This morning, after bringing breakfast upstairs to our guests, I noticed hundreds of spider webs in the grass. Timmy hasn't cut the grass for over three weeks. His right leg hurts (actually makes a grinding noise) so he has avoided this task, though he can go to the gym twice a day, for over four hours. Go figure. Anyway, I pointed out the webs to him. They are funnel webs, made by the funnel spider, and in the center, hiding in a hole is the spider waiting for a bug. Timmy then told me that one of his earliest memories of my grandmother is her swiping away at the spider webs in her hedges. He thought that very brave as his whole family seems to be afraid of spiders. But that made me forget spiders and think of those hedges.

They were high and surrounded her house at 28 Washington Avenue. So high that Poppy would stand on a step ladder, waving hedge cutters that were attached to a long extension cord. As Poppy cut the hedges, Grandma would pick them up and cart them away. I grew up in that house with the hedges and can remember trying to peek through them to watch passers-by.
A perfect safe playground for kids.

Mrs. Chase, the next door neighbor, did not have hedges, but an iron fence, but her yard was so grown in you could barely see the house. Next to her house, the Lotsko's had the same high hedge that Grandma had. My most vivid memory of that hedge is when Tommy Lake's grandfather dropped dead in them. I remember it was a while before his body was removed, and for a long time, whenever I passed those hedges, I saw the indentation of where his body had fallen. Today I would say quite a nice way to go. I also bet Poppy and Grandma were happy that the old man made it past their hedges safely.

So, that's how spiders got me to Grandma's hedges. I think Timmy might be cutting the grass today and there will be a lot of spiders out of work for a while.