Part 3: New Boarder

Welcome once again. I hope you are enjoying this wintry weekend. Unless of course you happen to be in the southern hemisphere, in which case I hope you are enjoying this summery day.

When last we met, Marvin had rather precociously invited himself into my pocket and, hence, my home. With no further preamble, we will begin the story from that fateful moment on the back porch.


Having a spider in my pocket was one thing. Bringing it into my home was quite another. And I hadn't even begun to process the issue of actually conversing with it. There were so many things wrong with this picture that I opted for complacence over incredulity. It was just easier to go with the flow. Thinking would come later, I hoped.

Still, the spider had a name, or so it claimed. It seemed only fair -and certainly more polite- to refer to the creature as "him" from here on out. Marvin. Okay. If he said so. Who was I to question what he had told me?

"You okay up there?" Marvin asked, peering at me from the edge of my shirt pocket.

I thought for a second before answering. "Well, if you consider that I have a spider in my pocket, one who is speaking to me no less, and that I'm actually replying to him and walking calmly into my home rather than flailing about and screaming as if I were on fire, then yes, I guess you could say I'm okay."

"What's to consider? Seems like a pretty normal situation to me." He smiled innocently.

"Well it would to you, wouldn't it? You're the spider. Do you think other people, seeing me in this situation, would find any of this normal?"

"Why not? Don't you people talk to each other or help each other out if one of you is in a jam?" He looked at me expectantly.

"That depends."

"On what? I don't see any reason for not being friendly. And I would certainly find it rude if I saw that someone was in need of help and was being ignored."

"It's more common than you might think."

"It's not!" he said, shocked.

"Yeah, it really is. And the more people there are, the more common it becomes. You see it all the time. Especially in cities. People just ignore each other. They even avoid each other."

"Then why do they live in cities at all if they don't want to be around other people?"

"Good question. I don't know. Maybe they like the conveniences of the city. Or maybe it's because of the culture that cities offer."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, people like to go to museums, see films, attend plays. In cities you have all these things together. It's like having a window on the world."

"Look, I'm just a spider, so maybe I'm missing something. You like museums, plays, and movies because...?"

"Because you get a mix of creativity and thought and culture from people from all over the planet. Art teaches us more about who we are, and it expresses thoughts and feelings. It makes us better people because it shows us ourselves, or it shows us others who may not be like us at all. So we learn more about beauty and sadness and joy and, well, all kinds of things. I think, in a way, it shows us essential things that we have in common as people."

"You know, you're really confusing me." His little spider brow wrinkled down the middle. "You ignore each other, you don't talk to each other, but you go to museums and theaters to find out about each other."

"Exactly." I stopped, wondering what I had just said. "No, not exactly. I'm not very good at explaining these things."

"I can see that."

"Well, at least we don't ignore each other as much in smaller towns. That's why I live here." I drew a semicircle in the air around me, pointing out the living room we now stood in. "Besides, you guys eat each other after sex," I said triumphantly. "At least the females do."

"That's a myth, wise ass. Only a few species do that, and not consistently either."

"I suppose it depends on your mood."

"I'm not having this conversation. Could you find me a matchbox or something? I could do with a rest, in a comfortable bed. It hasn't been a great day."

I took Marvin into the kitchen, set him down on the counter, and began to root through the drawers.

Part 2: The Plot Thickens

Hello again, dear reader. I would like to begin this installment by sharing a memo with you.

                    Dear Phillip,

                    I tried calling you a number of times over last weekend, but I was having

                    considerable difficulty pressing the keys and was unable to get through. 

                    Please return my android. I can't use this phone properly and you aren't on

                    speed dial. Apart from the obvious frustration it causes, the situation also

                    makes me feel somehow inadequate.

                    The intention of my aborted telephone call was to ask you what the hell is going on

                    with the blog. We had agreed that you were going to write one entry per

                    week, until my story has been told, or we reach the present, or our readers

                    get bored. Whichever comes first.

                    I fear that at this pace, it shall be the latter.

                    Please don't read into this. I have every confidence in you and I know in

                    my heart (yes, contrary to what you might think, spiders have hearts, too)

                    that you made the right choice when you agreed to help me, just as I made

                    the right choice by choosing you. You are, when all is said and done, my

                    oldest and dearest (human) friend.

                    So please get your ass in gear and right the damn blog entry.

                    Yours,

                    Marvin

This was on my desk this morning. I am not entirely sure how it got there, but naturally I have my suspicions. So I wish to extend my sincerest apologies to the reader. I have been lax in my duties.

When last I wrote, I had told you that I had found a spider in my bedroom and calmly removed it with a broom from the premises. Unfortunately it had escaped in a pile of dust between the boards of my back porch.

