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I firmly hold the belief that it is always possible to change. I believe you can in fact train a seasoned creature, provided that the old dog is willing and ready for growth. So long as the person is willing to admit when it was in error, and work to become a better dog.

Well, admittedly, I am that seasoned creature. And the trick I am working to acquire, despite the fact that I am decrepit? It is an major undertaking, an issue I have grappled with, repeatedly, for my entire life. My ongoing effort … to grow less fearful of the common huntsman. Apologies to all the remaining arachnid species that exist; I have to be realistic about my capacity for development as a human. The target inevitably is the huntsman because it is sizeable, commanding, and the one I see with the greatest frequency. This includes a trio of instances in the recent past. Inside my home. I'm not visible to you, but I’m shaking my head at the very thought as I type.

I doubt I’ll ever reach “enthusiast” status, but I’ve been working on at least attaining a baseline of normalcy about them.

An intense phobia regarding spiders since I was a child (in contrast to other children who find them delightful). During my childhood, I had a sufficient number of brothers around to guarantee I never had to handle any personally, but I still panicked if one was clearly in the immediate vicinity as me. Vividly, I recall of one morning when I was eight, my family still asleep, and attempting to manage a spider that had made its way onto the living room surface. I “handled” with it by positioning myself at a great distance, nearly crossing the threshold (lest it pursued me), and discharging a significant portion of insect spray toward it. It didn’t reach the spider, but it did reach and disturb everyone in my house.

In my adult life, my romantic partner at the time or cohabiting with was, as a matter of course, the bravest of spiders between us, and therefore in charge of dealing with it, while I emitted whimpers of distress and ran away. In moments of solitude, my strategy was simply to exit the space, plunge the room into darkness and try to forget about its existence before I had to enter again.

Not long ago, I was a guest at a friend’s house where there was a particularly sizable huntsman who lived in the casement, mostly just hanging out. In order to be less fearful, I conceptualized the spider as a female entity, a gal, one of us, just relaxing in the sun and listening to us chat. Admittedly, it appears rather silly, but it was effective (somewhat). Or, making a conscious choice to become more fearless proved successful.

Whatever the case, I've made an effort to continue. I contemplate all the sensible justifications not to be scared. I am aware huntsman spiders are not dangerous to humans. I recognize they prey upon things like flies and mosquitoes (my mortal enemies). I know they are one of nature’s beautiful, non-threatening to people creatures.

Yet, regrettably, they do continue to move like that. They move in the deeply alarming and somehow offensive way possible. The vision of their many legs carrying them at that frightening pace causes my ancient psyche to enter panic mode. They claim to only have eight legs, but I believe that triples when they are in motion.

However it is no fault of their own that they have scary legs, and they have the same privilege to be where I am – if not more. I’ve found that employing the techniques of trying not to have a visceral panic reaction and retreat when I see one, attempting to stay composed and breathing steadily, and consciously focusing about their positive qualities, has begun to yield results.

The mere fact that they are fuzzy entities that scuttle about at an alarming rate in a way that haunts my sleep, doesn’t mean they deserve my hatred, or my girly screams. I can admit when I’ve been wrong and fueled by baseless terror. It is uncertain I’ll ever reach the “scooping one into plasticware and taking it outside” level, but miracles happen. Some life is left within this old dog yet.