What I Learned from the Eensie Weensie Spider

I am the person who mows the lawn in our family.  I love to mow the lawn.  It's so rewarding to see the before and after difference every time.  A few weeks ago I was mowing the lawn and I noticed occasional spider webs built right on top of the grass, something I had not really seen before.  I don't really like spiders so it was somewhat satisfying to mow over these spider webs and envision the spiders being sucked up into the lawn mower.  End of problem, or so I thought.  The next week when I got out the lawn mower and began mowing I noticed new spider webs right where the old ones had been.  Apparently I had not sucked up the spiders into the lawn mower after all.  Somehow those spiders had escaped my giant cutting and sucking machine.  The nursery rhyme I have known practically all my life popped in my head.

The eensie weensie spider climbed up the water spout,
Down came the rain and washed the spider out.
Up came the sun and dried up all the rain,
And the eensie weensie spider climbed up the spout again.

As I mowed I began to contemplate what the words to that nursery rhyme actually mean.  I realized that the rain did not kill the spider (just as my lawn mower had not sucked it up) and though it had probably had a very unpleasant experience being washing out by the rain, (or run over by the lawn mower) the spider did not give up.  Once the sun came back out (or the lawn mower passed by) that spider climbed back up the water spout to remake its web (or started a new web in the grass).  

I don't know how many times the eensie weensie spider got washed out, but I have mowed over those spiders in my grass quite a few times now and they just keep surviving and rebuilding their little webs.

The lesson that occurred to me from all of this is one of not giving up, but of persevering through unpleasant and possibly even traumatic experiences to rebuild what we have lost, start over, and keep going.  Though I am not thrilled at learning a life lesson from a spider, I must admit that they present a good example of what to do when the going gets tough.  I have a feeling that from now on every time I see a spider web I will be reminded that I must never give up, and when the rain in life falls, or I feel run over by a lawn mower, I need to just climb back up and keep going.