Total Eclipse 2017

The concept of a bucket list is foreign to me. It could be because I’m more of a home-body than others: I’m mostly happy to be by myself and to stay at home working on a distraction of some sort. Or, maybe I think experiences are relative and that a person doesn’t need to jump out of a plane to feel alive. Then again it could be that I’m just plain scared to do stuff. Regardless of the reason, I’ve never thought that there are specific things I need to do before I die.

That being said, if I had a bucket list, seeing a total solar eclipse with my own eyes would’ve been at or near the top of that list.

To keep a long story short (and I know it’s a long story because I already wrote it out in a draft)… (and because the eclipse was days ago and most people don’t care anymore), I’ll just say that astronomy has interested me since I was about 6 years old when my mother gave me a used, worn-out copy of “Stars: A Golden Nature Guide” that she bought for me at the Amherst Public Library. It was published in the 1950s and was comprised mostly of pictures and illustrations of constellations, planets, comets, cut-aways of the sun, etc. As you’d expect, much of the information was out-of-date if not proven to be flat-out wrong since its publication date, but it made no difference to me. It made me love being outside at night where I could try to find all the things I was reading about in that book. Star gazing was probably my first passion in life, and, while the possibilities of witnessing a meteor shower or a comet in the night sky were exciting ones, I knew that seeing a solar eclipse in the middle of the day had to be the coolest thing you could possibly see when it came to stuff like this.

Many years later, I gained a friend who not only shared a birthday with me, but also shared a similar love of astronomy. We took Mr. Lengyl’s astronomy class together at Marion L. Steele during our senior year and borrowed the large reflector telescopes that he built so we could see what we could see on the coldest of winter nights. It was in this class that he showed us the footage he took of the July 11, 1991 total eclipse off the coast of Mexico. While everyone got a kick out of his orgasmic reaction to totality, I was secretly jealous of him. It was also toward the end of that final year of high school that an annular eclipse passed overhead, which to me was a cosmic tease more than anything else. We all gathered outside during peak eclipse to watch twilight creep in but fade away just short of the ultimate view because the moon was just too far away. It was still an amazing thing to see, but definitely left me wanting.

While I’d like to say I remained obsessed with astronomy over my entire life, my passions have become many and I didn’t really know about the approaching eclipse in August until about six months ago. My friend from high school and I discussed meeting each other in Tennessee to see it together, but those plans fell through and I procrastinated about making arrangements for myself. Maybe it wasn’t meant to be, and, after all, there would be another eclipse in 2024 right here in NEO. Let’s just wait.

Then, about two weeks before the event, I found-out that another friend would be passing through Tennessee during the eclipse on his way back from a family reunion in Florida, and a mad dash to make it happen began. The first task was finding a place to stay, which was nearly impossible because every campground plot, hotel or motel room, bed and breakfast… you name it, two weeks before the eclipse was too late for a traditional solution like that. For some reason, I thought to check-out Airbnb and I found a brand-new listing for a room at $200 a night and I snatched it up. The next challenge was finding equipment to view it and I was able to find a 5-pack of solar eclipse glasses after days of waiting for a notification of new stock arriving somewhere. Finally, I managed to get the time off from work and that was that: I’m going to try to see a total eclipse!

I’m not going to get into the details of the event, but in summary: The Airbnb situation turned-out to be better than I thought it would be because the hosts were really laid-back and agreeable people. The sky was clear, though there were moments when an army of fluffy clouds threatened to obstruct our view, but they never did. My decision to haul all of my equipment to Tennessee was ultimately a good one because I managed to capture some nice memories despite not being able to by a $200 solar filter online.

Most important of all, the experience was everything that I thought it would be. It’s not hard to describe, but it’s absolutely something you have to experience yourself to fully appreciate. I don’t know if it’s “humbling” but the mountain of chance occurrences that all happened over the past few billions of years that allowed this event to even be possible… at the very least it makes you think and it makes your jaw drop and it makes you smile and laugh and shout. It was without a doubt the most extraordinary and beautiful spectacle of nature that I’ve ever seen with my own eyes. And I hope there are clear skies over NEO on April 8, 2024, so I can see another in my lifetime.