A spider without its web

I encounter this spider everyday. Sometimes in the morning, sometimes later, whenever I go for a shower. I see it in the bathtub, near the drain. It's not that it waits for me, because everyday it brushes with death. Everyday, I don't see it at first. Everyday, I turn on the tap and the spider starts to scurry away from the water and that's when I notice it. But after a few energetic steps the spider loses its strength and confidence and the flood threatens to overcome it.

That's when I step in. I offer it a safe passage using a tissue or a piece of paper. She climbs on board and gets a ride out of a life-threatening situation into the dry land of the bathroom floor. This happens everyday.

Philosopher Thomas Nagel writes,"What is it like to be a bat?" I say, what is it like to be a spider?

I don't know.

But this I know - a spider without it's web is a vulnerable creature. It allows me to play God or Nero.

In summer time, our house gets invaded by Argentine ants. There is massive retaliation against those hardworking creatures. How does it feel to wipe out thousands of members of a collective whose only crime is to seek food and water? Not very uplifting, I say.

But sometimes I would follow one enterprising ant and its thirst for life. An empathy would evolve. And I would grant him life and invariably this thought would arise: this is how a god must feel or better yet, this was how Emperor Nero might have felt!