Friday, Chuck and I came home from grocery shopping. We unloaded the car and brought everything inside, then, because people were coming over, Chuck grabbed the empty case of beer and went to the Modelorama to get a refill. I came out to lock the gate behind him, and that's when I saw it: a big, ugly spider hanging out just over my front door.
In our house, I am in charge of spider executions. Chuck takes care of all other bugs, but spiders are my responsibility. This was never a problem in Texas, where the largest spider I ever saw was about an inch long. And stupid. And slow.
The spiders were see here, on the other hand, are big. Really big. This particular one was four inches. And I know from experience that they can jump. And move fast. And they are far from stupid. In other words, they completely freak me out, so I stood there with a ripping case of the heebie jeebies and wondered what to do. As if that weren't enough, I realized I had already walked beneath the thing at least four times.
I looked around for anything that would help in my defense or the eventual assault I knew must come. Nothing. There is nothing in our garage. Not even the car, because Chuck had just left with it. And now that I knew it was there, there was no way I could walk underneath the spider to get into the house where I might find something useful.
Okay, self, think. I had a set of keys and the clothes I was wearing. Not my armory of choice. The big problem was that the spider was really high. I decided to throw one shoe at it to knock it down off the wall, and then smash it with the other shoe. Seemed like a plan. I felt a little MacGyver-y. I had figured out how to smash a big, scary spider using only the clothes on my back, or – er – feet.
The shoe made a very lovely 2 foot long charcoal colored smudge on my pristine white wall, but completely missed the spider. I didn't even come close enough to scare him a little. He sat perfectly still in the same place, quietly laughing his menacing spider laugh at me. Note to self: brush up on your shoe throwing skills. Even worse, the shoe landed well within the jumping range of the spider, so there was no way I was going to retrieve it.
Well. Crap.
Here is where I had to make a decision. I still had one shoe left. It was still on my foot. I could try again with the second shoe, but that's the one I was planning on using to smash the spider when I knocked it off the wall with the precision throw of the first shoe. I had even calculated probable landing locations of the spider and the number of steps it would require to reach it when I was selecting which shoe to keep and which to throw. So, should I throw the other shoe, hoping my aim improved dramatically and that the spider would land far enough away from at least one shoe to allow me to recover it and put it to use? Not likely. I would probably end up barefoot and defenseless.
So my other choices involved waiting for Chuck, which would be truly unkind, and seeking out help. I took stock of my utter ridiculousness. I was standing in my garage, unable to walk into the house, and I had only one shoe. I decided that looking foolish in front of my neighbor was marginally better than spending the rest of the afternoon in my garage waiting for the spider to move on of his own accord.
I stepped out my front gate and bobbed the four steps to the door of my neighbor, Miguel, my height changing depending on whether I was currently walking with the shod foot or the naked one. I knocked crisply and loudly and waited. And waited. I looked around and realized that I did not see Miguel's car anywhere. I also realized that quite a few people were looking at me. As I gazed up and down the busy street, eyes were hastily averted, and I realized I was The Crazy Gringa with One Shoe. Lovely.
I wanted nothing more than to slink back into my garage and hide. Except that the spider was still there waiting for me. And the front of the garage is completely open to the street, so I would then be The Crazy Gringa with One Shoe Standing in Her Garage Like Someone with the IQ of a Carrot. As much as I hated being the former, I really didn't want be the latter, so I pushed on.
Next door to Miguel's there is a mechanic. We have not met the mechanic, or any of his friends that hang out there, or any of the customers that are always parked in the street. It's not that we haven't tried. Whenever we walk by everything stops and the entire population of mechanic domain watches us. I always smile softly and give a little wave. But there is so much pressure when everyone is staring at you! A few times I have offered a quiet buenas dias, and once I even got a mumbled reply.
I really think they are shy and hesitant to communicate with us. I suspect their English is worse than my Spanish. But they always watch and have customers hastily move cars if they are in our way when trying to get into our garage, so they can't be bad guys.
I told myself firmly they were nice men, took a deep breath, and hobbled the six more steps to the mechanic's. Everyone there was staring at me anyway. I might as well let them know what it was all about. I opened my mouth to speak and realized that I had no idea what the word for spider is. This was quickly followed by the revelation that the only means I had for looking the word up, digital or analog, were inside my house, and if I could get in there to actually look it up, I wouldn't need to translate the freaking word anyway. So I winged it. I knew spider wasn't even close, so I tried variations on arachnid. No cigar.
