The “Web of Life” means a great deal to me—that connection binding all beings together. We are all here. Living on a small bluish planet in one fantastic Petri dish called “Life on Earth”—we are here together. We share a common natural history. We coexist. And we are co-dependent.

Non-human animals have meant the most to me as I grew up. They are more beautiful than we are, I reasoned. They lead lives that are more consistent with balanced nature. And they are just so dog-gone interesting! They teach their young to be good practitioners of “Nature’s Balance”. If you study them for awhile, you notice that they freely share a lot of good examples. All you need to do is watch.

See the glory of a common garden spider! She is golden with earthy brown stripes and cheery yellow and auburn patterns—markings fit for royalty. How stately she stands her watches. Day after day through the long, hot summer, she builds and rebuilds her magic home. See how sedately and how steadfastly she mans her post—web center—by the fence, the garden gate and the garage—under the spreading willow and under eave and between the wall and the parked car, or before the window where you observe her silent sentinel while you wash dishes inside your kitchen. Watch her slowly grow into her magnificence. As the days are longer, hotter and drier, she thrives. These conditions, that send us thirstily seeking shade and cold lemonade, are the spider’s Elysian Fields, her Eden, and her comfort zone. And while we bemoan the summer flies and evening mosquitoes, she silently entraps them—as many as she can, in her beautiful web, she removes them from our nuisance. They make her fat. But she wears her girth well. She lithely glides along her strands, quick and powerful as a tigress. In her own way she has mastered our yards and flowerbeds. By autumn, she is bulbous, still regal in mien and powerfully effective at her trade.

As the sunshine brightens the abundant fall colors and the nights grow colder, our heroine arachnid enjoys the fruits of her summer-long labor. In her prime now, with her distinctive markings matching autumn’s glory in striking handsomeness—now she benefits us the most—taking the blue-bottle flies, the grasshoppers and the miller moths, she lords it over the winged pests that make us cringe. But her purpose has nothing to do with managing winged vermin for us. She has a higher purpose. She has motherhood on her mind!

Photo: A Top Quality Photo of a Garden Spider[1], found online at: http://www.copyright-free-photos.org.uk/spiders/01-garden-spider.htm

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