Itsy Bitsy Spider....how I've learned to appreciate them

I've disliked spiders as far back as I can remember. That is, until fairly recently when I noticed myself becoming more tolerant and accepting of them. Whereas when I was younger, I often stepped on one simply out of fear, I now do my best to avoid hurting them. They are everywhere, it seems, doing what they are driven to do. I often find myself getting a piece of cardboard, scooping them and gently moving them outside the house if I find them indoors.

In the case of garden spiders, my acceptance has grown into downright admiration for them. I still don't want to touch them or pick them up, but I've gotten to where I now look forward to them each year as they create their webs in my backyard. There are certain plants they seem to like and I can always count on them to be there year after year. For the most part they are of a brown color such as the one in the photo. I have seen brilliant green and other colors but they don't seem to be as abundant and also seem to be in more secretive or hidden places. I keep hoping to find more of these so that I can capture them in a photo.

What's really interesting though is how some of them will also create webs in unlikely places, such as our recycle bin or green waste containers, also creating a problem in the process. We keep the containers near our old garage/storage room in the back. It's not unusual to get up one morning and see that the spider has created a brilliant huge web, overnight, and attached one end to the garbage container, the other to the wall of the garage. When it comes time for putting the containers outside, it really bothers me to have to detach the web from the container, basically destroying it in the process. You'd think the spiders would learn not to do the webs on the containers after I repeatedly damage their webs this way, but they are determined.

As soon as the container is returned to the backyard after the garbage day pickup, the same thing happens again: the next morning there is a brand new brilliant web attached to the container and the garage wall. I've tried moving the container further and further away from the garage wall, but it rarely deters the spider(s). They simply then connect one end of the web from one container to another container nearby. This is where my admiration for them grows more and more....the determination they have, simply to survive! There is beauty in that.