NO NEED TO BE GENTLE

By Joanna Bressler

I saw my first centipede one night while I was reading an absolutely marvelous trashy novel. Wriggling on the living room rug a hair’s breadth away from my bare feet, it was about 4 inches long, pitch black and strikingly unattractive.

I had only lived on Oahu for three months, but I’d dreaded centipedes from the moment I heard about them. Their sting supposedly sends people screaming to the hospital.

“You can do this!” I said to myself as I tiptoed away from it. My self said back, “Who the hell do you think you’re kidding?”

Simply waving good night to the centipede and shutting my bedroom door would not have worked. I didn’t feel like I could do it, but I had to.

I snuck up on it and clamped a Pyrex measuring cup over it. Then I lifted the cup a quarter inch and sprayed half a can of Raid directly at it. When it didn’t die – the insecticide seemed to make it more lively – I sprayed the other half of the can of Raid at it. Then I lifted the cup and hit the centipede with a hammer about 45 times. It didn’t stop moving, so I hit it another 45 times. When it finally seemed at least stunned, I picked it up through several layers of paper towel, threw it into the garbage, and took the garbage out.

With consulting the Internet, assembling my weaponry, strategizing, having panic attacks and lengthy remobilizing periods during the battle, it took over an hour.

During the next year, and without first texting so I could clean the place up, eight more centipedes visited my apartment. Not one of them, I’m happy to say, got out alive.

The killing spree, however, taught me a great deal about centipedes and myself. Just for starters: A tiny little centipede baby is not too adorable to kill.

In fact, a horrifyingly long centipede wobbling on the edge of your coffee table is worse than that same centipede crawling on your rug. You must first knock it off the table before applying the measuring cup, and it might land on your bare feet.

All of a centipede’s legs are coated with poison. Thus, when a centipede slips into bed with you, even if doesn’t sting you with its two front horns but simply slithers along your bare arm, a mild stinging sensation awakens you. This quickly escalates into intense pain. You will need ice packs, antibiotic ointment, and Tylenol for immediate treatment, and psychotherapy for the rest of your life. First, though, you must kill the centipede trying to climb back into your bed.

You learn about yourself, too: That you have unsuspected reservoirs of fortitude but very little emotional stability in a crisis. That you relish being a centipede killer. Even worse, that you take every opportunity to brag about your prowess, exactly like I’m doing now.

Joanna Bressler lives and writes on Oahu. Her major goal in life is to start a support group for centipede killers.