Saturday, June 30, 2007
| Our pet, Spindle... So, about 6 weeks ago I was watering our tomatoes when a large, black spider came out of our electrical box. She arranged herself in such a position, that I could clearly see the red hourglass shape on her belly. We have found dead black widows around our yard. We know they are there, but they do not tend to live in spaces that see a lot of use. I ran inside to get the phone. I call Q at work, " Hi. I just found an alive black widow. What do I do?" "Kill it," says my husband, who is 55 miles away in the central valley town of Lathrop (we call it La-throw-up.) "How?" I ask, in a seriously whiny voice. "Where is it?" I tell him the whole story and he suggests the vacuum cleaner, since she has gone back into her electrical box lair. I ask him to google "black widow" as I am on the phone with him staring at the elcetircal box. "Hhmmmm, no one has died of a black widow bite in the USA in the past ten years. They are nocturnal hunters. They are generally not aggressive." He went on with some more facts. I wondered what I should do. I was not willing to try the vacuum cleaner idea, so I let her be. Q came home from work, and since I was still wanting this black widow removed from our yard, he tried his vacuum cleaner trick. "I think I got her," he said half-heartedly. "How can you be sure?" "I cant," he shrugged. "Great! Just great," now I KNOW where a black widow is probably living in our yard. Granted, she is out of the way and not going to jump out at us ever, she is still there. Lurking in the electrical box, behind the tomatoes. My worm bin is back there. She is going to have babies. Days and then weeks go by. I have come to terms with her living there. I don't mind it anymore. I am acutely aware that I know where she is living, but it does not frighten or freak me out. Then, last weekend Q comes in to the kitchen with an old yogurt container asking me, "Is this your black widow?" There she was with her big, spindly legs and her red belly. "Yep, that's her," I answer slowly. I had not realised it, but I had accepted her as part of my life. Her poison and danger lurking in the corner, just a reminder. Q was going to squash her. "Wait! Not yet," I told him. I wanted to look at her. One night passed and the next day I put this ad on CRAIGSLIST: ---Please don't flag me. My situation is this:
Three messages came to me before my black widow post was flagged and removed from craigslist. They were three kind and supportive posts that I should not kill her. One guy suggested I put her in a glass jar into the garbage can. When she gets to the dump, large dozers will surely break the glass and she will be free in a place teaming with bugs. I like this one. One of the others suggested to let her go at the base of a tree thirty feet from my yard. And the last one suggested that we keep her for a pet. Sylvan named her Spindle. She is living in a quart size mason jar with small holes poked into the lid. We have been catching bugs for her to eat. Sylvan had already been quite a bug catcher and now he comes rushing into the house, "Mama! Mama. I caught a bug for Spindle." It is quite entertaining to watch her catch and wrap her prey. I always think of Frodo and Shelob. I heard Sylvan telling his friend about, "...our pet black widow, Spindle..." I laugehd out loud. We are not going to keep her forever. In fact, we are leaving on 7-7-07 and I suppose that is her release date, unless of course we decide to do the garbage thing. Then it will be this coming Wednesday, garbage day. For now, we will catch bugs with glee and feed them to Spindle. gk |
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