Growing up, I spent almost every school break with my mom on a cattle ranch just outside the city limits of Avon Park. My older brother, Jerry, and I wasted countless hours roaming through the pastures, climbing trees, playing with cars and riding his Shetland pony, Cricket, all over the place.
Some of our pastimes were questionable in nature, including those spent fighting, armed with anything from sand spurs to dried cow patties. All of these altercations were, of course, initiated by Jerry because I would never have thought to utilize these nefarious devices on another person without his influence.
One of our more disturbing games was “bug dungeon.” We’d turn over rotted logs and catch whatever species of insect we thought could be contained in our hand-dug dirt pit. With its rhinoceros-looking horns, our prized catch was the ox beetle. For some reason, every time we found one, my brother immediately named it “J.R.” which, I suppose, originated from the T.V. show, “Dallas.”
On one summer break when I was around 8 years old, Jerry showed me the crowned jewel of nightmarish creepy, crawling discoveries: a large population of banana spiders (a.k.a. Golden Orb Weavers) thriving in a stand of palm trees. If you’ve never had the opportunity to see one of these monstrosities, count yourself lucky.
For those with weak constitutions concerning arachnids, I’m sorry to say that their leg span surpasses that of a large person’s hand and they have the audacity to grow prickly, black hair around the joints of their appendages, like some type of hell-spun leg warmers. Their golden abdomens, speckled with white splotches, are too large for comfort while their heads have a white coating that makes it look eerily like a human skull.
The weaver’s webs are so strong, they can catch small birds. Make no mistake, if these suckers were any bigger, they’d find a way to take over the world.
Our previous attempts to trap spiders in the bug dungeon were unsuccessful, but Jerry had another, really stupid idea for the Golden Orb Weaver. He thought our tree house could use a little sprucing up and decided to transport several of these menacing spiders.
I was the containment unit and he was the catcher. My red Salvation Army shirt with my name stenciled on the back was fashioned into a make-shift pouch by folding up the bottom half to hold tightly against my body. Jerry would grab a spider and I’d snap open the pouch as he dropped it in. I could feel their spiky legs poking me in the stomach and managed to hold it together until, all of a sudden, something foreign (which I later discovered to be a loose string) brushed across my upper thigh.
My nerves sent an impulse to my brain that said, “Hey, smarty pants, one of those death spiders is crawling down your leg at this very moment!” I panicked. The pouch was flung open and, as I was hopping around screaming, I batted my arms in a downward fashion hoping to sweep away any persistent spider still clinging to me.
Jerry’s initial disappointment in me didn’t stop him from accomplishing his goal and the tree house in which we used to play soon became an obstacle of horror packed with dozens of spiders watching us with scores of beady, black eyes.
To this day, I still have nightmares about overgrown Golden Orb Weavers coming to get me. Big brother’s mission accomplished.
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