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I firmly hold the belief that it is forever an option to change. My view is you truly can teach an old dog new tricks, on the condition that the mature being is open-minded and ready for growth. As long as the person is ready to confess when it was in error, and strive to be a more enlightened self.

OK yes, I am the old dog. And the skill I am attempting to master, despite the fact that I am decrepit? It is an significant challenge, an issue I have battled against, frequently, for my all my days. My ongoing effort … to become less scared of huntsman spiders. My regrets to all the other spiders that exist; I have to be realistic about my capacity for development as a human. The focus must remain on the huntsman because it is sizeable, dominant, and the one I see with the greatest frequency. Including on three separate occasions in the last week. Within my dwelling. I'm not visible to you, but I’m shaking my head and grimacing as I type.

I doubt I’ll ever reach “enthusiast” status, but I’ve been working on at least becoming Normal about them.

An intense phobia regarding spiders dating back to my youth (unlike other children who find them delightful). In my formative years, I had ample brothers around to guarantee I never had to engage with any directly, but I still became hysterical if one was obviously in the immediate vicinity as me. Vividly, I recall of one morning when I was eight, my family still asleep, and facing the ordeal of a spider that had crawled on to the family room partition. I “managed” with it by standing incredibly far away, nearly crossing the threshold (lest it ran after me), and discharging a significant portion of pesticide toward it. It didn’t reach the spider, but it did reach and disturb everyone in my house.

With the passage of time, whoever I was dating or sharing a home with was, by default, the least afraid of spiders in our pairing, and therefore tasked with handling the situation, while I made frightened noises and ran away. In moments of solitude, my tactic was simply to exit the space, turn off the light and try to forget about its being before I had to enter again.

Recently, I was a guest at a pal's residence where there was a very large huntsman who resided within the casement, for the most part hanging out. In order to be less fearful, I envisioned the spider as a her, a girlie, one of us, just chilling in the sun and listening to us gab. Admittedly, it appears rather silly, but it worked (somewhat). Alternatively, making a conscious choice to become less phobic proved successful.

Regardless, I've made an effort to continue. I reflect upon all the rational arguments not to be scared. It is a fact that huntsman spiders are not dangerous to humans. I know they eat things like insect pests (my mortal enemies). It is well-established they are one of nature’s beautiful, harmless-to-humans creatures.

Alas, they do continue to scuttle like that. They travel in the deeply alarming and somehow offensive way imaginable. The sight of their many legs transporting them at that frightening pace induces my caveman brain to go into high alert. They are said to only have a standard octet of limbs, but I am convinced that triples when they are in motion.

Yet it is no fault of their own that they have frightening appendages, and they have the same privilege to be where I am – possibly a greater claim. I’ve found that implementing the strategy of trying not to have a visceral panic reaction and retreat when I see one, working to keep still and breathing, and consciously focusing about their good points, has actually started to help.

Just because they are hairy creatures that move hastily extremely quickly in a way that invades my dreams, does not justify they merit my intense dislike, or my high-pitched vocalizations. I am willing to confess when my reactions have been misguided and fueled by unfounded fear. I’m not sure I’ll ever attain the “catching one in a Tupperware container and taking it outside” stage, but miracles happen. A bit of time remains left in this veteran of life yet.