Spiders are as unique and varied as humanity, if I may be so bold to say. Their behavior is more predictable, so with just a few close looks you can learn many things that will always be true. Spiders may surprise, but they never confuse. Spiders work quietly in the background, eating nastier insects, only ever intruding by accident. Spiders are misunderstood, solitary and elusive.
I could talk for hours about all their quirks.
Most of the time when I tell others about my love of spiders they ask “But why, Bri?”, or just “But why?” if they don’t know my name. This is a big test of patience—having to explain how, while people-gossip might be very juicy to them, the affairs of spiders have an impact on us all. So please have an open mind and give the critters a chance.
My absolute favorite is the jumping spider; there’s so many wicked facts about these little guys. Did you know they don’t hunt with webs? They have powerful rear legs that they use to, spoiler alert: jump on their prey. Talk about a big surprise!
Before I learned about web-less spiders I assumed that if a spider wasn’t in a web she was searching for a good web location that would catch a lot of bugs, like in the corner of the kitchen. Spiderwebs are everywhere after all: haunted houses, creepy caves, hanging between tree branches that are covered in dew. It’s a good lesson that you shouldn’t assume things about anybody, even if they are a spider.
You might say my interest in all this started with a bang. One night, I was watching TV when I had a weird feeling, like there was something near me I couldn’t see. This turned out to be my “spidey sense”, because when I turned my head I saw a Common House Spider had snuck up on the wall beside me, and was now only inches from my face, so close that all I could see were the little bumps and hairs on her two long front legs swiping the small space between us.
I screamed, ran to my room, and slammed the door. Grandpa came running after me and said a lot of things, but I didn’t hear him. After some time passed I came back to myself, and Grandpa was next to me in my bed, explaining that nearly all spiders in North America are harmless to humans. In fact, he told me exactly what I told just told you about spiders hunting down nasty pests. Grandpa knows that I need hard evidence, that way I don’t accidentally take him seriously when he’s being a jokester, so he pulled up an article from National Geographic on his phone. The text on his screen was so large I had to scroll for a long time, but it confirmed that Gramps was right.
That’s also when I first saw a picture of a jumping spider.
As you can tell, this was a turning point for me. This spunky little guy had two huge soulful eyes surrounded by two small soulful eyes, looking at me through the pixels on the phone with as much curiosity as I sent back. His expression was as clear as day to me.
It was a powerful moment that was spoiled a little when I learned that jumping spiders have four more eyes on the tops of their heads, so while they may seem keen to look you over they’re always multitasking. Like when Gramps is scrolling through news sites on his phone while I’m telling him lots of cool things about spiders. But even with only four of his eyes on me I felt more seen than ever in my life.
Armed with the knowledge of how great spiders are, my love for them blossomed as wide as the full moon. I thought my fear of them was gone forever, but my next encounter (with a Sac Spider) still gave me the ick. This mismatch of thought and feeling was like a splinter under my fingernail, so I took to the internet to learn why I was this way. To my surprise, this was an instance where I was absolutely perfectly in tune with societal expectations.
Humans have gotten pretty smart during the millions of years we’ve been around, but we weren’t always this way. Back then I would have hated spiders, because deep in the instinctual mind of Homo Eructus Bri was the knowledge that a tiny bite from the wrong spider could cause a real problem. Especially when your only medical care is to whack the bite with your club. That’s a joke. But still, Homo Erectus Bri wasn’t too bright so she couldn’t have understood that most spiders prefer to live in harmony with humanity, and don’t want to bite our greasy skin if they don’t have to.
As you can tell, spiders have not grown too smart for their own good. If they had, they would stay far away from humans because most of us SoS: Squish on Sight. Due to this, it is up to people such as you and me to speak for spiders, to get down on our knees and beg that everybody keeps them alive even though they’re so easy to squish. Killing a spider intruder takes so little effort that even smart people do it, all because of that instinctual fear I just told you about.
Jumping spiders are different though: they don’t trigger that fear in anyone. Isn’t that something! I’ve shown dozens of people pictures of jumping spiders, and not one of them screamed, unlike when I show them a picture of a Sierra Cacachilas Wandering Spider. After hours of research I failed to explain this phenomenon, so all I can give you is an educated guess.
Jumping spiders are small, fuzzy, have cute inky black eyes, and are clever. These characteristics are also found in house cats, which normal people also aren’t afraid of and therefore don’t SoS.
Also, like a cat, they are tough to find. On a good day you can sometimes catch one on the windowsill. When this happens it feels like I don’t have to breathe anymore. I get my nose right up to him, he stares up at me with half of his eyes, and we have a moment together where time doesn’t exist.
Grandpa says most people don’t think so much about spiders, but it’s ok that I do. He told me others might find it weird how I’m so charmed by them, because spiders are ‘creepy crawlies’, but anyone who’s worth their salt would appreciate all I’ve learned about spiders. They would find these facts interesting, and worth knowing themselves. They would listen because they want to.
