The Spider Dance

 

I noticed the spider's web just outside the door in the morning. Its owner, fat and snug, sat in the middle of its real estate; a grand creation of engineering; which swayed gently in the breeze. I'd have to move it out of the way, before I could go outside. I wouldn't want to forget and find such a beast in my hair.

It was the afternoon by the time I remembered that I hadn't fed the fish.

There are six of them left in the pond. The water is beautifully clear. Five are golden, but one has remained stubbornly black.

One of the eight that survived the winter disappeared during the spring, and the other, one of the smaller ones, died at the beginning of summer. I wondered if the heron had caught the former, and that perhaps a short-sighted, sex-crazed frog may have drowned the other.

In the spring the fish ate all the tadpoles. Perhaps that was why one of the fish was attacked in a revenge killing. If so, then the fish have some mysterious ally. This summer headless frogs have been left on the patio for me to step on. It's quite a mystery.

'Fish food costs as much as gold dust,' I mused as I slipped my feet into my garden shoes and then stepped outside.

Immediately, something sticky swept across my face. The web. 'At least the spider wasn't in it otherwise it would be in my hair,' I mused.

And that's when I saw it dangling from my left eyebrow.

The spider dance is a work of art.

You shake your head and scream. You bow to the ground, and made jitter-bug pawing motions with your hands. You step to the left and then to the right. Until your speechless neighbours applaud.

The spider ignoring all this calmly abseiled down to the ground and then scurried away, leaving me to wipe away remnants of its web.

At the pond the fish were at the surface, their mouths opening and closing, and I had the distinct feeling they were laughing.