Sympathy for the Spider

"Sympathy for the Spider"
By
Brian Paul Dunlop


Upon one Sunday night, as I sat in my kitchen, penning another timeless

tale about the wretch that has become of humanity, did I feel an

irritating sensation within my bladder. I turned to get up from my

chair, but suddenly, I became slightly startled because of a large red

spider scurrying its way across my kitchen floor towards my brother's

sandals.


As I rose from my seat, I saw the spider find sanctuary under one of

his sandals. My intentions were pure and simple, and that was to kill

the spider to which had invaded the sanction of my home. I couldn't

allow it to live, and ignore its presence, for it may crawl on me and

bite me, at any given moment, if I had put my guard down.


Now, I wouldn't say that I am totally arachnophobic, but I have been in

my younger years, but at that time, I no longer feared the spider

because the spider feared me, and I could tell, as I didn't see the

spider go anywhere else; it didn't move, all it did was hide under a

sandal, fearing the intentions of the strange giant that stood before

it.


And without a moment to take any chances, I lifted up the sandal to see

a startled spider trying to move its eight legs as fast it could, as to

avoid my most judging and biased hand. But it was to no avail as I

brought the sandal down hard on the spider, leaving it twitching and

lingering on the agony of life.


When I saw this, I knew of the pain to which it was experiencing, but

choose not to finish it off, as who was I to decline this creature, its

last few moments of life? And I knew, I already had prior engagements

within the bathroom, upstairs, so I decided that if it’s not dead

before I came back then I would finish it off, once and for all, myself.


As I left the bright glow of the kitchen, I was met with the dark,

errie persence of my dining room. Besides spiders, darkness was

another phobia of mine that tormented my thoughts during my childhood,

and even at that point, though significantly lessened, these phobias

were still present, which caused me to turn on the hallways light as I

descended the staircase to the bathroom.


When I entered the bathroom, I turned on the small mirror light and

rushed towards the light switch at the end of the hall, but it was too

late as my brother awoke and complained in a grouchy manner as his door

was missing as a result of many aggressive bi-polar mood swings that

gradually caused the door to fall off its hinges.


And just as he had arisen from bed, trifling about the bright glare of

the hallway light, did I turn off this light, all the while, walking

towards the bathroom, apologizing to my brother for disturbing his rest

in such a late hour, during the night.


While I used the toilet, I forgot all about the spider, downstairs. It

was as if it had been flushed away with my waste; both useless objects

that burdened me, greatly, now gone and forgotten, as if they had never

existed at all.


When I returned to the kitchen, the memory of the injured spider fled

back to my mind, and I returned to the very spot where I had first

began to inflict pain upon it. And this time, as I looked down at the

spider, it lay motionless, and I realized that its suffering was over.


So I grabbed for a tissue from off the table and gently poked the

spider with it, as a way to make sure that it was really dead. And

then suddenly, the spider sprang to life, and in a dying effort,

quickly wobbled across the kitchen floor with most of its working legs.


And when I saw this, I picked up the sandal that lay beside the

tortured spider, and quickly slammed it down on its body.

When I lifted the sandal up, I saw that the spider was still alive, as

it lay with its legs and body, compacted together, but still flailing

about in every given direction, in immense pain.


When I saw this, I made it my duty to kill the inflicted spider and end

its suffering, for good. So I took the tissue, still in my hand, and

brought it down on the morbidly injured spider to a point to where I

heard a loud crunch, and I knew that the deed was done.


After this, I picked up the remains of the spider with my tissue, and

threw it in the waste basket, then washed my hands with soap and water,

and thought of the true significance of the deed I had just done.


Because deep within my conscience, I felt a lingering presence of

guilt, and with this came with much thought as every time I killed a

spider or insect, it felt trivial or necessary, or at some point,

during my earlier years of my childhood, fun and enjoyable, as if me,

killing these creatures was, but a game. But killing this particular

spider felt much different than any other spider I had killed,

previously.


For in this spider, I saw such raw and pure emotion, to a point that

whenever I thought of such an occasion, my eyes would become moist and

glossy with tears. And all I could think about was its never-ending

will to cling on to the very essence of life, even though, this essence

proved to be painful and unrewarding.