Theft by Finding - David Sedaris

new colony of spiders on the living-room ceiling. Their webs are complex and sprawling, resembling
the new art museum in Milwaukee. There were four of them, and at around midnight they started going
crazy, leaping around for no reason. There was a lamp on the table beneath them and the light cast
their shadows huge upon the ceiling. I caught each of them a moth and then went to check on Clifton,
who was gone. His web is empty except for carcasses, and I’m wondering if he went off to mate.
July 11, 2002
La Bagotière
Hugh returned from Paris and I was delighted to see him. It’s scary here alone at night, frightening
the way it was when I was a child. In the first place, the house is crawling with creatures—insects,
rodents. There’s probably a snake curled up here somewhere. Then there’s the world outside
desperately trying to get in. Lie in bed alone and you can hear animals in the yard—something’s
outside the bedroom door, something’s overturning a trash can. Before going to bed on Tuesday night,
I made the mistake of reading. It’s the memoir of a forensic pathologist, so on top of everything else, I
thought of skeletal remains and the way coffin lining sometimes fuses to the bone. It occurred to me
that I’d maybe left the door of the milking chamber unlocked, but I was too frightened to get out of bed
and check. All in all, it was a terrible night’s sleep.
My fingertips are haunted by the feel of struggling flies. It’s like holding a living, determined raisin.
Coretta Scott’s web has gotten ragged and fragile. Prey no longer sticks. I keep thinking she’ll take up
repairs or maybe spin herself a new home, but no. Jerry, the spider in the window, is suffering a
similar fate. I threw in a fly and it struggled free. I threw it in again and again, eventually knocking it
unconscious. Then I thought, What am I doing? When it revived, I threw the fly to the new, enormous
spider on the living-room ceiling. He attacked immediately, no hesitation whatsoever, and I felt as
though I were rooting for the Nazis in a Holocaust movie. It’s easier with Hugh around, but when left
alone I feel I might be losing my mind. Let me catch just one more fly, I think. Just one more!
July 14, 2002
La Bagotière
A brown bird built a nest in the flower box outside Granny G.’s bedroom. She invited me up to see
the chicks, three tiny creatures resembling baby dinosaurs. They were asleep so she prodded them
with a sharp stick. “Here,” she said, “watch them move.” I’m planning to go over this afternoon with
some grubs and a set of tweezers.
Two of my newer spiders have died, but Coretta Scott just keeps on going. Her web is a mess of paint
chips and mosquito parts, yet she refuses to move. I’ve been feeding her for a week but can’t see that
she’s gotten any bigger. I’d kill for a good book about spiders.