A Spidery Good Morning

It’s been a while since I made time for a morning walk. The sun is burning through the fog

I take a look at my backyard (you never know what you’ll see there any given moment: wild turkeys, deer, bears) and all looks peaceful

Trekking up the hill

The dogs start running along the fence below me, so I go to greet them and find this:

My dog Maya wants to be in the picture, too:

As I keep walking, my socks and sandals soaking wet from the dew on the grass, I see thousands of spider webs everywhere, on the ground, suspended between the tall grasses, and on tree branches. Did they all have a competition last night to see who could create the most beautiful web?

I don’t know spiders very well and I am too lazy to research them at the moment. But I was intrigued by the webs – some of them looked like tiny hammocks, others like that feathery thing you hit with a Badminton racket, a diamond necklace…

This one reminded me of uncountable galaxies in the universe:

And every once in a while, there was a true masterpiece:

Even if you hate spiders or scream and run out of the room every time you see one up on the ceiling, you have to admit: there is symmetry and artistic talent in a web like this. You don’t even have to get close enough to see the spider sucking the life out of its prey. The web is the spider’s calling card: craftily suspended, it captures the dew like so many sparkling diamonds. Spiders don’t go to architecture school but they know where to attach their main lines to give the web both strength and flexibility. And it has to be sticky enough to trap an unsuspecting insect (spiders have to eat, you know). And every once in a while, if you look really hard, in the right place, you come across a magical spiderweb like this:

Here are a few other spider(web) posts to enjoy:

Spider’s Web: A Dream Catcher Mandala

Sunday Post: Concept