Spiders

Apologies for the delay in getting this posted - life's been pretty hectic of late and it's easy to let details like the blog slip a little.

More apologies to anybody out there who isn't a big fan of spiders. This post is all about them. One, in particular, that I found hunting in my kitchen a while back.

So without further ado:

I read somewhere that spiders don’t have muscles. They move around by alternately filling and emptying their legs with blood; extending and retracting each leg for maximum creepy effect.

Perhaps it’s symbolic that they locomote by pumping blood, because they seem so single-mindedly intent on draining blood. Friends, I witnessed a chilling spectacle the other day: A spider on the prowl.

The entire scene happened between my blinds and my window, and I watched from the outside. It was a beautiful Tennessee fall day, the air as clear as glass; the first of the yellow leaves drifting lazily down in the breeze. I was sitting out on the porch drinking my coffee, enjoying the morning, and I noticed that a fly had gotten trapped between my blinds and the window. It’s fascinating that the fly is so intent on flying through the glass that it never thinks to turn around and escape to relative freedom of the room on the other side of the blinds. I’ve found numerous flies lying dead on my windowsills because they spent their entire lives railing against the closed window.

But this fly faced far more terrifying dangers than starvation. I glanced back a moment later, and a new creature caught my eye: a spider, about the size of a fingernail, was sitting on the outside of the blinds. A wild thought crossed my mind: “she looks hungry.”

I’ve always felt beneficent towards spiders, because I appreciate the fact that they eat bugs I don’t like. So I leaned in closer to get a better look at the spider in my window. She was black, with faint orange pinstripes running down her legs. Elegant. And then she moved. Just a tiny turn, seemingly random – but then again. Again. It was as though she were tracking something with her body… I followed her line of sight, and there it was – plain as day – she was indeed hungry, and the trapped housefly was her intended prey.

My heart thumped a bit faster. Could it be? Could this spider seriously think she could catch an insect, almost her same size, that could fly? Insanity. But the longer I watched, the more I realized that she was deadly serious. Her patience was stunning. She would stay utterly still, silently waiting for the fly to approach, and then track it precisely with her body when it was close. If the fly didn't come close enough for a strike, the spider seemed perfectly content to wait for another chance, as though she knew the fly would not escape.

Every now and then the spider would change her location, trying to find a more advantageous position from which to pounce.

Then, suddenly, opportunity reared its head. The fly, blithely oblivious to its mortal danger, alighted a few inches from the spider, and the spider grasped at its chance. Unfortunately, the climax of the chase ended in failure for the spider… The fly proved too big for the spider to hold on to, and escaped its grasp after only a moment’s struggle.

I was disappointed with the spider’s loss of her prey, but there was little I could do for her. One thing’s certain: I’ll never take the apparent peace of my kitchen for granted again… who knows what horrific battles are being staged right beneath my nose?