As you can tell, Grandpa can be a pretty cool cat sometimes.
But he isn’t all sweetness and roses. One time I caught him doing something horrible. I’d been playing Garden Mech World: Complete all afternoon, like every Sunday. One by one, my online friends logged out, which meant one thing: Ding ding! Come and get or we’ll feed it to the dogs!
I don’t have a dog, and neither does Grandpa, but he still says this every time food is ready. I don’t understand why; but he says it so much that now I say it too, even when my cat Sprinkles is staring right at me with longing in her saucer eyes.
Sunday is leftover pizza day, which makes me feel on top of the world even though I had that uncomfortable rumbling in my stomach. I spun out of my computer chair, straightened my shoulders, and marched to the kitchen. I didn’t even take a second to look at the rows of photographs lining the hall like I usually do, there’s no time to look at pictures of Baby Bri and her progenitors when cold pizza is on the line!
Our kitchen is always spotless. I have no tolerance for anything being out of its place, and Gramps is mostly the same way. Did you catch the ‘mostly’? Sometimes he can be lazy, especially after eating when he’s liable to go straight to the armchair in front of the TV and leave his dishes just laying on the table. I used to clean up his mess, but this would always ruffle his feathers. You’re my granddaughter not my maid Brianna! He’d scold me like this, even though I was just helping out, which would make me really mad at him and turn into one of our big misunderstandings. He’s gotten better, but when he does forget I just leave the room and try not to think about it there, with food scrapes drying out, hardening onto the ceramic, as microscopic bugs that the spiders couldn’t catch start crawling all over it.
But don’t get the wrong idea buster! Besides the occasional plate Grandpa keeps everything clean. He even scrubs the walls when springtime rolls around.
“Spring is a time to refresh the body and mind,” he’d tell me while de-greasing the area around the stove.
“Take a bath then, Grandpa.”
This would make him talk forever about how a ‘dwelling’ is the house of the body, which in turn houses the mind, and to keep one fresh you must keep the other two fresh as well. It didn’t make any sense, and I wanted to talk about other things, and it ended up turning into another of our big misunderstandings.
So, I didn’t blink an eye when Gramps was standing on a chair in the kitchen with a paper towel. My quest for pizza was urgent, and I almost marched right by him before I remembered that it was winter. Spring wall cleaning wasn’t due to start for months.
I looked up at him, and Grandpa was already looking down at me. He had a weird expression on his face and was poorly hiding a paper towel behind his back. To make sense of what this all meant I examined the surroundings for context clues. That’s when I saw, up in the corner where the wall turns into the ceiling, a spider.
Not just any spider: a nice plump Daddy Long Legs, which isn’t its official name but is what people like to call it. I think it’s because everyone has a dad and most of them have long legs.
And that’s when I realized: Grandpa was going to SoS the Daddy Long Legs.
I don’t remember the next few minutes, which if you’re paying attention you know means I had a freakout, a meltdown, a ‘tough time’. When I started to come back I was sitting on the kitchen floor, Grandpa hovering above me but not touching. The paper towel was on the table. The spider hadn’t moved, like he was watching the show from the box seats instead of being the star.
I asked Grandpa why. His answer wasn’t very good, something about how killing spiders is something people do without thinking. I already knew this, but I never thought Grandpa was like every other person. I told him that Daddy Long Legs are harmless. Many people think they can’t bite but they can, they just don’t want to. In that way they’re even better than jumping spiders, who are too tiny to bite. Daddy Long Legs prefer to watch us from above, wondering how these giant mammals would survive without their tireless efforts hunting down pests.
Tears were running down my face, but I wasn’t shaking anymore, so Grandpa put his hand on the floor and slowly sat down next to me. As he came down his whole body cracked and groaned, and I told him he’d need a bath come spring to restore himself. He laughed at this, even though it wasn’t a joke, but I don’t think he thought it was funny anyway because he wasn’t smiling. He put his arm around me and rubbed my shoulder, which felt nice even though I’m an adult and don’t need to be comforted like a child.
We were silent for a while. I don’t think it was one of those awkward ones, because when Grandpa spoke again he told me he was sorry. He told me that he appreciated having me around, that he appreciated me. I asked why, since I make a lot of noise and have to do things in a particular way. I know I’m the cause of our misunderstandings.
He squeezed my shoulder and assured me that everyone has misunderstandings sometimes. Not just with others, with themselves. Without me here he wouldn’t learn or grow at all, and after a while he’d just be one big misunderstanding.
Grandpa is full of poetry, but this time was the best because I understood exactly what he meant. I gave him a hug, like you do in moments like this, and helped him off the floor with another round of cracks and groans. We grabbed a piece of paper from the printer, put it in front of the Daddy Long Legs, who decided he’d had enough of us and hopped aboard to be carried out to the wide-open world.