What Do a Scrawny Kid, Spiders and Psychology Have in Common?
A tarantula ended up in my lap when I was 8 years old. I was sitting downstairs blissfully watching cartoons on a Saturday morning when, all of a sudden, I felt something weird. I looked down and YIKES!!!!!!! a humungous, jet black, extremely fuzzy tarantula was trying to get warm by snuggling in my scrawny lap. Now we lived in Virginia Beach, which, while still reasonably swampy in the 70’s, was not a jungle habitat for giant spiders.
I did what any reasonable kid would do: screamed and stood up. This flings the spider off my lap which freaks me out even more because WHERE IS HE NOW?!?! I proceeded to run across the glass top coffee table, jumped over to the glass top end table (glass topped tables were very groovy in the 70’s), launched myself out of the room, hurtled up the stairs, vaulted the railing at the top of the stairs and stood on the toy box on the other side of the railing.
At this point, my Mom comes out, all sleepy and highly annoyed. She was even more annoyed when I told her all the ruckus was about a spider. I tried to warn her, but all I could do was stutter, “No, no, no, Mom, it’s really big.” She marched off downstairs. Moments later, she is racing up the stairs, joining me on the toy box, yelling for my Dad.
Next up, Dad comes out and heads downstairs only to return upstairs quickly to call our Navy SEAL neighbor. Mr. Badass SEAL came and swiftly captured the beast in an avocado green Tupperware (see previous mention of the groovy 70’s). He mentioned that the spider likely caught a ride in a bunch of bananas imported from South America. His daughter brought the giant fuzzball to class for show and tell.
Why does this matter now? First, Happy Halloween. Second, this little incident taught me that 1. bananas are bad and 2. spiders are scary. Now I’m not much of a fruit fan, so maybe I was just looking for an excuse to not eat fruit, but it took me years to realize that, actually, bananas are delicious. As for the spiders, I spent the better part of my life deciding that they were terrifying, horrible creatures.
A few years back, using the principles of a psychology treatment called "exposure,” I challenged myself to face my spider phobia head on. At a local museum dedicated to butterflies, spiders and other invertebrates, they have tarantulas you can hold, all named “Rosie.” One Rosie I held was a huge brown and black tarantula that just looked like an awfully big, scary spider. One Rosie, though, was a light gray, tinged throughout with pink. She was gorgeous, and helped me decide that maybe I could soften the “spiders are scary” story in my head. Exposure for the win!
As I’m writing, I realize I’ve written 2 months in a row about facing fears. We’re getting told these days that the world is a scary, dangerous place, filled with people we can’t trust. I guess I’m here to gently suggest that we push back a little bit and notice the good. Small goodness is frequently available…a nice walk with a friend, sharing a homemade meal, helping a neighbor cut up a downed tree. Push back against the rhetoric that we should all be scared of each other. Pay reasonable attention to real danger, of course, but also notice how often you are actually safe, that people are often kind and you can enjoy yourself.
