In Homage

Yes, I'm somewhat afraid of spiders.

But, in general, I think they are beautiful and amazing creatures. And the Orb-Weaver spiders are my favorites.

I love to watch them quickly and deftly weave their intricate, circular webs. The speed with which they navigate the strands to thriftily wind up the evening's prey never fails to thrill me. Their bright-colored bodies and biological drive for order resonate with my soul. They are, to me, sisters of the night.

My latest beauty was residing happily near my back patio floodlights, a perfect choice for catching flying insects in her silken trap. Every evening for about a week I have watched in wonder as she built the day's web; every morning I awoke to find her handily tearing it down.

But this morning, I found last night's web still attached, with large holes in it and the anchor waving in the breeze. Though I thought it strange, it wasn't until this evening that I began to wonder what had happened to her - Orb Weavers rarely leave their web behind, even when they relocate. So I picked up my flashlight and looked for her.

And found her. Or, more accurately, what's left of her.

Above her beautifully and carefully wrought web of symetry, in an alcove of my patio overhang, is the tell-tale tangle of smelly, sticky spider-silk created only by the female Black Widow Spider. And stuck in the edge of that tangled nightmare is the shrunken, dead husk of my beautiful Orb Weaver.

First, out of respect and a strange sense of duty (funny how I would feel such emotion for a bright-colored spider that would inevitably give me a herkin' case of the heebie-jeebies if I found her on my body), I will tear down last night's now-tattered creation as she herself would have done. And then...

revenge.