Back to nature not for Wendy | Coffs Coast Opinion | Local Voices from Coffs Coast, Australia

THOSE who know me well know I don’t do nature. Not of any description. If it’s creepy or crawly and in my house it must be exterminated – unless of course it’s one of the kids and even then, those who know me well...

When it comes to unwelcome intruders there’s none of this shooing it on to paper with the pretence of ‘releasing it back to nature’ rubbish. Hubby has to put a sizeable hole in the ozone when ever a creepy crawly shows its face in our house.

It’s all in our pre-nup. We have an even share of life’s most distasteful tasks. I do school lunches, taxes and parent/teacher nights while he does cricket watching, crotch scratching and critter killing.

Although how hubby had the forethought to include a ‘no-clean-up-the-body’ clause next to his bug squishing job description puzzles me to this day.

About this same time last year, when the mother of all cockroaches was doing laps like a Formula 1 race car around my bedroom, I vividly remember telling hubby in no uncertain terms there was no sleep (for anyone) while it was on the loose.

Due to my hysteria he was only one step away from ripping up the carpet when he finally cornered the cockie and splattered it across the wall.

So I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, what with all the humidity this week, when I saw something moving out of the corner of my eye – unfortunately it was just as I was saying goodnight to my youngest and about to turn off her bedroom light.

“Eewwh, yuk, what’s that thing up there?”

Don’t ask me why I said it but I did. It’s the kind of remark once said you can’t take back and once said, will always require some action on the part of the speaker.

My youngest jumped out of bed and shot across the room screaming at me, “What? Where? What?”

I pointed to the window. Teasingly poking out from behind the curtain were a few legs. And going by the hairiness and ugliness of those legs, we both knew what was behind the curtain.

Hubby and my eldest weren’t home (not that my eldest would have been any help, he’s the first one to stand on a chair and squeal like a girl) so we were on our own.

“Okay, well I’m guessing it’s too late to pretend I didn’t see any- thing,” I said as my youngest almost drew blood digging her fingernails into my arm.

“Come on, sweetie,” I said with fake bravado, “we’ve been in the fitting rooms at Target during summer sales – if we can handle that we can handle this.”

She gave me a ‘what’s with the ‘we’– you’re the mama you handle it’ look. Great.

Right it would be death by aerosol ‘cos I wasn’t getting close enough for hand-in-shoe combat.

“Okay sweetie, here’s the plan, you stay here and don’t take your eyes off the spider while I’ll go get the spray.”

“Mum? What’s plan B?”

Less than a minute later I was back in her room with the spray.

“It’s gone.”

“What do you mean it’s gone?” I said trying to keep my voice at a level that wouldn’t scare the neighbourhood dogs.

We still haven’t told my eldest the real reason why he and his sister have swapped bedrooms.

But my youngest has learnt two important lessons this week. Never take your eye off a creepy crawly when it’s in your bedroom and never tell your brother any- thing he doesn’t have to know.