Arachne was a weaver and a beautiful young girl who had the hubris to challenge the goddess Athena (Minerva) to a weaving competition. While Athena’s tapestry celebrated majesty of the gods and told her side of a long-standing dispute with Neptune, Arachne’s depicted the many times disguised gods had raped human women. This enraged Athena, who destroyed first the tapestry, and then Arachne, by striking her on the head. Crushed, Arachne tried to hang herself. The goddess saw this as brave, and her wrath gave way to a kind of pity as she transformed the girl into a spider.

2,500 years after the Athenian surrender to Sparta, we are still telling ourselves these stories of divine cruelty. If we do not believe the gods cannot be just or merciful, is there any hope for us mortals?

Arachne lost her mother at a young age, which must have been traumatizing. Perhaps she channeled her angst into her weaving, and that internal drive was what made her skilled enough to best a god. But Athena, who could have been a mother figure to this precocious and wounded creature, instead insisted that Arachne humble herself through worship. Arachne, deeply aware of the the abuses the gods had inflicted upon humans over the years, understandably refused. For that, of course, she was punished. So often, instead of coming together to protect each other, women compete with each other instead, and the consequences can be devastating.

My last name is Webb. I can relate to Arachne. If being young and beautiful and talented is not enough to protect you in this world, perhaps it is better to be a spider and be feared. Personally, at this point in my life, I would like to look just scary enough to be left alone.

I do remember being a hot young thing wearing fishnet stockings to the dance club. Miss October is that too. The spiderweb pattern on her legs recalls the days when she made herself appealing to the male gaze, when she wanted to be seen for her body, instead of what her body made. She holds a lace purse full of pearls, which are spider eggs. She will be a mother, much more tender and caring than the goddess Athena, as long as she isn’t taken from her daughter the way Arachne’s mother was taken from her.