Along came a spider

There's a spider floating in mid-air above the desk.

It's not a very big spider. It looks like an red ant with a weirdly long extra front leg. The left one must have gotten torn off at some point, which gave me pause -- I knew it was a spider because it was hanging from the lamp, but I miscounted the legs at first and had to peer closely at the little fellow to make sure it wasn't one of those nasty six-legged critters I fear and despise.

I don't mind arachnids, but I do hate insects. I used to be afraid of spiders too, but one day in college, Mr. Rocks ("and-we-liked-'em!") was sitting on the floor when down came a spider, floating right above him. I was all like, "Ew, kill it," but Mr. Rocks just tapped the spider gently, making it frantically crawl up its invisible line to the ceiling. After a moment, the spider came down again in front of Mr. Rocks' face, and he tapped it again. Up, down, up, down. I always had a soft spot for our eight-legged friends, seeing as they kill and eat our six-legged non-friends, but from that day forth, I wasn't afraid of them either.

Unfortunately for this little guy, that doesn't mean I'm content to have a web stretching from the lamp on the left side of the desk to the computer monitor on the right. Out you go into the night, my friend. I think the eatin' might be better out there anyway.

Buddhists don't go as far as Jains, who not only don't eat meat, but also abstain from vegetables that must be uprooted (carrots, onions, potatoes), since "vegetables grown underground are the depository of countless of small creatures" and because "the uproot of such vegetables definitely results in the destruction of plants and trees." This a really fascinating concept -- see the explanation for why grains and rice are "fully non-injurious foods" and why the ideal fruit is that which has already fallen off the tree, on this page.

Now, where was I? Oh yes, the spider has been deposited outside by my dad, who tries to practice the Buddhist principle of avoiding harming living beings. (How many "-ing"s can YOU stack in row? Step right up!) This is often misinterpreted as support for vegetarianism -- Buddha himself was not vegetarian. He advised that meat should only be eaten when it was not seen, heard or suspected that the animal had been specifically killed for the monk's consumption. (Thanks, Anthony Flanagan!) Which poses an interesting dilemma in today's world of industrial slaughterhouses -- we've got no direct connection to the animal being killed, but in the end, the cow/pig/chicken/goat/duck/buffalo is getting killed for whoever buys it, right?

Hey, I eat meat. ("Bacon tastes goooood," etc.) But I also don't kill spiders. So there.