Spider Song (Part 1)

I’m not really afraid of spiders, not the way some people are afraid. Many psychiatrists as early as I can remember have diagnosed me with arachnophobia, even before they knew that I knew what it meant. But I did know. I’ve always known. Maybe that’s why I am afraid of spiders, I don’t know.

I’m not as scary as you may think. Just smart. I always know. Always have, always will. That’s what’s puzzling me. The fact that I can be puzzled is a mystery in itself, but there’s more. You see, I’m only in 7th grade, and, well, I’m always right. It gets boring after awhile, really, but that’s not the problem. I hate spiders. Hate them, but I don’t fear them. Sure, I’m scared of things, like death. Death is another one of those mysteries. Mankind is doing everything it can to prolong life, even though they know it will never last forever, no matter how hard they experiment. Life is a fleeting thing. It is going to end. Though when the time is, no one can tell. You can make the best of the life you are given, or you can’t. It isn’t entirely up to you, either, like everyone makes it out to be. Others around you can affect your life in many ways. Think about it. If you never had any friends because you were never pretty, and your family put you out as a foster child when you were just a babe, how happy could you possibly be? So, everything affects your life.

Okay, so death is one of my big frights. I want to be able to live forever. And I’ve finally figured out how. Yeah, so it’s not foolproof, and it’s not entirely my idea, in fact I combined Archimedes theory with a Superman movie, and got mine. But it works. It took me awhile. But it works. So my plan is time travel. All I do is go back in time until I’m young, relive those days and try again. I’d live forever. Bingo. Overcame my fear of death.

One fear I will never overcome is my non fear. Spiders. They are frightful creatures, and no one understands their motives. Black widows eating their husbands? I mean, I understand that you get hungry and you already have planted your eggs, but isn’t there more to life than that? When you get hungry, you eat a strange spider, one for whom you have no feelings, not the love of your life! So I hate spiders. So cruel. The one thing in the world I don’t understand, the one thing that I really hate (I’m all into that life to it’s fullest thing), and everyone thinks I’m afraid. Fear comes from not understanding, I realize, but I understand the scary part of spiders. Some have venom. In fact, a daddy long legs is the most poisonous spider in the world, but it’s mouth isn’t big enough to bite you. Scary, but once you know the second half of the story, you overcome your fear. So I’m not afraid of spiders. Yet that doesn’t click with the nutty psychiatrists I go to.

Enough with the scary stuff. I think you may be starting to get what I’m saying. Don’t worry, I understand your small brain capacity, I’ll give you the facts more than once. But anyway, I guess I forgot to introduce myself. I’m Sunshine. That’s the only name I ever had. You can call me Sunny. And in this book, we aren’t going to talk about family. At least, not yet. It’s still too painful.