I’ve always been afraid of spiders. An incident from many years ago is still bright and clear in my memory. A memory of my friend and I bouncing on a bed in Scotland, trying to jump high enough to smack the spider on the ceiling before it came to eat us in our sleep. Our attempt at spider homicide failed - miserably.
I truly hate to kill things, believing that an intelligence far greater than mine has placed every living being on this planet for a reason. Thus, it’s not up to me to remove those beings without just cause. My fear does not equal just cause.
So I decided that since fear is the result of ignorance, I would need to learn more about these little eight legged creatures that shared my home. When I moved from one place to another, I discovered that there had been a Black Widow living under my bed for probably a very long time. So, even the deadly Black Widow wouldn’t come eat me in my sleep. But she also had eaten something that WOULD cause me harm in my sleep - small, white scorpions that invaded our apartments every time the palm trees across the alley were trimmed. The floor was littered with their desiccated corpses,
Could it be that Black Widow’s were not the creatures of legend with dripping fangs ready to cause great harm to humans? Could it be that they might actually be beneficial?
With these questions on my mind, I left the Black Widow who made a corner of my utility room her home as winter began to approach to her own devices. That winter I noticed a marked decrease in other spiders, and the tiny moths that plagued us every year didn’t seem to make an appearance.
When spring came, I gently captured her in a glass and moved her outdoors. Apparently, she told her brethren about my shared living space, and every fall I get one, just one Black Widow coming inside to make a corner of a room their winter digs.
I began studying them, and noticed that their webwork was a total mess. I can understand why they kill their mates. I imagine the conversation probably goes something like this, “Honey, your housekeeping skills are the pits. Can’t you make this web a little more tidy?” to which she replies, “If you don’t like it I’ll just kill you and have you for dinner, you ungrateful wretch”.
This year my visitor made her web in a bathroom that allowed me to observe her antics very easily. That messy web? Wow is it efficient at catching those obnoxious tiny moths and teeny flies I didn’t even know I had! When something hits one of those strands, she is incredibly fast - motoring down the strands to the hapless victim and rendering it helpless.
She also is rather tidy, dropping the carcasses under the web after she has satisfied her hunger. That messy web is actually an engineering marvel.
I still have no idea what signal she sends out to other 8 legged creatures, but they steer clear of all the rooms around where she has set up her den. Some sort of invisible sign that only spiders can read must be plastered outside my walls. “Stay Away or Lose Your Life - This Space is MINE!”
She is very shy, and it has taken several weeks for her to not scurry rapidly into the far upper corner of her web when I’ve come in and turned on the bathroom light. I now leave a small light on in one corner of the room to attract her dinner to her web.
By not screaming and smacking her with my shoe, or a large hammer, I’ve grown to respect this little creature. Her efficiency is remarkable and her dedication to her job is exemplary. Most of the stories I’ve heard about her are just not really true. She isn’t the fang-dripping monster waiting in the dark to pounce on unsuspecting humans. Indeed, she’ll go through anything to get out of reach and is not aggressive to anything but those creatures that can be her dinner.
Because of her, I’m no longer afraid of spiders. I’ve even ordered this little guy to celebrate my new found knowledge and respect for arachnids.
