Swingers...

 

A small, brown web-spinner swings ever so slightly on her trapeze, dangling in midair under my toothbrush holder, a resident there since we moved into this house, some 16 years ago. Today’s performer I assume to be a great, great, great of the one I spotted way back then. Still in the same place, swinging.

There’s a growing pile of tiny exoskeletons on the pink Formica surface beneath her…ant, silverfish, mosquito, gnat…all sucked dry like a flattened juice pack, but I still wanted to be assured that she was well fed.

Plugging in a night light adjacent to her trapeze did the trick. A beacon in the dark, it attracts the gnats and other miniscule, winged roast beef sandwiches and leg of lamb dinners she thrives on.

That was two weeks ago.

Now there are three little brown web-spinners hanging from the toothbrush holder, doing their ariel dances, trying to outperform each other, and only coming down from their high wires to suck on a still struggling juice pack or two.

In the morning, I check in, say “hello” to the girls, brush my teeth and leave, noting that as I turn off the bathroom light, the night light turns on simultaneously.  It becomes the marquee, for an all-night diner, illuminating a dark road, calling in weary travelers who don’t realize until it’s too late, that they themselves are what’s for dinner.