Yeah. Thought I’d start this blog off with something totally inyerface. This picture is from Poss’s MySpace page and that is (well, was) on her bedroom wall. And she left it there.

I hate huntsmans. I have always hated them. People will tell you all sorts of stuff about huntsmans, most of it not true. They say “oh, it’s more scared of you than you are of it” but if it’s so scared of me what is it doing in my house? They also claim that because the huntsman’s venom is not all that deadly to humans, they are not a threat. Also not true. As my very wise father points out, you can get antivenom if you’re bitten by, say a Sydney Funnelweb, but there’s no cure for being scared to death! And the hunties that live around here are big and scary. They have attitude, and apparently you’re more likely to get bitten by one of these than any other spider, mainly because the bloody things are always lurking round in your house and creeping up the walls and generally being scary and horrible.

Okay, so I’ve pretty much made my point on huntsmans. I don’t like them. I will not tolerate them in the house. I have been known to get the kids to round up a chook, bring her in the house and get her to eat the offending arachnid. That way I can make sure that it’s dead and GONE.

Here’s another picture of a spider:

this is a jumping spider.

When I was 13, we moved into our first very own house. Up until I was ten we lived with Nana and then we had rented houses for three years and finally our own place. And I had my very own bedroom. Paradise.

Well, this house was in a fairly new estate and there weren’t flyscreens on the windows and my bed was under a window and I got jumping spiders. They went on my pillow and had their own Stawell Gift pretty much every night that first summer.

Thing was, at that age I was scared of ALL spiders.

So I had a choice.

I could let those jumping spiders make my life utterly miserable with their leaping about and other athletic antics, or I could just get over it. So I looked at them up close and decided they were cute. And I decided I liked jumping spiders. I mean, what’s not to like? They are cute and funny, they like people’s company, they’re engaging to watch, they are some of the most decorative and beautiful spiders I’ve ever seen, the Chinese even have a nickname for them, they call them pussycat spiders.

Now back to the huntsmans.

The other day there was a huntie on the kitchen window. Not a big one, but it carried the usual huntie aggro with it. Anyway, I went up to that spider and told it it needn’t think it was going to stay in my house.

And I touched it.

Beloved couldn’t believe his eyes. ‘That’s on the outside of the window, isn’t it?’ he said.

‘No,’ I said. And I touched it again. Only on its leg, but still touching. I touched and touched it.

Beloved maintained that even though the spider was small, I still wouldn’t have been able to touch it a few weeks ago.

He gave me a jar to catch it and I scooped it up. I didn’t even need to put a bit of cardboard under it, I just caught it in the jar and left the top open and gave it to Beloved to put outside.

Now, I’m not guaranteeing that I can go up to any old huntie and catch it in my hand or in a tissue and put it gently outside. I’d still sooner see the buggers going down a chook’s gullet. But I don’t feel utterly tormented by them any more.

And I guess that’s what this blog is all about. I mean, not spiders, but about overcoming previous programming. About the strength of the human mind. About our ability to change what we are. About how we can become who we want to become.

I think we can all do it.