Post by Admin on Oct 24, 2023 6:11:53 GMT
Earlier, I posted about my eye to eye contact, within 15 yards, with a large Black Bear that initially startled/scared me for a few seconds, before he/she walked away. Which reaffirmed my observation(s)/beliefs that Black Bears prefer to move away from humans when they come in contact with us.
But what would you rather do, 1) Come within 15 yards of a large Black Bear and stare each other eye to eye like I did today, 2) Pick up a Snake, or 3) Touch a Spider.
When I taught Secondary Science, a guy had a business called "Snakes Alive," in which he brought Snakes from School to School for a fee - each student had to pay a dollar or two to get to watch his show. He gave a presentation and at the end he pulled out all kinds of different Snakes and let the children hold them. He came so many times to my school, that I became quite unafraid of touching, picking up, or holding a Snake. In Psychology, that's called "desensitization." In Psychology, when one has a phobia of something like being afraid of Snakes, then the Psychologist, or Psychiatrist, slowly and gradually keeps introducing the "Snake" to the person until the person has no problem touching and holding it. I became desensitized to touching, picking up, and holding snakes, from years of him coming to our school. At the very very end, he'd break out one of the largest Snakes of the world - either an Anacondas or Python. It took every student in the class to line up to hold the extremely long Snake. One thing I'd like to tell people is this, Snakes are not slimy. Snakes feel very dry and leathery. And finally I'd like to say that Snakes would prefer to escape and get away from humans in the wild - they only attack when something drastic happens like if you step on them or get to close to them and they feel like they have no escape.
Which brings me to Spiders. After years of touching Snakes, I preferred to touch, pick up, or hold a Snake to touching or holding a Spider. But that's only because I've never been desensitized to Spiders. So, on my own, I have been desensitizing myself to Spiders. My favorite Spider is the Jumping Spider. They are small cute Spiders (some disagree that there is any Spider that's cute, but they are to me). I have routinely, through the years, allowed Jumping Spiders crawl on the back of my hand(s) and arm(s). I really like them.
But when it comes to Spiders, I've had a phobia of touching larger Spiders. Today I began desensitizing myself to larger Spiders - well, just one Spider in particular. Jumping Spiders are very small, which don't bother me to hold them. But the Spider I seen today, was approximately one inch long from longest arm to longest arm. One inch may not sound like a long distance, but to me when it comes to touching a Spider it is.
The Spider was making the most remarkably beautiful web under our shed cover. The Spider was ugly, but it's web was extremely beautiful - Charlotte's Web beautiful!
I decided to touch it and see what it would do. I preferred not touching a one inch long Spider, but I over-came my fear and did so anyways.
The Spider did every maneuver possible, from crawling quickly in every direction in it's web, to finally, when I touched it once again, dropping straight down.
I came back late tonight, at 2pm, to see if the Spider was still in it's web - after my toying with it. I really wandered if it would desert the Web and moving along or not, after I had actually touched it with my index finger multiple times.
With my light, I shown the light on the incredibly beautiful and intricate web that it had make - it was a beautifully perfect Web, but there was no sign of the Spider - perhaps I had terrorized it so much that it did move along- ?
Then I looked up in the crevice/crack of the metal rod that the top of the left side of the web was attached to. I seen a small object that looked more like the smallest wad of mud than a Spider. I thought to myself, could that be the Spider ?
I quickly found my answer as I took my index finger and touched the wad. To my surprise and joy, the Spider came uncoiled and dropped straight down, with web holding it as it fell, straight down, holding itself midway half way down. I did not touch it again, but the Spider then, after momentarily stopping, the Spider went ahead and dropped all the way down and landed on the fender of my Father's 4 wheeler rear fender.
I propped my light so that I could observe what the Spider would do next, and I drank a beer and smoked my pipe while observing it. The Spider was determined not to move anywhere at all from its position on the 4 wheeler fender. I decided not to touch or toy with the Spider anymore. I finished my beer and cashed out the tobacco in my pipe and left - leaving the Spider to feel as it had gotten away from me - it obviously had interpreted my touching it with my finger as an attempt by a Predator to attack/try to eat it.
So today and at 2am, late tonight, I began the process of overcoming my fear of larger Spiders. The old saying that Spiders are more afraid of you than you are afraid of them is actually 100% true - each person makes their own determination on that statement though.
Michael Piziak