Snakes and I truly do not get along. Just to mention the word snake gives me goose- bumps. The same goes for night crawlers or plain old angle worms. Anything that slithers, they are all the same to me.

My phobia with worms often made things difficult when my girlfriend and I wanted to go fishing, and we did love to fish. However, we worked things out with a simple agreement. My girlfriend agreed to put the worms on the hooks. I took the fish off of the hooks as she did not like to grab the fish and get stuck by their fins. It kind of grossed me out when she used her thumbnail to cut those big night crawlers in two.

Now one of my earlier experiences with a snake happened when I was around ten years old and was raising rabbits to sell as pets. Of course, each rabbit had a name, and they were all precious to me.

My favorite rabbit, named Sweetie, was due to have a litter of young ones. Naturally, I was very excited and couldn't wait for those babies to be born. The cage Sweetie was in was about as high as my head, and every morning I would run to her cage first and check to see if she had birthed her litter.

On one particular Friday morning I knew the babies would be born because Sweetie had built her fur nest in the corner the night before. So I raced out to the shed as fast as my feet would carry me and quietly opened the cage door so as not to scare the new mother.

Imagine my horror when, instead of finding babies, a huge blue racer snake leaped out the cage door and hit me smack in the face before slithering over my shoulder and out the door.

I screamed at the top of my lungs all the way back to the house and got my father to come with me to kill that miserable snake. Of course, the snake was gone taking Sweetie's babies away in it's stomach. This little incident did nothing to endear snakes to me. I swore vengeance on them all.

So I went through the earlier years of my life avoiding snakes whenever it was possible. My next traumatic experience with a snake was after I was married to my first husband.

It was a rather nice summer day, and I decided I had better fix that piece of broken fence I had noticed on the back of our farm. I really didn't relish the thought of chasing our cows and horses all over the country. That is not fun at all.

I gathered up my fencing supplies and headed across the pasture. When I got to the spot where the fence was broken, I noticed the grass was rather high and made a note to myself to come back and cut it later in the day. I was humming a little tune as I waded into the grass and, you guessed it, I stepped smack dab on a huge snake. That old snake was just as surprised as I was. He jumped into the air as high as my face with his mouth wide open. He was one seriously pissed off snake, and I was one seriously frightened lady.

I threw my tools down and started running. I never figured for a moment that the snake wouldn't want to get away from me just as bad as I wanted to get away from him. Boy was I ever wrong. I looked back over my shoulder and that old snake was about ten feet behind me in hot pursuit. I tried throwing a rock at the snake but that seemed to piss him off even more. I turned and ran for my life.

There was a small stream I had to cross on the way to the house. I figured that would stop that darned snake for sure. However, no one had ever informed me that snakes could swim. That old snake politely waited for me to cross the stream then swam across and kept right on coming. He followed me clear up to the barn; where he stopped and glared at me for a moment before calmly heading back across the pasture. I am sure that snake had a good chuckle with his buddies that night. As for me, I informed my husband that the fence needed fixing and no way in hell, was I going back there.

The next incident with a snake was when my son and I were picking mushrooms. We came upon a huge blue racer sunning itself on a log. I told my son to leave the snake alone, and maybe, we could sneak on past it. We were almost by the snake when my son decided to be funny and threw a stick at it. That snake exploded off of the log and headed for us. I told our dog to get the snake, but the dog said I had to be kidding and ran for his life. All three of us went a different direction, but you can guess which one of us that snake came after.

They must sense my fear of them or something. My son thought it was very funny until he saw the look on my face when I started for him. He decided it was his turn to run.

In more recent times my husband and I were out mushroom hunting. The picking was great that day and we were finding a lot of mushroom. There was a big tree that had a lot of mushrooms growing at the base of it so I headed over to pick them. I was picking away when I spotted my nemesis, a blue racer, lying behind the tree. I hollered for my husband and he came and chased it away. I figured that was the end of that snake and went back to pick the mushrooms. When I straightened up I felt something bump the top of my head and there was that snake. He had climbed the tree and was hanging down above me with the intent of dropping on me.

So here I was screaming and fleeing again, but at least my husband was there to save me this time. That snake gave him a hell of a fight, it did not want to vacate that area. My husband said it probably had young around somewhere, but I didn't stick around to find out. The snake could have those mushrooms for all I cared.

I will tell you one more story about my phobias only this time it has to do with night crawlers instead of snakes.

It was one of those warm mornings in summer, and my husband got up before me to let all the cats outdoors. He decided to come back to bed for a while so he left the door part way open in case the cats wanted back in before we got up.

About a half hour or so later I got up and headed into the kitchen to make some coffee. Imagine my horror when I stepped on something cold and slimy. The whole kitchen floor was covered with squirming night crawlers. It was something like a nightmare from hell, the invasion of the night crawlers or something like that.

Over by the kitchen door sat the cause of all this chaos, with a happy look upon her face. You could almost hear her saying, "I brought you breakfast Ma". It was Blossom, my favorite kitten, at least up until that time she was anyway. She had another night crawler in her mouth and was very pleased with herself.

I yelled at my poor husband, which scared him so bad he landed on the floor of the bedroom. I think he thought the house was on fire, or some other major catastrophe had befallen us. He charged into the kitchen and, of all things, started laughing so hard it's a wonder he didn't wet his pants. I didn't see what was so funny and crawled back in bed and refused to come out until my husband assured me those ugly slimy critters were all gone.

Well, I have told you my story as best I know how. It's not easy living with a phobia like this. Especially because I live on a farm and might run into one of those slithering creepy things at any time. It makes it embarrassing also to always have to ask someone to put the worms on my hook when out fishing.

One of my very spiritual friends suggested that maybe in my past life someone threw me into a pit full of vipers, or perhaps I died of a snake bite. He said past life memories buried deep in my brain could be the cause of my deep fear of snakes. Who knows, but at least it gives me a reason to throw back at my husband when he calls me a chicken shit.