My relationship with spiders: a history

After I saw the massive spider on my ceiling this morning (I don't know where it is now), I texted Jay and asked if he would come deal with it. He said, "only if you scream bloody murder first."

See, there's a story or two here. Some of you know it, but I've probably picked up a reader or two since then (I've also probably lost four or five, but whatever). First, the pre-story:

When I was very little (four or five), mom read me "The Hobbit" because she really liked it. She didn't bother with the whole "is this appropriate for small children" analysis. So she read me "The Hobbit," which, if you'll recall, has a nasty spider scene. So I got nightmares. Every night. I would wake up screaming every night. So mom took me to a psychiatrist, who administered an IQ test, on the basis of which he or she and his or her crack team determined that I was mentally disabled and would not mentally progress past the age of four. Mom did not neglect to hold this against me when I decided to major in psychology, but I digress.

Sooner or later, for whatever reason, I stopped screaming every night. But I continued to scream at night occasionally, into adulthood, when I thought there might be spiders around (like every time I went camping). I would go to bed on guard, and the slightest stimulus--light, maybe--would prompt a blood-curdling scream. When Jay and I were in Panama, after a day out on the water and some alcohol, I took a nap, only to wake up screaming as I "hallucinated a hole in the wall." (His words). I probably hallucinated spiders. I eventually realized what was happening and trained myself not to wake up screaming, by actively calming myself down before going to sleep in situations where I would otherwise fear the spiders. Also, looking out for spiders became very, very unpractical when I spent a couple of months in Nicaragua; there were spiders and grosser creatures everywhere. I would wake up every morning and think, "hmm, what insect or arachnid will greet me in the shower this morning?"

But a year or so before those months in Nicaragua, Jay and I spent the better part of a week in Panama. We were in Boquete, and we'd just returned from a ten-mile hike on Volcan Baru when the
hotel owner, thinking we were a couple, asked if he could move us to a room with a single bed (and, it turned out, no door on the bathroom--very romantic!). We were so exhausted that we didn't care. We were still exhausted the following morning, but we went for a quick walk by the river (it was beautiful), and then returned to the room to pack. I quickly packed, then collapsed on the bed and closed my eyes. Jay put his suitcase on the bed and opened it.

Jay: A., get off the bed!
A.: Huh?
Jay: GET OFF THE BED.
A.: I'm tired.
Jay: A.
A.: What's happening?

I sit up, open my eyes.

There's a GINORMOUS spider inside Jay's suitcase. Which was on the bed, as was I. There was no escaping. I screamed bloody murder.

The spider ran away. We took everything out of the room--my stuff was already packed, and Jay proceeded to pack outside. The hotel guy (by hotel, we mean a bunch of rooms in a garden) told us that there weren't really spiders around, so he didn't know what we were talking about. But I'm telling you guys, this spider was massive.