Websters' World

An Essay by Stephen Geez
www.StephenGeez.com

Art by Dizzy

DizzyArt

Gossamer threads undulate languidly in the morning breeze.  Silken funnels crouch in shadowy afternoon corners.  Geometric constructs dreamcatch the inviting gaps in foliage, backlit by silver-gold bursts of setting sun.  Spiders lurk about, nature’s constructors transforming the world.

If you’re lucky enough to live where seasons proclaim their changes, you might recognize springtime by its burgeoning effusions of flora: trees budding, perennials sprouting, grasses greening.  Or maybe you note the songs: birds serenading, frogs counterpointing, crickets syncopating time.  Me, I’ve always looked for less-obvious signs, the commencement of building: cracks growing anthills, eaves sprouting birds’ nests, nooks and crannies boasting new spiderwebs.

Spiders know what they’re doing when it comes to harnessing the potential of their own unique thread-producing talent.  They cast like fly-fishermen, parachute their young, doggy-bag tonight’s snack, trap watery bubbles, and decorate from cityscape to countryside, inside and out.  I’ve even heard of one writing “SOME PIG” for its friend Wilbur, but that might be fiction.

Spiders are quite different from people.  They’re not meant to share our space, and generally not welcome in close quarters—except that we begrudge them our gardens to feast on bugs that would otherwise devour our food.

Confronted by a spider at close range, many people tend to react viscerally.  No wonder: spiders are hairy little critters that appear bigger than life.  They clearly pose a mortal threat, and often display the brand of malevolent intent found in serial killers—or worse.  Hence, spiders serve as ideal fodder for Halloween scare-fests, horror flicks, and the kinds of practical jokes that jokesters learn never to repeat.

Spiders have elicited worship, sacrifice, and more than a few myths and legends, some of which I brazenly co-opted to spin the tale in my novel The Fixer: Spider-Boxed.  I think there’s even a comic-book/movie hero having to do with super spidey powers.  Bad guys, beware!

Sure, some spiders can be poisonous, dangerously so, but those species are rare and few, and instances of people-gnawing tend to classify as spider self-defense.  Most of the bad rap for “spider bites” is unearned.  More often the culprit proves some other biter, or maybe even a scratch, any damage from subsequent infection by a bacterial strain, likely staph, possibly an antibiotic-resistant superbug known as MRSA.  For spiders wrongly accused, there is no Innocence Project to seek justice.

Actually, spiders really are quite vulnerable.  Except for a few notable exceptions, most appear very small.  None enjoy the hard-shell protection or vice-grip pincer defense of their crab cousins, or the poisonous slingblade whiptails of their other cousins, the scorpions.  Watch even a big spider tangle with a wasp; the sure money bet is backing that wiry combatant with a stinger in his tail.  Of course, a tarantula can shoot itchy hairs at you.  Big whoop.

I’ve always admired the spider’s ability to weave webs.  A great wonder of nature, spider silk embodies properties science and engineering are only beginning to understand and harness.  Still, the remarkable variety of webs produced by various species seem miraculous in themselves, testament to niche adaptation—not to mention a good way for the spider-wary to monitor the location of any eight-legged adversaries.

Okay, I admit it: I’m spider-averse, too.  As one known all my life for a fascination with—and propensity to handle—all manner of creatures, I harbor an uncharacteristically deep reluctance to share personal space with any spider of any size.

And I sure don’t want one on me.

My worst spider nightmare occurred decades ago in the Everglades.  Two friends and I crowded into a tiny, leaky, miserable excuse for a wooden skiff, its petulant 3-horsepower motor near-worthless even when it occasionally puttered along between stallings.  Miles into backwater swamps, we found ourselves in the dim wash-channels of thickening trees and brush while the purple sky darkened with great roiling storm-clouds.

We had ventured into the lair of Florida’s spider-beast, the great Golden Orb.

Yes, everywhere we looked, massive six- and eight- and ten-foot webs gated the escape routes.  Though photographically exquisite in their symmetry, up close in person they proved threateningly ominous.  Worse, their centers boasted monstrous black-and-gold spiders the size of a man’s finger-spread hand.

The boat motor chuckled a few times at our predicament, then sputtered and died.  Rick yanked feverishly on the cord while Scott and I worked against each other and the rising wind, churning muck with splintery wooden paddles.  Suddenly the motor caught a spark and roared to life.  We were saved!—except Rick hadn’t disengaged it, so the boat lurched forward, ramming us right through the brush and webs, leaving us lodged deep in one of Dante’s levels of arachnid hell.

Spiders rained down on us, flailing about the boat, crawling on our bodies, their silken strait-jackets wrapping us ever tighter—

Well, if you’ve ever unexpectedly walked your face through a web, you know the feeling.

Of course we eventually managed to escape unscathed, and now it all seems rather amusing.  I mean, what felt like an attack on us must have felt to them like our aggression.  We’d blundered our way into their homes and hunting grounds, destroying a day's web-work, costing them each an all-important chance to earn their sustenance.  I’m sure the spiders harbored no grudge, though.  They simply rebuilt, just as people do after catastrophes.

So next time you spot a chilly-morning web outlined by beads of glistening dewdrops, remember to think past the creepy-crawlies, and admire the sheer wonder of nature’s glory.

Spiders always find a way.  Spiders always find a place.

Maybe we’re not so different after all.

I’m admiring the work of a spider right now—but no, I don’t need to look closer, thank you very much.  I mean it.  Let’s not disturb the hairy littler critter . . .

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