I stood for a while and watched this garden orb weaver spider with their lunch. It occurred to me that my feelings for spiders have come a very, very long way.
Despite my love for Charlotte as a story character back in the day, I used to hate them, killing them on sight indoors, avoiding them wherever possible outdoors.
I think it was when I lived in Hawaii that this started to change. At least where I lived, prevalent would be an understatement to describe how many spiders were out and about.
I started to learn more about them, respect their web-weaving artistry, appreciate them for eating the mosquitos, and just generally like them a bit more.
I still have a bit of a curse under my breath when I walk into a web, and I don’t particularly want any crawling on me. But if I find the odd Huntsman indoors, I’ll gently scoop them up (in a container) and take them outdoors. And I’m fine with the house spiders that have their residence in the corners of the kitchen windows. They mean I don’t have to be too worried about leaving the door open for some lovely fresh air, and they get a nice fly lunch out of it once in a while. And the garden spiders of various varieties fascinate me.
From abhorrence to respect and admiration. Quite the journey. Is there anything in your life that has followed a similar path?