Having successfully evicted the little eight-legged fiend, I became somewhat emboldened by the experience and - closing the door to the porch firmly behind me so as not to let the creature back in - I ran back to the kitchen to grab a flashlight from under the sink. I marched confidently back to the porch door. I was surprised at how much my attitude had changed in such a short space of time. After years of being terrified, I was now ready to put those irrational fears behind me.

I knelt down on the porch and flicked on the flashlight, shining the beam between the slats. Eventually I found what I was looking for.

I almost felt sorry for it. "Poor little thing."

"I'm not a thing," said a tiny voice. Maybe it was my conscience. "Do you think you could give me a hand here?" said the voice again.

"Okay. Now I'm talking to myself," I said aloud.

"That may very well be the case, but I'm also talking to you." I jumped back and almost fell off the porch. A splinter slid smoothly through the fabric of my jeans and found a home in my left butt cheek. Just my luck.

Feeling a bit asinine, I looked left and right, scanning the neighboring yards, making sure nobody was watching me. The Goodmans' dog had stopped her frantic digging in the corner or their lawn and was looking at me inquisitively. Apart from that, it appeared I was not being observed.

"Go back to your digging, Princess." The dog cocked its head at me then abruptly turned, catching some interesting scent in the air. A moment later she was off in another part of the yard.

I must have dropped the flashlight. I picked it up and aimed it again at the spot where the spider had been. It was still there, slightly crumpled but apparently quite lucid.
"I'm sorry, but were you just speaking to me?" I asked, addressing the crack between the two-by-fours and praying that this conversation was not being recorded by some nosy neighborhood kid.

"Of course. Who did you think it was, the dog? I mean, really." The sound certainly seemed to be coming from the spider. "I should probably introduce myself. My name's Marvin."
Keeping my flashlight trained on the spot, I clearly saw the spider's mouth move.
"Okay, so what is it you want from me?"

"Well, for starters, it'd be great if you could help me out of here. Can't you see the state I'm in? And from where I'm sitting -if you can call this 'sitting'- I'd say you're pretty much responsible for my current predicament."

"Okay. I can accept that. But what exactly do you want me to do?" I was trying very hard not to focus on the fact that I was conversing with an arthropod.

"I'm going to walk you through this. Get that broom you so lovingly smashed me with earlier and bring it here. Shove it... No, on second thought, don't shove it. Gently press it down onto the porch so I can grab onto a bristle or two. Then lift me out of here and bring me inside."

"Bring you inside?"

"Do I stutter?" he replied irritably. "Look, could you please speed up the proceedings? I'd like to get out of here before the sun goes down."

I did as I was told. After all, who was I to argue with a talking spider? I grabbed the broom, pressed a corner of it firmly into the wood slats, and waited.

"Okay. Up we go."

I lifted the broom, much more carefully this time than in the bedroom. At first I didn't see the spider at all. Then I saw him,  hanging from the broom by a gossamer thread, about an inch after the last bristles had cleared the surface of the porch.

"Have you got pockets in that shirt?" he asked me, in a much kinder tone than he had used only a moment before.

I checked. "Yeah. One breast pocket." I was wearing a short sleeved, green cotton pullover. "I suppose I know why you're asking."

"It does look quite cozy." He smiled.

Somewhat incredulous of my own actions, I placed my hand under him. He dropped from the thread into my palm, and I moved my fingertips to the edge of the pocket so that he could crawl inside.

"You have no idea how much I appreciate this. Say, I know we got off to a bad start, but I think this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

And thus began my friendship with Marvin.


"Are you happy now that you got to write yourself into the story?"

"How exactly am I going to tell this story without writing myself into it?"

"Well, you could write about all my adventures, Phillip."

"You know I hate it when you call me Phillip. Please, just Phil. Besides, your adventure really starts with me, doesn't it?"

"I suppose so. It's just that I hate that incident with the broom."

"I've apologized for that so many times now, I've lost track. You're not going to make me feel guilty again, are you?"

"I suppose not. Sorry. It's just one of those memories. It's still painful. I was only trying to be friendly, and you..."

"Stop it, Marvin."

"Sorry."

Part 1: Preface - The spider's story and how it began

I have been commissioned by Mr. Marvin A. Spyder to write his blog entries. My identity is unimportant as I'm essentially a ghost writer for the spider in question and will not, as a rule, enter into the story he has asked me to tell.

Nevertheless, before I begin with his story, I would like to begin with a preface, as a means of orienting the reader as well as of putting my present situation into some sort of context. I also consider this exercise a warm-up, as I'm not sure exactly how to narrate this tale, though Mr. Spyder assures me that I'll do fine. I will let the reader decide for him- or herself.

