Clyde the Spider

In the years to come the spider will get bigger, I will become braver, and it will seem as if I had stared down Death himself. In truth, Clyde the Spider was a fairly inconsequential porch-guest; an orb-weaving spider who made a significant impact (in my mind, anyway) on the number of flies that found their way in to our already insect-friendly basement apartment. But arachnophobia is arachnophobia, and I couldn't let my girlfriend live in fear every night until we moved especially when that fear negatively affected our dog's bladder.

So I did what any boyfriend would do and pulled Clyde off the web. Now, I would love to say that Kieley's fear of spiders was the only reason I was feeling a bit nauseous as I approached Clyde with two giant plastic cups, but the truth is crushing bugs has made me a bit squeamish since long before I met Kieley. So capture and release in to the wild was the strategy. Great plan, right?

As Kieley said " it played like a horror movie" as I caught Clyde but couldn't find him when the time came to dump him elsewhere. I came in the house with the job half done. Hey, at least Clyde was somewhere else besides right in front of our door. That's when I heard the tearful scream: "It's on your back!" as Kieley slumped to her knees cry-gagging (I made that up, you're welcome to use it as necessary).

I headed for the door and threw my shirt in to the street, Clyde and all. I figured that was the last we would see of him, but like any good monster Clyde returned the next morning. It seems his daytime hours were being spent in the mailbox--something I suspected but would never have known for sure if I had not glimpsed a pair of legs crawling back inside on my way to work.

The bastard was cornered and I knew what to do, squeamishness be damned! I crushed him in to bitty pieces as part of him fell through the bottom of the mailbox never to be seen again.

"John, what about when you get mail?" you ask. Turns out the mail never comes to our little basement apartment, but that is a story for another time.