missed connection

A few minutes ago, I was lying in bed listening to a radio adaptation of James Blish’s Surface Tension*, when I noticed a small, rather quick spider moving across the ceiling.  I was reminded of a time a few months ago when Aida and Jen were visiting…we were lying in bed, watching a spider on the ceiling.  It suddenly began rapidly descending on a web, right for my head.  I barely avoided a head/spider collision.

As I was just now lying in bed, remembering my previous spider on the ceiling episode and watching this particular spider crawling from one spot to another, I realized it was coming closer and closer to a location directly above my head.  Two or three times it dropped down an inch or so on a strand of web, returning, after a short time dangling, to the ceiling.  After each descent, it repositioned itself closer to my head.  Then, when it was directly above my head, it began a quick fall, supported by its web.  I rolled out of bed, and it returned again, perhaps reluctantly, to the ceiling.  Now, as I write this, it is crawling away from the spot above the bed to some other part of the ceiling.

I think it wanted to make friends by dropping onto the surface of my eyeball, or exploring the depths of my cavernous maw.

I just looked for it again, and can’t find it on the ceiling.  Maybe it lowered itself down somewhere, offended that I didn’t remain lying on the bed, my forehead a beckoning landing-platform.

*I read Surface Tension a few years ago as part of a collection called The Seedling Stars, while visiting my family in Minnesota.  I liked it a lot, and thinking of it makes me think of my parents’ cabin and being there with family.  It’s a very good thing to feel.