Let me preface this preface by saying that this act is not a matter of my taking any artistic license other than that authorized by the arachnid in question. He is, to put it in his own words, "totally okay with it."

Before I agreed to write this blog, I asked Mr. Spyder...

     "Please call me Marvin if you're going to write this at all."

     "OK, Marvin. I'm still feeling my way through this."

     "That's fine. But just get on with it. Don't think. Write. The readers will be fine with it. Or they won't. But first we get the story out there, then we'll worry about publishing."

     "Um, Marvin, actually we are publishing, if you want to get technical."

     "Then tell them it's a work in progress. They'll get the idea. People are smarter than you think."

(Please excuse the apparent interruption, but I thought it easier to type our conversation as it was being played out rather than explain it all in narrative after the fact. I will henceforth refer to Mr. Spyder as Marvin, as he has requested. This is mostly because he has a strong aversion to titles, airs, or other affectations, but is also because he's paying me, so I'll do as he requests. He's not a tyrant at all, though. He's a really down to earth guy, or spider, or whatever. Sorry for digression. I believe I was in the middle of a sentence.)

So, before I agreed to write this blog, I asked Marvin if he would allow me to write this introduction. He not only agreed, he said that it was a necessary part of the story.

(Also, thanks to his rather timely interruption, I feel we've really broken the ice here, so now I am at liberty to express myself a little more colloquially. Sorry for all the artifice at the beginning. As I said, I really didn't know how to begin. Now that the creative juices are flowing, I guess we'll get right into the story.)

So the story begins like this:

One day - a Saturday morning, if I'm not mistaken, or maybe a Sunday - I was cleaning the house. Not the typical cleaning you usually do - vacuuming, mopping floors, Windex-ing the bathroom mirror - but "hidden dirt" cleaning. I was dusting all the shelves, moving furniture, cleaning behind the toilet bowl, and dusting the corners and the lampshades for cobwebs. If this is the sort of cleaning you usually do, congratulations. I, however, am a twenty-something bachelor, I live alone, and this sort of cleaning happens once or twice a year. Otherwise, I keep a clean house.

Anyway, I happened to be cleaning the night table by my bed. The lamp was dusty and somewhat cobwebby. So I gave it a good dusting off, and as I was doing so I saw something drop from the lamp to the floor behind the table. I lifted the night table and there it was: a fuzzy spider with long legs and what I thought was a rather belligerent expression.

Now I have never been a fan of spiders, so I did what any grown man would do.

I screamed. Then I set the table down as delicately as I could, given the circumstances.

I crept stealthily over to the broom I had left leaning against the bedroom door and returned just as silently back to my position by the bed. I moved the broom delicately between the night table and the wall. I took a long, slow, deep breath. Exhaled. And started stabbing wildly at the spot on the floor where the spider had fallen.

After a countless number of spastic thrusts with the broom, I dropped it altogether. It fell to the floor behind the table and stood upright, motionless, half propped against the wall. I stepped back and started to get down on my hands and knees to take a closer look. Thinking again, I quickly stood upright. What if it was waiting under the table, poised to climb up my nostril the first chance it got? Changing my strategy, I lifted the table - slowly, delicately - and moved it aside. Then I reached for the broom handle. Ever so lightly,  I lifted and pulled the broom away from the wall.

The spider was nowhere to be seen. It had either escaped or been crushed to a pulp.

I was hoping for the latter, but I feared the former.


A cursory inspection of the broom showed no signs of spider cadavers or other remains, but just to be safe, I walked down the hall, through the living room and the den, arriving at the back door that opened onto the porch, and all the while holding the broom at arm's length.

I opened the door, stuck out the broom, and shook vigorously. A dusty fallout drifted down from the bristles, accompanied by occasional clumps made of cat hair and whatever other detritus had accumulated under the furniture. They landed in a rough ellipse on the wooden slats of the back porch.

And one of them moved.

I raised the broom above my head, poised for attack. And the little bugger slipped through a crack between the wooden boards.

As my anger had gotten the better of my irrational fear, now I was out for blood, or whatever else filled that little carcass. I dropped to my knees and peered between the cracks.

Gone. Little bastard. But at least it was out of the house.

"I thought you said at the beginning that you weren't going to enter into the story."

"Well I can't very well tell this part of the story without entering into it, can I?"

"I suppose not. But then where does that leave the rest of the story?"

"Do you think we could discuss this later? I'd like to post the preface."

"Fine. But this isn't the end of the conversation. Just so we're clear."

"I promise not to get too involved in the story."

"Right. We'll see."