I return
to the Spiders room and stand in the doorway to try and get some unpeopled
pictures of the sculptures. I’ve come to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
on a February Friday, dragging my friend along with me to see this exhibition
specifically. He’s off staring at neon light art, and I’ve wandered backwards.
Back to see again the one tall spider alone by the window, the cascading series
of five spiders in a line like an unusual version of Russian nesting dolls, the
ten-foot-tall spider just there, the spider the size of my mother’s cairn
terrier set on a round pedestal, and another one only slightly smaller than
that affixed to the wall.
“It’s
the stuff of nightmares,” a woman says, hovering at the edge of the entrance.
It
flashes through my mind to keep silent, but I can’t bite my tongue quickly
enough. “I love them,” I say, “I think they’re beautiful.” For they are with
their delicate legs and cocoon shaped bodies in their iron and steel casings. I
gush on with something like (but perhaps not as eloquently), “Bourgeois’s
mother was a tapestry weaver and Bourgeois wanted to show the spider as
something nurturing and loving, not simply as something to fear.” But by this
time, the woman has walked away. Fortunately for her, she knows how to get out
of being explained to. Afterall, she didn’t come to hear me give a lecture. Making
a face at myself, I shut my mouth and take a step into the room.
The
spider, for me, has become a symbol of freedom and of befriending fear. It’s
become the emblem of adventure. It’s a sign of my individual fortitude. The
spider reminds me to take the time to understand what I haven’t previously understood;
that which I’ve only reacted to and been afraid of. To see the beauty in what
isn’t commonly loved. To appreciate the life of all living creatures. It stands
for a lot.
My
nightmares are made up of other things.
And
yet, as I think about it actually happening like a movie in my mind, I do have
to admit if that spider on the wall came to life and started down toward me, I
might move pretty quickly in the other direction. Or if the pedestal spider
turned and came my way, I’d probably say something that my grandmother would be
shocked at hearing. Something that might rhyme with “spit.”
Once,
while sitting at my writing table in my apartment in the Scottish Borders, I
caught a movement out of the corner of my eye. A ghost. A visitor. Startled, for
I thought I was alone, I turned my head to see a giant wolf spider heading
toward my feet at something close to Mach speed. To be fair, it was only the
size of a half dollar coin. Even so, I said, “Oh spit,” and moved my feet up
off the floor.
After
that initial shock, and before I lost sight of it, I caught it and let it
outside. Yet, while having squelched my flight response, my adrenaline had
kicked in and I had to turn some circles before I could sit down and work
again.
So,
I get it. The stuff of nightmares.
Certainly,
it’s smart to have a healthy respect of spiders. We’re biologically conditioned
to avoid things that might kill us advertently or inadvertently. So, there’s
that.
But
it’s funny how we always assume the worst of things. It’s not as if the Scottish
spider running across the floor was out to get me. It probably didn’t even know
I was there. And, unless I suddenly had the extreme misfortune to find myself
in a horror flick, it’s not as if one of these steel or bronze spider statues—if
one came to life—would immediately attack.
I
like that Bourgeois rejected the traditional portrayal of the spider as evil.
Her spider is not the oozing, fat, sly demon of Tolkien’s world. It’s not the wicked,
opportunistic gang of spiders in one of the Harry Potter books. It’s not the red-faced
and fanged Empress of Racnoss from Doctor Who. It’s also not quite Charlotte of
Charlotte’s Web, but nevertheless, I like that Bourgeois called her 30-foot-high
version of the spider Maman. Mama.
I
like that I’ve seen one of the Mamans
in person.
I
guess in the end, the stuff of nightmares is subjective.
The day
after I write the previous sentence, at bedtime, I reach to turn out my lamp
when I see a good-sized wolf spider making its way up to the top of my yoga mat
which stands upright next to my bed, which is right next to my face (apparently,
I run across a fair number of wolf spiders. Or, more likely, I tend to call all
non-web making spiders wolf spiders. This might not be completely arachnidly accurate).
When I move the mat, the spider drops to the carpet and hastens in the opposite
direction, away from me. For a moment, I wonder if I can feel comfortable
sharing the room with it. With a sigh, I decide I cannot. I like spiders. When I
can see them. From a decent distance. Not in, not near my bed. We’re cool, but
not that cool.
Getting
up, I gaze down at the spider. It’s still in motion and I don’t have an appropriate
container near to hand. My tea cup still has both a smidgen of tea and a teabag
in the bottom and I don’t want to clean tea off the carpet or drench the spider.
I don’t want to go to the kitchen for a glass because then I might lose my new
friend altogether. What I do have is an empty Ziplock bag.
Carefully,
I manage to catch the spider in the bag without hurting it or myself. I slide a
piece of paper under the opening and cart us all off to the back door. Letting
it free into the night, I say, “Sorry to put you outside.” I go back to my room
and sleep the sleep of one with a clear conscience (or at the least with a room
cleared of known spiders).
Acknowledging
the contradiction between what I’m going to say next and the fact that I just
put a spider out alone into the dark, I like to imagine that if those Bourgeois
spiders came to life, they’d be my friends and I’d be their friends.
After
all, spiders are really good for the world. They help keep bug populations down
which diminishes disease-carrying pests and fosters a healthy ecosystem. Not
only that, but web-weaving spiders create astounding and intricate pieces of
art (albeit deadly ones for those aforementioned bug populations) and can be used
as examples of design mastery and patience, if one was inclined to use them
that way. As far as strange spider facts go: more than one spider has been sent
to space to see if web-weaving is possible in microgravity. As a matter of
fact, it is. That’s pretty cool. Also, back on Earth, jumping spiders have some
of the cutest little faces you’ll ever see. With over 35,000 species of spiders
(on Earth and in space), there’s a lot to appreciate. There’s a lot there to
love. More than statues, though there are those too.
When
it comes down to it, in reality, we humans pose a much greater danger to spiders
than they do to us. The truth as it stands now, for spiders, is that we are the
stuff of nightmares.
I’m
sure the museum-visiting lady is glad she got away from me when she did.
