Speaking of Scary . . . this was the sight which greeted Kathy and I not long ago when we opened up the door to our side yard. Right in the doorway, spanning maybe the top third of it, was this amazing spider web, with its proud builder right in the middle of it. It would have been a downright beautiful sight if the spider in question hadn’t been as big as a hamster.
Most people who know us well are surely aware that Kathy and I do not exactly follow the textbook when it comes to male and female division of labor. For instance, I’m the one teaching music lessons in the studio while she’s out in the garage using the power tools. (The only power tool I know how to use is my metronome.) But when it comes to creepy crawlers, Kathy suddenly becomes one of those terrified female straight out of a 1950’s sitcom who leaps on to the nearest chair, holding up her skirt and screaming to be rescued ( especially when it comes to spiders and centipedes. ) Consequently, I’m forced to undergo a dramatic metamorphosis from Lover of Opera to Killer of Bugs. (I’m using the term “ bug “ loosely here- I’m well aware that neither a centipede nor a spider is properly referred to by that term. I guess I’m using the term to mean anything that you wouldn’t want to find crawling around in your shorts. I don’t care what genus or species or phylum it is – they’re all bugs.)
In this case, we felt like we had to get rid of this spider web because it was making it all but impossible for us to exit the house through this doorway – and we also didn’t want to completely freak out Vanessa, our houseguest, who would often be letting out the dogs in our absence. We had visions of her being carried off one night and never being heard from again ( trust me, this was a really, really big spider ). So I was charged with removing the web and making sure that the spider didn’t get into the house. And none of that proved to be especially easy. Tearing down the web itself was almost heartbreaking – it was so beautiful – and although I’d hoped to shoo the spider out into the yard, that proved to be impossible and I finally had to kill it by smashing it with a book. That was not a pretty sight at all, and the spine of the book looked for all the world like I’d smashed a tomato with it. (This is not an exaggeration at all.) And when for some crazy reason I decided to show the splattered book to my wife, she freaked out worse than when she first laid eyes on the spider. It wasn’t until that book was safely deposited into the garbage (and Kathy made certain that it went straight to one of the garbage bins in the garage) that we could declare our Spider Saga closed.
And yet, every time I open that door to our side yard, I think about that amazing spider web that used to be there – which is now gone without a trace. I think of the painstaking work it took for that spider to build it – and of how I destroyed it in a matter of a second or two. And somehow the words of Rodney King come to mind: why can’t we all just get along?
pictured: the spider web in question. I used flash, which is why the spider itself looks snowy white. In fact it was dark gray – and I could be wrong but I’m pretty sure it had a skull and crossbones on its posterior.