NEWSDAY (New York, New York) 01 December 05 Old Lyme woman conquers a phobia by becoming expert on snakes (Stan Decoster)
Old Lyme, Conn. (AP): She would be running down a hill, covered with snakes that would sink fangs into her flesh. Linda Krulikowski would let out a scream, and then, sweating, she would awake from her nightmare.
Her husband, Ernie, would comfort her, but the dreams would come again and again. Her fear had become a phobia, and Krulikowski knew she couldn't keep living like that. She had no choice but to confront her demons.
"I learned that if you love the thing you fear, the fear will go away," said Krulikowski, a 62-year-old who works at Laysville Hardware and lives on the shore of Rogers Lake.
So what she did, over a period of 25 years, was to become an expert on the snakes of New England. She traveled through the woods of southeastern Connecticut, crawling on her belly and getting extremely close to the reptiles, collecting 1,500 slides in the process.
Ed Ricciuti, author of "The Snake Almanac," said the self-taught Krulikowski knows more about snakes than many professionals. He noted that Krulikowski has fearlessly come within several feet of snakes in the wild, even bellying up nose-to-nose with the timber rattlesnake, one of two poisonous species in New England. The other is the copperhead.
"Some of those rattlesnake pictures - she crawls right up to them," Ricciuti said. "I wouldn't do that in a million years. She has found a real passion in life, and she wants the world to know about it."
Krulikowski has done just that in a 308-page book, "Snakes of New England," which includes about 300 of her color pictures, along with descriptions of the various kinds of snakes and their identifying characteristics.
She was raised in Meriden and Chester with a sister and four brothers, and hails from a long line of physicians. As a child, she recalled, her brothers would chase her with snakes and sometimes put one in her sleeping bag on camping trips.
That is where the fear began.
In 1982, her son, Ernie Jr., was playing in the Old Lyme woods with a friend, Steve Berube. They had been handling snakes, and Berube, 12, was bitten by a copperhead. He was treated and recovered quickly.
Berube, who still has a keen interest in snakes, then helped Krulikowski get over her fear of non-venomous species. He would show her how to hold them gently, and let them pass from one hand to the next. "I just kept bringing them over to her house," he said, "and she got used to them."
Berube helped Krulikowski get over her dread and start her travels into the woods with her camera. Berube and Krulikowski today share a common view of the snake, often seen as evil.
"I believe what people fear, they kill," Berube said. "What they can't understand, they want to kill. And I think that this goes well beyond snakes."
Folklore and mythology have treated snakes in different ways. In Krulikowski's words, it's a "mixed bag." There is the snake as a symbol of evil, and a contrasting view as a symbol of strength and healing powers.
Her book notes the biblical reference in which a serpent tricks Eve into eating fruit from the forbidden tree, and she persuades Adam to do the same. As written in the Book of Genesis, God placed a curse on the serpent, decreeing it must always crawl on its belly and be an enemy of humans.
Over time, other viewpoints have arisen. The snake was revered as a sign of independence and freedom on the flags of early American battleships.
Also, Krulikowski points out, the snake is depicted in many cultures as a benevolent creature capable of healing qualities. One of the most visible symbols of the snake's healing power is the physician's symbol, which depicts a staff with wings and a snake wrapped around it.
Like most other animals, she said, snakes attack only when threatened.
"The snake," she said, "is an innocent form of life which is part of the everyday plan of survival set down millions of years ago. In its natural habitat the snake does no harm to humans, and simply follows its natural instinct and its place on the food chain of survival."
Old Lyme woman conquers a phobia by becoming expert on snakes