Spider Eyes

I can't find the spider now. When I got out of the bathroom, it was gone. But for about an hour this morning, I lay in my bed and watched it on my bedroom ceiling.

I can't sleep past 7:00, but I've committed, for a time, to remaining in bed until 8:00 on Saturday mornings. There's a million things I could do. Many of them really need to be done -- the washing, a Christmas present that didn't wrapped and delivered, rousting my 14-year-old son for another crack at his undone homework, and on and on. But for a little while, between 7:00 and 8:00, I try not to do, as a sort of Sabbath discipline.

So, today, I just watched the spider. For a long time, it sat still, near the wall on my left. Then it started wandering along the wall moving in one general direction, but taking little diagonal left- and right-hand bunny trails, as if it was looking for something. What, I couldn't imagine. After a long while, the spider suddenly made a hard right turn and headed across the center of the ceiling -- crawling a ways, then stopping, doing a little slide to the left, to the right, then on again -- allllll thhhhheeeee waaaaaayyy to the other wall on my right.

I tried to imagine the spider's world. As I did so, my world inverted, and suddenly, I was on a vast, flat white expanse. In front of me nothing but what to me would look like two- or three-foot high bumps, likemoguls on a ski slope. As far as my spidery eyes could see, in every direction, nothing but bumpy road.

Back in my bed, I wondered if the spider is looking for something to eat. Somewhere, behind one of those bumps, some little bit of a fly or other miniscule bug-like breakfast tidbit might be cowering. Or maybe it's bored, and just looking for a change of scenery. But when the spider got all the way to the other wall, it stopped for a while, then made another right and started creeping along that wall. It continued its trek to the corner, then made another right and goes allllllll thhhhhheeeee waaaayyyyyy across to the other side. Then the spider abruptly struck out diagonally, and followed a rather erratic course across the middle again to the fourth wall across the way.

Well, you've seen it all, pal. Now what? I wondering if the spider's ... well, frustrated? Maybe looking for a way out?

I wondered if the spider could see me, with its little spider eyes, in my bed, watching and wondering. If only that spider knew what I know, I thought. In my head, I shout, Hey!! Look Up! All the cool stuff is up here!

Suddenly, the earth beneath my feet collapsed to nothing, and in a moment, I found myself in the deepest depths of the ocean of space. The universe lay before me, a stunningly, inconceivably vast expanse -- a glowing tapestry of stars and gaseous clouds and millions upon millions of galaxies. And the unseen Voice shouted, "Hey!! Look up ....'

And I began to pray, with fear and trembling -- hungry, desperately wanting a change of scenery, but most of all, holding on to my hope that there's really a Way Out, "Lord, I want to know what you know."