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Webs and Memories
On Facebook this morning a friend posted a picture of a fantastic orb spider web on a bush; an amazing creation. It brought to mind a memory I’d long forgotten. I’m sure I have many of these forgotten memories. It’s such a joy when they are unexpectedly remembered, when something as ubiquitous as a picture of a spider’s web jolts a memory to life. I’m grateful when that happens.
When I was around 9 or 10, one summer evening my mom and I dragged the kitchen chairs out the door to the back porch. There we sat and watched a large spider weaving her web between the roof and the porch pillar. We ate popcorn and watched her late into the night until neither of us could stay awake. In the morning, we hurried back to the porch to see it finished. It was an amazing work of art. I put stakes all around with red bandannas and pieces of cloth tied to them so no one would accidentally walk into it. I wanted it to stay forever, it was so pretty.
I tried to draw its intricate pattern on paper. Mom said if I could draw it, she could put the transfer on a pillowcase and I could embroider it, then I could keep it forever. My memory lags there. I don’t recall the project getting that far, or what became of the web. But what I do remember is sitting beneath the starlit sky, past my bedtime, under the porch light, beside my mother, watching a miracle taking place. And forever after I would look for, and expect to see, the web on the porch. And my mother.