Scorpion

At some point I heard an anecdote or read a story or something about someone who put their foot in their shoe without looking first and there was a scorpion in it and it stung them and they died. It was one of those little bits of information that stick in the mind.

I keep an old pair of shoes in the garage to slip on whenever I need to take the trash out or something, and I don’t always shake them out first, but every single time I put a foot into one of them, I think “maybe this is it.”

Of course, I think “maybe this is it” about a million things; if I indulged every bit of paranoia that flits across my mind with an actual ritual, I would live in a state of constant paralysis.

Anyway, since moving to the Southwest, I had yet to encounter a scorpion, until yesterday. I was moving a big pile of broken down moving boxes from the living room into the garage and as I carried them through the house, a scorpion fell out and waddled away. I squished it, but two things: one, it was REALLY difficult to squish. Like, I stomped it multiple times and finally had to grind it with my heel. Those things are tough. Second, it was IN THE HOUSE.

Now, as a lifelong singleton, I know how rare my lifestyle is: everybody couples. That scorpion has a partner. At least one. It might even be poly. What if they are everywhere?

I had this idea that scorpion stings were highly toxic, but I googled it, and turns out they’re almost never a big deal. They’re just painful.

Still, though.