bark spider via https://spiderid.com

Millions, maybe even billions, of short, silvery strands of sheer light are strung and restrung across and among the many overlapping, intertwined branches of this tall thick fir tree, sun streaming through it all, as I look up from my perspective, swinging gently in a hammock (strung likewise, not between branches but between trees). I can see suddenly, everywhere above me, these innumerable tiny spider strands that are backlit by the sun and are swaying slightly in the soft breeze.

Who could image so much life, so much spider-spun magic, in one tree, everywhere, up and up and up, through the branches?  There is not a single web as we normally think of them; these are not cross-hatched. There is simply many, many, extraordinarily many, uncountable many, single silver strands, everywhere, shining, shining, millions of threads of light, over me, above me, sunlit, revealed now, only in this one transient backlit moment.  Incredible, almost voluptuous, is the immensity of this lit spider-made magic.

Last night Chris and I had, as usual, a campfire, and this morning early already there was a strand of spider web strung across the fire pit.

When I take a walk now, I take time to notice that every tree—really, every tree—has tiny spider webs all around and up the trunks themselves, tiny, sticky webs only inches long, covering and wrapping the tree in an incredible catchment system for small things.  And every little strand of web trembles in a slight breeze and shines in a bit of sunlight.

How amazing.  And how amazing that I am just now noticing, after all these years!

These tiny spiders are the busiest, most efficient, and most abundant of all the “medicine” I have been with this summer.  Life continues to astound.