There was a loud knock at my front door. Wondering if the doorbell was broken, I opened it to find a pizza delivery driver at the bottom of my steps. A quick glance to my right revealed the problem. Our resident orb weaver had attached one of her anchor threads to the edge of our doorbell. She was in the middle of her web, waiting motionless- about a foot from my elbow.

Him: You know we call this “The Spider House.”

Me: *Sigh* I know.

Him: My wife would not stand anywhere near that.

Me: She’s just trying to catch a bug. She would never hurt me.

Him: I know… but… I’ll just stay over here.

My husband suggested that we gently relocate our porch spider to a nearby bush. He has a point. Our packages are frequently left at the bottom of the steps and the milkman leaves the milk at the very edge of the porch. I’m not trying to be unwelcoming by leaving her. I just can’t bring myself to destroy her web.

She started out under one of our front bushes- but the day before hurricane Florence blew in, she moved onto the porch. I couldn’t deny a small creature shelter in a storm, so she stayed. I’ve enjoyed watching her ever since.

Each morning, she carefully replaces the spiral lines in her web, then adds a zig-zag of thicker webbing called a stabilimentum to the center. How anyone can see her as anything other than an amazing little tool-making artisan, is beyond my understanding.

All her diligent web building has paid off. She’s attached two carefully constructed egg sacs to our shutter. They will house her spiderlings until they hatch next year.

Our local pizza place is probably not wrong to call our home “the spider house” but I do not tell the drivers about the orb weaver in the wildflowers about four feet from where they are parked…

Or the one by our fence…

Or the two in our back windows…