The mechanic looked at me as if I may not only be crazy, but slightly dangerous, which was both understandable and predictable. Finally, I said simply, "Ayudame, por favor." Help me, please. That was the right choice. I haven't met a Mexican man yet who can resist a damsel in distress. I beckoned him to follow me and then awkwardly strode with as much dignity as I could muster while wearing only one shoe. He followed me to my front gate, but was hesitant to trespass on my space. I finally got him inside far enough that I could point at the offending critter. Light dawned in his eyes, and he hid a smile as he went back to the shop to retrieve a pole.
He returned with his chest puffed out and made protective motions at me. I wanted to tell him, "don't worry about me, I'll be standing over here in the street", but I just smiled and waited by the gate. It took him a couple of tries with the pole to knock the spider down, which made me feel much better about my shoe throwing skills.
He knocked the spider right into the corner near my front door, which pleased me not, but then he proceeded to do battle with the spider, which kept jumping two feet into the air, until he had scooted it to the middle of my garage. The mechanic was a little freaked out and kept jumping about himself, which helped me feel like not so much of a wuss. Then he horrified me by refusing to actually kill it. Something about a year of bad luck.
Normally, I think all of Mexico's superstitions are charming, but not when they leave an eight-legged menace in the middle of my garage. I wanted to scream "Man up!" The least he could do was scoot it out to the street. But he just smiled at me and went back to the shop.
Damn good thing I kept the one shoe.
And my aim is far superior in a ground-based assault. What? You didn't actually think I went over and stepped on it did you? After watching it jump like that? No way. And then I went and retrieved the first shoe and smashed it again to make sure.
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|SAdministrator |m-d-Y H:i:s jenniferOkay, I forgot to include the word, but after Friday, I will never forget the word. The Spanish word for spider is araña.
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|67.171.42.xxx |m-d-Y H:i:s ChrisOMG you have me in stitches. In the states I would use the vacuum. But here in Seattle there is no way the spiders get that big. Yikes!
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|SAdministrator |m-d-Y H:i:s jenniferOMG! The vacuum!?! I could never do that. I can envision the spider living in the bag and feeding on dust mites and having hundreds of babies and then when I went to empty the vacuum the bag would bust open and...
Hope I didn't freak you out too bad, because I kinda freaked myself out.
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|189.149.8.xxx |m-d-Y H:i:s islagringo - Gringo in ParadiseNancy pointed out this post to me and I am sure glad she did! I almost couldn't finish reading it because I was laughing too hard! Brilliantly told story!
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|SAdministrator |m-d-Y H:i:s jenniferI noticed you had a bug run in recently too. I used to have the same problem, except my weapon of choice was the shampoo bottle. Your commenter is right, bleach in the shower drain is the ticket.
Thanks for reading!
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|201.165.14.xxx |m-d-Y H:i:s NancyI love this story, Jennifer, but where is the picture of the araña resting in peace? And jumping two feet...really?
I haven't seen one of these yet and really don't want to believe in them, ugh.
I guess I have to believe they exist, but I hope you are over here if I ever see one.
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|SAdministrator |m-d-Y H:i:s jenniferHe was more like resting in pieces. And I didn't think it would be what you wanted to see with your morning coffee.
This is my third one in two years, so not super common. Maybe I should have Scott come spray on a more regular basis.
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|216.162.220.xxx |m-d-Y H:i:s AnonymousExcellent story well told! That had me laughing aloud and nodding my head in agreement. I confess to a deep, atavistic response to spiders. And it's heartening to hear that chivalry is not dead, and that the spider IS. I can just see that manly mechanic trying to keep "cool" while dodging the spider too.
Funny way to meet the mechanics; I'm sure they were amused. I don't think they'll nickname you the crazy gringa--I would bet they know other people who don't react well to big spiders, but it's a fine opportunity to be macho and do a good deed. Relying on the kindness of strangers when your shoe pitch didn't work makes perfect sense!
Even little spiders creep me out. I swear, they see me and they start vibrating with malice—I just KNOW it. Other bugs don't bother me, but spiders do. A friend gave me a wonderful gadget that I use now to deal with any that make it into the house, but I don't think even my beloved Bug Wand could airlift that 4-inch sucker. It truly is a great little appliance though. (Now if I could just reverse-enginer it to blow the spiders OUT of the tube when I take it outside to dispose of them...sort of like a bug-laden Roman candle.)
It doesn't help that my cat Lenny likes to find spiders in the basement sometimes, then carry them upstairs and PLAY with them. He makes little growly "this is MY prey!" noises so at least I know to go deal with it...trouble is, he also makes that same little growl when he gets hold of a Q-tip, so at night I have to leap out of bed to see which item he's batting around on the bed.
Shudder.
Saw a tempting t-shirt the other day: "The Only Thing We Have to Fear is Fear Itself...and spiders."
Mostly Cloudy 82 oF • 28 oC
And... at least you met your neighbors.
Great post dear!
Love ya'll
~A.