The name of this blog is Killing Spiders because its original intent was to focus on content of interest to single women over 40.  Single women, I mused, have to kill spiders themselves because they don’t have a partner to do the deed.

Readers could construe this as sexist — why can’t a woman kill a spider?  Why is it the man’s job to kill spiders?  What about same-sex relationships, who is supposed to kill the spider?

Since starting this blog in 2013, I have become part of a couple.  Legally, I’m single, but I live with my significant other in a committed relationship.  One would think that I no longer have to kill my own spiders.  After all, I have this man who cleans my garage and fixes my plumbing.  Isn’t he doing pest control, too?

Think again.

I live with a guy who WON’T KILL SPIDERS!  Or snakes, either.  But we don’t have any of those crawling around the house (hopefully).

My Honey is an environmental conservationist.  He loves animals and respects the world’s ecosystem.  His undergraduate degree is in Biology.  He won’t kill a spider, or most any bug, except mosquitoes and cockroaches.

His creature-respecting side is one of the things I love about him.  My cat, Nala, likes him better than she likes me.  While I find it sweet and touching that he is angered and saddened when a careless motorist hits a fox on the highway, I’m a bit annoyed by the “no dead spiders” rule.  I have to surreptitiously squish the creepy arachnids when he’s not looking.  I’ve flushed a few when he isn’t home.  But the other day, when he carefully trapped a spider in a plastic cup and asked me to set it free in the back yard, I grudgingly did as he asked.  After all, he goes along with some of my whacky habits, too.

One could say the fact that I fell in love with a spider protector is ironic.  What do you think?

 

Those of us of a certain age remember the Alanis Morisette song “Ironic,” which was in frequent rotation on radio stations in the mid-1990’s.  The ironic thing about the song is that none of the situations of which she croons are ironies.  The lyrics have been analyzed for appropriate use of the literary device, and guess what? No irony!

Most of you are probably thinking, ‘OK, no big deal.  This chick has to kill her own spiders.  So what?’ Or, ‘why the hell is she going on about irony?’  Well, I’m a writer and irony is one of my favorite devices.

Wait, there’s more!

A couple of weeks ago I woke up one morning with a large — and when I say large I mean GIANT — red, bruising mark on my calf just under the bend of my knee.  My thoughts immediately went to the worst possible cause of such a wound — blood clot.

After an Urgent Care visit, a trip to my primary care physician and a vascular imaging study, my family doctor’s initial diagnosis stands:  spider bite!  I’m still taking some high test antibiotics and the wound continues to be swollen and discolored.

I went home from my second doctor visit and told my Sweetie what the doc had said:  it’s probably a spider bite.  She told me three times to check the bed for spiders.  I thought this silly, as I had just changed the sheets.

“Oh, there was a spider on the bed a few days ago,” my spider lover said.

I squealed: “WHAAAAAAAT???? Where was I? Did you KILL it?!”

“You were asleep.  I flicked it off onto the floor,” was the answer I received.

EEEEEKKKKKKK!

So what do you think?  Is it ironic?