Superstition and symmetry prevent me from killing spiders. I like them, and respect their work. They weave webs. They catch bugs and eat them. And there is wonder in the symmetry of their bodies and the precision of their motions. Spiders carry theology and geometry.

Tuesday I came home to find a spider on the ledge of the beaded board in my lavatory. She looked as if she needed to go outside. So I grabbed two index cards from the stack that I bought at Dollar General in Staunton, Va. One card was to carry the spider, the other was to brush it away in case it got too close to my hand.

I did not need the second card. The spider crept onto the main one, and as I walked us to the door, dropped down by a thread. For 30 seconds, I had a spider on a leash. Something out of a book for children.

Angela Merici founded the Ursuline order at Brescia, a city east of Milan, in 1535, two years after the birth of........

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