Spider Silk

Threads of life and love

A shopping list takes a creature of the forest down memory lane as she ticks off the items one by one. What would you add to the list?

The tail fur glistened in the morning sun as I brushed it, unsure who in the heap of kids the tail actually belonged to. Of course I didn't need to brush them anymore. I hadn't for years, but it was more ritual these days than necessity; a moment to spend with the children, whisker to whisker, at whisper distance from their pattering hearts. They were almost grown now. Many moons ago I had started every day detangling their floppy tails after having slept snugly together with the seven of them. They all bunked in their own nooks of the round den these days, with nobody to bother their slumbering whiskers.

After having gulped down the last of the morning dew I threaded a basket onto my tail, placed the shopping list underneath my acorn hat and scurried along the path downforest. The sun was already above Mossy Log. Spider webs were glistening in the blueberry bushes, as if the stars had cast silver blankets onto the understory to protect it from the dangers of the night. I stopped to check the blossom and slipped a flouncy flower into the basket for my father. Sweet Dad, how he had played with the littluns when they were smaller! Hopping across the brook from pebble to pebble, with the children bouncing behind him; tying catkins to their tails when they played squirrel; reading them stories by the hearth at nightfall, fourteen peppercorn eyes twinkling at him at the mere sound of his voice. Explaining to them the outlandish concepts of can openers and rubber duckies until they rolled around on the ground, delighting the forest with their pearl giggles. He was old now, slow and frail, his body failing him.

I unfolded the shopping list by Water Stride’s pool. Alder cones was at the top of the list. The night had been windy, so some of last year's dry ones should have fallen to the ground. I was right, heaps and heaps of cone clusters had dropped everywhere. "Don't pick the first, don't pick the last, don't pick more than you need and use everything you pick", I repeated to myself as I surveyed the ground to decide how much to take. I put three in the basket for kindling and set off again.

I stopped at Hazel's to check the list again: Sticks, bendy. I chewed off some slender ones – she wouldn't need them anyway – tied them into a roll with a piece of dry grass and slid the bundle onto my back. The den walls needed reinforcing, they had for a while now and the sticks would keep them upright for another season, at least until the kids left home to offer their marks in the world.

“Spider silk!”, I called out loud when I saw a web by the raspberry thicket. I had almost forgot. My father's socks had been mended over and over through the seasons and a new pair would keep his feet more comfortable. I found some cobwebs by the river and made sure they were abandoned before I carefully unraveled the thread. I desperately wanted the spider silk to have magic powers, to ease my father’s discomfort. I knew it wouldn’t, though. A fortnight ago, I had helped him put his socks on; slowly, lovingly. Those feet had taken him all over this forest and others many times over. Now they wouldn't serve him anymore, at least not in the way he wanted them to. Calves swollen and heels cracked; he ached everywhere. I had been utterly gentle not to cause him more pain, wrapping my warm hands around his calves, whispery soft, hoping he would sense my heartbeat through them. When both feet had been properly socked, I had looked up at him, overwhelmed by the love and sorrow in his eyes.

With a sigh in my soul and the glimmering skeins at the top of the basket I took the fast lane home, afternoon sun gilding the swaying grass tufts. Safe at home I took off my hat and watched the shopping list fall to the ground. I picked it up and raised my eyebrow at the last item on it; "RUBBER DUKIES (FOR GRNDPA)", it said, in block letters. Kids! Bless their tousled tails. I placed a couple of alder cones onto the hearth and watched them catch fire.