I have a similar feeling when i see spiders. Today while driving (luckly I was at a stop light) a spider came crawling out of the cieling. Though it was small, I felt panic and instantly killed it with a piece of paper. I often worry I will some day crash my car becuase of a spider.

Growing up in South Sacramento, the very edge of town, was a challenge when it came to pest invasion. My brother and I used sleeping bags fairly often in the winter months, as the house was not hermetically sealed against the elements.

I was 7 years old when I was awakened by a light, feathery tickling sensation on my right cheek. I raised my hand to brush away the hair or whatever may have been there, bothering my sleep. My smallish, 7-year old hand settled upon a wolf spider that immediately arched under my palm.

I have been arachnophobic ever since. Not even the docile daddy-longleg is a match for my panic, these many years later.

I love spiders, any kind of bugs...snakes...hell, I have a snake tatooed on my left forearm from bicep to wrist! Regardless, the 'personal' always makes me more curious...thanks for 'showing' us who you are rather than telling

i love spiders, and never killed one (unless by accident). only guided them out the door. i also love praying mantises, beetles, and definitely butterflies (my favorite). love serpents/lizards (gosh, they are soooo adorable!, especially ones that look like mini raptors). set loose two lizards once on my friends back in college. big boys squealing like helpless little children. it was fuckin' awesome!!!

sincerely,

l'il devil

p.s. i belong in paris. if it wasn't for ma famille, mon fiance, et mes amis aux etats-unis, i would stay here permanently.

"la seule difference entre moi et un fou, c'est que je ne suis pas fou." - salvador dali. (well, i wish i can say the same for myself, but i AM crazy!!!)

p.s.2.. Irene was right...men are the same everywhere...london, barcelona, paris. goddamit. "monsieur, laissez-moi tranquille, s'il vous plait! vous me comprenez??? non, non, je ne peux pas avoir un verre du vin avec vous! plus, i'm trying to sketch the people/scenery, & you're blocking my goddam view!!!...& if you don't leave me alone, your frenchy l'il ass will taste my knuckle sandwich."

(whew! sorry. seriously, what's a gal gotta do to get some peace to concentrate on her artwork?)

there's this thing in my religion that you never kill spiders. it's a long story and more of a ... tradition, as opposed to a tenet of faith.
and eh yo, what about all those tales of Ananis [i think that's the name] from Africa.
they're ok, spiders. then again, i've only met the little ones. and they're good for making diversions in class.

oh, you spider people, you have no fucking idea...how i wish i had your strength now! i am in india... generally, i am not so afraid of spiders, and i try very hard not to kill them -- taking them outside in some glass or cup, putting them in some greenery to spin webs in peace... but yesterday there was a spider in my shower that, yep, i admit it, evoked murderous urges in me that i have to cop to (what about self-defense, is that okay?). you see, when i can look at a spider and know that the worst it will do is give me an itchy, annoying bite, i am really quite happy to coexist with said creature... but now that i am halfway around the world, all bets are off, as it were... and this thing was as big as my hand, light brown, hairy, though not tarantula hairy.... somehow most disturbing of all, it had a raised bump on its back/neck that looked like a little, singular white eyeball. and it was missing a leg -- while this should have made it look sort of disabled and less dangerous, it instead served only to make it look more battle-worn and squirrelly. and so damn fast -- how could something so small move so fast...? in my visual field one second, and then vanished in another, with me hopping all around in a dark shadowy bathroom trying to track it, marlon perkins style... in a place where i though there were screens on all of the windows, how does such a thing get into the shower anyway? can it climb up the drain? god forbid... and so i admit, i thought very seriously about killing it -- drowning it, maybe, or smacking it with something big and flat (but what? and what would that look like? sound like? aaaggghhhh!!!!) and then in the end, you know, ahimsa and all.... sigh.... it's capture involved tupperware, buckets, brooms, crazy make-shift lids, and nerves of little, fierce, woman-steel, but i will say proudly that i did not scream even once, and that said beast is now off meandering around in the bushes by the river unscathed (or more likely navigating its way back into my shower by whatever path it used previously...) and this is only day 6 in this country -- who knows what lies ahead....?

and then again, would that only spiders and other natural dangers were all that kept me up at night... rather than my wonderings about my life and my panicked realization that i don't know what i am doing in india in the first place.... why are our fears about things such as spiders and snakes and heights and flying all so nicely focused and culturally sanctioned, while my fear of my own seemingly all-important and yet utterly insignificant future is so maddeningly vague and taboo to let out? spiders....who cares?!? jefferson, i'd eat that spider of yours in a wink if doing so would illuminate for me what i'm meant to do in this life...

Starshine:

I think you have learned one of the fundamental lessons of this life or any other:

Don't go to India.

This is, ultimately, the same lesson I received from the Bhagvad Gita, only in that book you get it through Krishna losing his royal holy shit over Arjuna's hardheadedness. If you don't go to India, Krishna won't need to lose his shit anyway because you'll be safely situated on your American sofa. Praise be.

In any case, it seems to me that when faced with foreign spider attacks on American feet, one must turn, once again, to Kierkegaard, whose entire philosophical output I have boiled down to one sentence:

You're going to fail anyway, so you might as well do it sitting down.

Christian

P.S. I've wanted to visit India my whole life, but I have to say that the spiders may just keep me home.

oooh how i almost forgot about this mystical part of the world - jefferson's journal
:)
i once had a spider living in my car for about a month. i couldn't bring myself to kill it and it didn't seem to want to leave. strange thing. my car is not what i would consider optimal living space but go figure.
:)
KIM