Once Upon A Summer and a Spider
Once upon a summer, not long out of college and in a new job, Maddie rented a lovely little one bedroom apartment. It had a floor-to-ceiling sliding glass door that opened to a lovely little rectangle balcony. It had a black iron railing, waist-high, which extended the length of the balcony and was framed by creamy brick walls and a concrete floor–just enough space to dine surrounded by her dream for a lovely little garden, her own private oasis.
She added a bistro table and chair set, metal black to match the railing, and placed under it a bamboo mat. For her garden, she hung on the center of the railing a rather large long black rectangle window box. In it, her garden dream took shape in a riot of colorful flowers: pink and red geraniums, deep-yellow calibrachoas, one large blue-black salvia, pink trailing petunias and a chartreuse creeping Jenny. In one corner of the balcony, just behind the table and chair, she placed a large clay pot and planted in it her most precious (and pricy) gem: a dwarf weeping Ruby Falls redbud tree flowing with large heart-shaped leaves. She left the opposite corner without color, while she waited for an inspiration. Honey bees searched her garden window box for nectar; a particular hummingbird, iridescent green, made daily visits to the red geraniums daily; while titmouses and chickadees, and cardinals, even bluejays made quick rest stops on the railing. For Maddie, this was her secret garden–and it felt magical.
One morning, Maddie noticed in that vacant corner of the balcony a web with silk suspension strings randomly extending every which way. At first, she was annoyed but then became amused, even generous-hearted. She spied, in the corner of the web, a sandy colored very tiny spider. She decided to let it stay. After all, she thought, enjoying the outdoors and its natural beauty meant respecting and sharing it with all God’s wondrous creatures. “I’ll give you that little corner,” she said and named the spider Ms. Richards (Because Maddie had no idea of the spider’s gender.). And so went her summer morning routine: she would stand at the glass door, sip her first cup of coffee and watch for visitors; then step out into her garden balcony to weed and water the garden flower box, dust and trim the redbud leaves, always smiling with a kind of inner peace. Finally, she would sit down to a meditative breakfast, read or curiously watch for her neighbor, Ms. Richards.
After some time, Maddie began to notice tiny black specks on the concrete floor under the raggedy spun web. She mused, “What a chaotic mess.” She didn’t really care, at first. As days passed, a second slightly larger web was spun above the first one. The original web was deserted, like an abandoned house left shabby and dirty. She ignored it, sort of. But Maddie became concerned when a third web, which was even larger, appeared above the second one. Like the first web, the second one was also abandoned, but was left with pieces of insect wings and legs hanging from its dusty silky string rafters. The black speckles on the floor were also beginning to pile up. Maddie felt her lovely little garden oasis was being marred by this messy ungrateful growing arachnid, mocking her careful stewardship of nature, her tranquil garden oasis. She once shouted at Ms. Richards, "Clean up your filthy web-house mess!”
One lovely sunny summer morning things came to a head. Maddie opened the drapes to the balcony and saw Ms. Richards in its corner, spinning silk string around a screaming cricket (Or so Maddie imagined it screaming.). She could see its legs twitching and jerking to escape, screaming and screaming when Ms. Richards stung the cricket to paralyze it, all the while busily spinning and spinning it in silk, like a mummy. She watched the cricket make its last twitch.
Tears formed in her eyes. She thought to grab a broom and stop it, but being squeamish, she was never one to interfere with or even relocate crawling creatures–except if they trespassed in her apartment. As she was watching, she relived one night that a cricket got into her kitchen, behind the cooking stove, singing cricket sonnets and keeping her awake. It nearly drove her mad. She angrily got up to find and smash that annoying creature. She pulled the cooking stove away from the wall, climbed on top of the kitchen counter, leaned over the back of the stove so far that she nearly fell behind it, head first. Still, this very moment seeing that struggling creature trapped and dying, Maddie was struck with sadness for the cricket. She lamented that it would be dinner for Ms. Richards. Then she thought decidedly, it would be Ms. Richards’ last dinner.