I do not like insects.

Spiders. Crickets. Bees. (Oh my). You name the insect, I’m not a fan. (Yes, I know spiders are arachnids. Saying “arthropod” as a general term felt pretentious.)

I see one daddy long-legs and I freeze up. If one ant even remotely brushes my skin, I feel like Willie Scott trying to find the spike-trap switch in The Temple of Doom. (Shout out to Brad Pauquette, who doesn’t understand that reference because he’s never seen the movie.)

I grew up in a mid-century modern house. The walls were wood paneling. Bugs of all kinds would find their way inside–particularly in my room, for some reason.

When we first moved into that house, I didn’t have a bed. I slept on a mattress on the floor.

And so did the crickets.

Big ones, too. Or so it seemed back then. I hated finding them in my fluffy pink rug, and I hated having to squash them and worry about if they were actually dead in the tissue or not.

And I moved across the country at 20 years old, but my love for bugs didn’t really change.

However, when my neighbor (and best friend) calls me at 3pm and asks me to come kill the spider facing off with her in her bathroom, I can’t ever say no.

And I don’t want to.

Why is that?

Spiders.

I walked barefoot over to Alli’s apartment. She lives in the townhouse next door to me–literally a quick jog away, across the crumbly asphalt of my driveway and down the tiny grassy slope to hers. I scooped a sandal off her shoe rack before padding up the carpeted stairs. And there really wasn’t any anticipation–no butterflies in my gut, waiting to be caught in the inevitable web. My heart beat steady; if I were a cartoon, I’d’ve been whistling to myself.

Alli was waiting in the bathroom. She pointed at the stack of eyeshadow pallets on the sink.

I squinted. I didn’t see the thing at first–granted, my eyesight is terrible and my prescription is outdated.

But there it was–a tiny, many-legged thing, about the size of my thumbnail. Grody.

I looked at the sandal in my hand. Looked to the eyeshadow pallets, stacked neatly but in the way that a freshly set-up game of Jenga is neat. I turned to Alli.

“You might wanna get the vacuum from downstairs,” she said.

I squinted at the spider. It didn’t move, cocky little thing. I raised the sandal. Still nothing.

I set the sandal gently down on the lip of the sink. “Do you think the vacuum is strong enough?”

Alli nodded. “Should be. And I can do it if you want,” she added. “I just didn’t want…it to move.”

We stared at the spider.

…

…

…

Yeah, it didn’t seem like it’d be moving any time soon.

I shrugged. “I don’t mind it.” And it was true, for some reason.

I got the vacuum from downstairs–after walking past it twice–and Alli plugged it into the wall socket. I detached the wand. Switched the thing on to the highest setting. The shrill rumble filled the air as I slowly moved the wand towards the spider.

Closer.

Closer.

It darted, trying to hide behind the toothbrush cup.

But like a cow caught in the UFO’s beam, its little legs lost their grip on the white sink tile, and the little arachnid disappeared into the silver mouth of the vacuum hose.

I switched the vacuum off.

“Did I get it?” I asked.

Alli and I poked around the toothbrush holder. Peered around the eyeshadow pallets.

“Yeah,” she said. “I think you did.”

I switched the vacuum back on for a few seconds–just to be safe–then clicked the wand back into place.

As I walked back to my apartment, my mind swam ahead to old memories. My mom had gotten me a hand vacuum for my childhood bedroom, so I could deal with the crickets without having to squash them. It’s really quite effective.

But there was a time when I really didn’t need a vacuum. A time when tissues were the only weapon I needed to wield against unwelcome, multi-legged guests…

Bees.

When I was really little, my family stayed at my godmother’s house while we were getting our hardwood floors redone. According to my mom, I was about four years old.

I loved my godmother’s house. It was old–and that meant it was full of secrets and mysteries. The ceiling over the stairwell in the foyer was one of those old tin ones, shiny and silver and unlike any roof I’d ever seen. The living room was full of fancy couches and large-backed armchairs. There was a piano (always out of tune) and giant silver mirrors–vases and paintings and Persian rugs. They had a dumbwaiter going up to the second floor–or maybe it was just a laundry chute. To me, those were the same thing–and they were both magical.

My family stayed in the attic--the third floor, which I’d never been to before. It was dark and dusty–it’s always moonlit in my memories.

And beyond anything else, it was full of bees.

Dead bees.

I don’t know where they came from. I never heard them buzzing or saw one alive.

But all across the floor would be a dozen or so dead bees at a time.

And for some reason, I took it upon myself to deal with them.

We were only staying there a few days, but I spent each morning walking around the attic with a handful of tissues, plucking up dead bee after dead bee until there were no more left. I’d toss them into the trash, brush off my hands, and think Job well done!

And it never bothered me. Not once. This is the same little girl who, after squashing a spider in her bedroom, would leave the shoe on top of it for hours–days, even–and then, after finally cleaning it up, step around the spot of attack for weeks afterward.

That’s the same girl who grew up into the Cricket Vacuumer, dealing with bugs from the furthest distance she could possibly achieve.

For some reason, the bees didn’t bother her. I was able to sweep them up, per se, as casually as a baker wipes crumbs off a countertop.

And after crossing back from Alli’s apartment, and plopping down on my couch to finish out my work day, I started to wonder why.

Service.

It wasn’t about me.

Cleaning the bees up was an act of service.

It’s been nearly twenty years since then, but I remember that fact clearly: I’d done it as an act of service.

I’d wanted to help. To serve. I knew my parents were dealing with the hardwood floor people back home, and I was a guest in this fancy old house. I saw the bees and knew that it was, in the grand scheme of things, something I could handle. So I did. I handled it. And it didn’t bother me, because I was overcome by a sense of selflessness.

And I don’t mean “selflessness” in a pretentious way–I don’t mean to say “look at me, so kind and pure and great, you should clap!”

Not at all.

I was four.

I mean it in the sense that my “self” was removed from the situation. I didn’t exist. I was simply not a part of the equation. I don’t know how I did that as a four-year-old (or why I remember this so well), but I’m glad it did. Because being reminded of it now, I can see how helpful that mindset is, and how it affects my adult life.

When you put on the attitude of a servant, inconveniences don’t really exist. I learned this a bit as a hostess. You show up, you do what you came for (which is help people), and if you just do what you came to do, nothing gets under your skin. There are no awkward hesitations when your default is “this isn’t about me.”

And when Alli asks me to kill bugs for her, it isn’t about me.

It’s about helping a friend, no matter how big the spider is.

What about you?

Is there somewhere in your life where you need to take yourself out of the equation?

It’s not always easy (once again, I learned that being a hostess…). But in many cases, I’ve found it to be much less stressful.

Thoughts?

Let me know in the comments!