Spiders

Alright, I have had some truly terrifying spider adventures in my current apartment. My apartment complex is wonderful, and I have loved living here for the couple of years I have had a lease. Well, except for the fact that giant monster spiders sometimes find their way into my apartment.

My apartment is not nasty. I keep it clean and pretty well maintained. The apartment complex is a little older, but is nice and has received excellent maintenance. In fact, there is supposedly even a wait list for people to get into this apartment complex. So I'm not really sure where the spiders come from, but every couple of months I will find a giant wolf spider just casually sharing my living space, that are like the size of my palm. I can't figure out if it is because my apartment complex is near the woods and river, or through what space they are entering my apartment. It also does not happen too terribly often. However, it is still a terrible problem to have.

A semi-accurate depiction of the size of a regular spider as compared to the size of the spiders found in my apartment.

I really do not find them often, but when I do find one I panic. I truly don't handle it well. But throughout my experiences, I have learned how to be totally courageous. Brave. Valiant. 

One of the worst experiences I have had with one of these creatures happened late one night. I had arrived home after hanging out with some friends, and in the dim light I had turned on when entering my apartment, I could see a spot on the carpet in my hallway. I went to investigate, and discovered that it was in fact a giant spider. Probably the size of my palm. But no, not just a regular giant spider. A mommy giant wolf spider. 

That's right. She was covered in her own live young. Which meant I couldn't step on her, since then the millions and billions of baby spiders clinging to her body would spread out across my carpet like a tiny sea of terror. I decided to trap her under a bowl, slide a folder under it, and then throw the whole thing outside. Except that when I approached her to trap her, her mommy senses took note of the impending danger, and she tried to escape.

That's right. She was moving. Now the only thing more terrifying than a giant spider that is running is a giant spider that is hopping. And the only thing more terrifying than a hopping giant spider is a giant spider who spills piles of baby spiders on your carpet with each hop it makes.

That's right. Now I have baby spiders all over my hallway carpet, despite my brilliant plan. I slam the bowl on top of mommy spider and commence to handling the new situation. I squish every baby I see moving, which was like a billion of them. And then I pull out the vacuum, and vacuum my apartment for about 45 minutes. After the carpet was as clean as it was on the day in which it was installed, I devised my plan for mommy spider, who somehow still had tons of babies still on her. I couldn't stomp on her, because not only was she a clearly one tough mom, but I also felt guilty about  what happened to all her spider babies. So my plan mostly consisted of taking the plastic bowl in which she was trapped outside to a tree that was not next to my apartment, and throwing the whole bowl against the tree, so that I did not have to be anywhere near her when she was released.

I didn't litter. I ended up picking up the bowl. But I did throw it in the dumpster. I didn't particularly want to use it again. I also called my dad as it was all happening to make sure that I was going to be okay. That's part of a daddy's job. But I mostly think he thought it was hilarious.

My second most terrifying experience happened much more recently. I saw a giant wolf spider in my entry hallway, and quickly stepped on it before he could escape, and I thought it was dead. When I came back a few minutes later to clean it up, its body was gone. I was confused, of course, but there wasn't anything I could do about it. It just wasn't there anymore. 

So I just continued to exist, doing whatever work I had been doing or watching some tv, probably. And then I decided to take a shower and get ready for bed. After I had gotten clean, I hopped out of the shower and what was right there, blocking my exit from the bathroom, but a giant wolf spider. And there I was, trapped in the bathroom, shoe-less, and very nervous. 

See, I was only able to draw two conclusions from my situation: either there were multiple giant wolf spiders in my apartment, or the spider was intelligent enough to pretend to be dead in order to escape and hunt me down later. Both thoughts are really quite terrifying.

The view between me and my hallway. Also, my bathroom is really not that ugly.

So I pretty much dealt with the situation like a superhero, by hurdling over the spider and racing to get a shoe, and then swiftly bringing to an end the potential danger imposed upon me by that spider. 

Really, I feel really bad whenever I have to stomp on one of those spiders. My guilty conscience roars to life, and I wonder if they had little spider families or spider career plans. And I know that spiders like wolf spiders are not bad spiders, and that they are important to have in our ecosystem. But ultimately, I just can't share my living space with a big, hairy spider. I feel like most of you understand.