The End Of A Season
Today, as I walked the same path along the kudzu behind the school that I always do on my lunch breaks, I noticed that there was a lot less going on than even just a few days ago. Scant, even, were the grasshoppers that usually flutter away in hoards at every footstep. Fall is approaching. The leaves are changing colors, and the temperature is gradually beginning to drop. The bugs and caterpillars that I have spent the summer admiring and photographing are getting ready for the next phase in their life, and for many, that means the end of their lives.
Indeed, many insects have extremely short lifespans. The fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) lives an average of 40 - 50 days under optimal conditions. Houseflies last between 15 - 30 days; but perhaps most fleeting of all is the mayfly. An adult mayfly may live anywhere from 30 minutes all the way up to a whole two days, depending on the species. We hear these facts and figures all the time, but that’s usually all that they remain - just facts and figures; but today was different for me. For some reason, as I walked along the edge of that thinning kudzu and noticed the lack of grasshoppers at my feet, I remembered the book "Charlotte’s Web". I probably watched the cartoon long before actually reading the book, but I recall being shocked and saddened when Charlotte died at the end. What kind of children’s story ends so unsettlingly? I had that same unsettled feeling again, today as the realization of life and consequent death hit hard. I’m not going to lie: it had me a little bit down. It’s hard to think about how the simple changing of seasons affects the countless lives of even the tiny bugs hidden in the kudzu without realizing the fragility of your own.
What’s It All For?
Some years ago, I read the book "A Purpose Driven Life" by Rick Warren. For me, one of the take-home messages of the book was that even the most insignificant of creatures among us has a purpose to fulfill. In nature, those purposes are usually pretty easy to pinpoint, and they are almost always bigger than the individual. Take the monarch butterfly for example. They leave their winter homes in Mexico and fly as far north as Canada just to find milkweed to lay their eggs on. In some cases, several generations of butterflies will live and die in the abundant fields of North America before the final eggs of summer hatch. Those late-summer butterflies will make their way back to the overwintering grounds of their ancestors, only to make the journey back north again at the end of winter.
Why do they do it?
Those same monarch butterflies possess a toxin that renders them unpalatable to most birds. The catch is that a bird has to eat a monarch in order to learn about it. My students would wonder “what good does it do if the butterfly had to die, anyway?*” What is the butterfly’s purpose?
A Selfless Mother
A couple of weeks ago, I noticed a spider that was trying to hide itself beside my front door. I recognized it as a species that I use to find as a kid. I gently wrangled it and took some pictures. Then, I transplanted it to the garden and released it on a tomato plant in hopes that it would build a giant orb web that I could come back and take pictures of later in the evening. She took right to her new home, finding a dead curled up oak leaf that had fallen and gotten itself lodged in the tomato vines. When I checked later in the evening, there was no orb web, but the spider was still hiding out in its leaf. I found her there for the next two days without ever seeing a web. Then, she was gone; but, in her place was an egg sac. Somehow, she knew her time was nearing an end, but she didn’t fight it. Instead, she accepted her fate and yielded to the next generation. That seems to be the way nature works. The purpose of the individual is the betterment of the whole. Sure, the individual monarch dies; but, in death, it ensures the survival of countless others. Even the simplest animals in nature are so comfortable in their role that they are willing to lay down their life for the survival of the species.
I remember something else about Charlotte’s Web; something that my childlike mind overlooked all of those years ago when Charlotte’s death marked the end of the story for me. It wasn’t just about a spider helping a pig; it was about a legacy left behind. Of course, Charlotte’s life made a difference in the world around her; but, even in death, she left a legacy behind. She didn’t just die. Much like the spider in my garden, she yielded her life to the next generation. As the story goes, Charlotte died of exhaustion after putting everything she had left into one last web. But, this web didn’t contain any words or catchy phrases. It was full of eggs. While those words and phrases will be remembered by all who saw them, those memories will pale in comparison to her greatest legacy. The story didn’t end with the death of a spider; it ended with the birth of hundreds of them; spiders that left their birthplace and spread throughout the countryside, carrying a part of Charlotte wherever their silk-woven parachutes would take them. I’m sure this realization was bittersweet for Wilbur. On the one hand, Charlotte’s legacy would be spread far and wide; on the other hand, he would be left with nothing more than his memories. But then, he heard three tiny voices! He would not be without a token of Charlotte’s friendship, after all. In fact, many generations thereafter would rise and fall with Wilbur there to teach them of their ancestor’s great kindness.
Thinking about all of this reminded me to go out to the garden and check in on the little egg sac tucked away in an oak leaf in my garden. Only, when I arrived home, the leaf had dislodged itself from the intertwined tomato vines, and the wind had taken it away to who knows where. At first, I was a little sad. Selfishly, I wanted all of those eggs to hatch out in my yard so that I could see the beautiful spiders that they would grow into. But, deep down I know that their legacy is to spread out far and wide to ensure the survival of their species. I can only hope that two or three will find their way back to my garden next spring.
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