Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Spider Sense

Gerry has an intense unnatural horrendous unhealthy paralyzing fear of spiders and all things spider-y.
And members of the same family working in the same place can be a blessing.
These two statements go together . . .
Logan and his mother, Gerry, both worked at the Raymond Mercantile.
She, upstairs: administration.
He, main floor: sales and everything else.
It was a sweet setup.
Most days he would climb the broad, wooden stairway in the center of the store and lunch with his mom in the upper reaches of the store, which, as it so happened, were completely open to the lower reaches, allowing the upper echelons to actually look down upon the lower echelons.
On this particular day, as Logan approached the stairs, he noticed a large bin had been placed as an endcap to the row of shelves nearest the stairway.
Anyone ascending – or especially descending – would get a full view of . . . whatever that bin held.
And that bin held rubber animals.
That would have been okay, except that many of those rubber animals were spidery in shape. And large in size.
He called the manager over. The conversation went something like this . . .
Logan: “Ummm . . . you have to move that bin.”
Manager: “Why?”
Logan: “Because my mom is up those stairs.” Points. “And she won’t be able to make it home because she won’t be able to come down those stairs.” Points again.
Manager (frowning): “What?”
Logan (patiently): “My mom has a paralyzing (see above) fear of spiders. If she sees this bin with the . . . erm . .  . spiders, she won’t be able to walk past it to leave the store.”
Manager: “What? No. Your mom is the most together person I’ve ever met.”
A little aside here. Yes. Gerry is the most together person you will ever meet. She also has a paralyzing fear of spiders. Back to my story . . .
Logan: Picks up a spider. Holds it for Manager to see. Then tosses it backwards over his shoulder into the upper reaches of the store.
Pause here for someone to take a large breath . . .
Gerry: SSSCCCRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECCCCHHHHH!!!!!
Sounds of frantic scrambling and furniture flying.
Logan: “See?”
Yeah. He had her back.

5 comments:

  1. Yikes. I'm trying not to laugh but really, she could have had a heart attack or broken a hip or something.
    And everyone knows not to screw with mom. She'll always get you back. Logan better watch over his shoulder.

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  2. There's nothing so effective as a good demonstration, be it from a vacuum clean salesman or a naughty son (even a grownup one) :)

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  3. He most definitely had her back. Even if he did freak her out to prove a point.

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  4. That sounds like my husband. He is absolutely terrified of spiders! He double checks his car windows at night because he's afraid a spider might just happen to crawl in and fall on him while he was driving. Which would cause a heart attack and a totaled. He's really thought this out lol!

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  5. That's very sweet, Logan looking out for his mum like that.

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