Chip and Dale Designs

                                                            CREEPY CRAWLIES

   How many of you are snake fans? Spider fans??  Not me- and now it seems the older I get the worse it gets. When I was a kid, I played outside- A LOT. I remember one time finding strings and strings of what looked like yarn with slimy little balls in them in a pond. I went home, found a bucket and went back to the pond. I scooped up as much of the crap as I could and took it home. Days later, I looked in the bucket and lo and behold- tadpoles! Millions of ‘em!  I watched them grow for a few more days, sprout some legs, then eventually  released them back into the pond. Boy was that cool! So see- I used to not be bothered by slimy things!

   My mother, on the other hand, was a different story. On our way to my uncles’ home in New York we would drive through the Poconos. On this particular trip I was probably 10 years old or so. There was a snake farm that I begged to go into every. fricking .time. Finally my dad stopped. He probably was sick of my whining. As we are getting out of the car, my mother tells us she is staying in the car, rolls up her car window and locks the doors. This killed us- are the damn snakes smart enough to unlock car doors?  (This was long before Snakes on a Plane- boy that would have freaked her ass right out! ) We gave that poor woman grief about that forever. Well, the snake farm was as cool as I thought it would be- and I loved it.

 

   Back in the day my mother did all of our laundry. Washed it, hung it out on the line then actually put it away for us. Yes, we were spoiled. My brother had a little habit of putting his plastic snakes in various drawers so my mother would find a surprise when she put his clothes away. What a bastard. Why my mother did not proceed to tell him to put his own damn clothes away I have no idea. I would have tossed his clothes into the room and shut the door. And never did his laundry again.

   My dad, on the other hand was terrified of spiders.  My Saturday afternoons would often be spent  watching Creature Feature on tv- which sometimes involved giant creatures- and occasionally huge spiders took over little towns. This did not thrill my dad. When the spiders made an appearance he would make some lame excuse to leave the room- if he was lucky someone came in the barbershop to have their hair cut, or he needed to get a beer, make us dagwood sandwiches, etc. I never really noticed this was what he was doing- dads are not supposed to be afraid of anything, right?

   Fast forward a few years later. He was working construction and felt something on his shoulder. He brushed it off and kept working. A half an hour later he was violently ill and ended up going to the hospital. As the doctor was working on him, he said “I didn’t know there were poisonous spiders in the area”. He said it was a good damn thing he was laying down cause he would have passed out.  Poor guy.

 

   I was at a dear friends’ house several years ago and she told me one of her hubbys’ pet snakes had gotten out of its’ cage. How she could calmly sit there and not be totally freaking out amazed me. And it had been missing for days! There is no way I could have slept knowing that snake was on the loose.  She went downstairs into her sons’ room to put away laundry-(he is not an ass like my brother and did not hide fake snakes for her to find)and guess what was in there? The missing  snake! She went upstairs, grabbed a broom and a pillowcase and off she went. In utter amazement, I watched as she picked up the snake with the broom handle, then carefully placed the snake in the pillowcase. She then took the bag upstairs and dumped the snake back into its’ happy home. She was so brave- there is no way in hell I could have ever done that. You rock Di!

 

    A few years ago, a housing development was being built to the north of our house. This seemed to piss off the local snake population, and they started to migrate south. I really do not remember having an ALL SNAKES ARE WELCOME HERE sign up but the bastards came over anyway. One nice, fall day we decided to clean up the grape arbor to the south of our house and do some back yard maintenance.  We found several snakes in the backyard- off with their heads! Every time I saw one I would scream- which led me to be made fun of by my dorky teenage son. As we worked our way to the arbor, our son joined in the fun. And guess who screamed and ran like a 6 year old girl when he spotted his first snake?  Yep-Mr. “ I am too cool to yell at a snake like my dorky mother”.  He ran so fast he looked like the Flash! We found 4 more that day –which is now known in our home as the great snake massacre on Franklin Street.

 

   This leads me to yesterdays’ story from hubby. He said he was in the bathroom and guess what crawled out of a roll of toilet paper? A spider! I had just opened a new pack of paper, so this little guy must have had quite the trip. Bob said there was even a web inside the roll! I am glad it was Bob that saw him and not me!

 

   Now, all these years later, I hate all slimy creepy crawlies. Yes, I know they have their purpose, and that snakes are not slimy, spiders are good(mostly), blah , blah, blah. So. I guess not only have I turned into my mother but my father as well. In some ways this is not a bad thing-

   Party on my friends! And you are welcome for the nightmares :)