward, actually -- cocked himself back, and then leaned forward again.

"What is he DOING!", I wondered.

He then catapulted himself two feet through the air and landed on my desk. In one leap he had jumped half the distance to where I stood! I fell back in terror and stepped on a shoe. This was war!

The odds would be equal, for he could do something I could not. He could jump well. He did it again, landing this time on the far side of a shoe box. I certainly was not able to jump like that, and I was scared. I had a certain advantage, however, in being taller, so I had a better view of where he was going to jump. On the other hand, he had the advantage of KNOWING where he was going to jump, so my better view of the area was not tremendously useful and was less than comforting.

I had a certain amount of experience with seeing jumping spiders in the safety of the outdoors, in the wild, but I had never fought one, and never in my ROOM, and never one that could change its direction of travel in mid-flight!

"Just think," I thought, "I could sneak up behind him with a paper cup, and he could jump BACKWARDS, perhaps even onto my arm! And then I could crack my head on the edge of the desk, and he surely would have won."

I cannot explain what humane urge caused me to think of capturing him. It was not possible.

I stepped toward him, and he jumped again absolutely unpredictably, as I had predicted, this time sideways. I lurched backwards. I tried approaching him with a shoe. Again he jumped. So did I. I knew I was not going to win this way.

I backed carefully out of the room, and reentered a minute later carrying a new weapon. I looked at the desk where he should have been. He wasn't there.

He was on the CEILING! Ten inches from my head! I reeled back, bashed against the door jamb, tripped, and fell.

"I don't know if I can win this," I thought, "but I can try." I stood up, less hindered than I should have been by a bruised arm, sprained ankle, faltering consciousness, and, for all I knew, internal injuries.

I retrieved the weapon from the floor, raised it, pushed the button, and released upon the beast a plume of incapacitating bug spray. It rushed at the spider, deflected against the ceiling, and rushed back at me. I left the room, incapacitated. When I gathered the courage to go back, I found the spider on the desk, but he was moving sluggishly. I ran and got a paper cup, slunk up to him... and covered him with it.

"Thank god," I thought, "He's contained."

Two days after the above described episode, I uncovered the spider by tipping the paper cup with a very long pencil. He still looked ready to strike, but he was dead. My own injuries healed, not being as serious as I had feared, and I began to wish I'd let him go, out of respect for the valiant vanquished.

I once found a black widow spider in my room. Really! Do you doubt it? Have I cried, "Wolf!" once too often? A new roommate was moving in, and from somewhere within the depths of the wooden moving crates this intruder must have crawled out into the house. That night, I picked up a shirt off the floor (aka "bachelor's shirt rack") in preparation to put it on, and out of the shirt fell a bulbous, black writhing body with plainly visible red hourglass. There's little to tell about this encounter, as it was very, very short. I picked up a shoe off the floor (aka "bachelor's shoe rack") and squashed her flatter than the proverbial pancake. There was nothing left but a splat to scrape up, and I did not wish I had let her go! No, I got a can of bug spray (not the same one, for this was many years later), went on a hunting expedition, and found the nest! Hooray!

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