“True awe, a sense of wonder and insignificance, in the face of something enormous and grand, is rare in our lives.” – TED
The eclipse turned out to be a profound experience. More profound than I had anticipated. When we hit totality, there was a brief applause and cheers from the couple tens of people on “our” field. Followed by ohs and ahs. I felt positively emotional and inspired. Coupled with the paleontology center the day before, it does make one marvel at the universe. In the grand scheme of things, we are blessed with so little time, that we should reflect on our purpose, as well as our insignificance. Even my 5 year old crawled onto my lap saying “omg, I want to cry happy tears”. In the end, what difference do our lives make? I believe the one significant impact we have is by deeply and truthfully connecting with each other and our planet. Then how come mankind has so much drive to conquer? How come we witness so much intolerance and hatred? History teaches us that we can not hold on to what was or has been; that there is no such thing as one universal truth. Our only constant is ever evolving change.
It is eerie to feel the temperature dropping, the sky darkening, stars emerging, shadows rolling over … until finally the sun’s light is completely blocked by the moon for all in all 2 very short yet very long minutes. To me, the emerging of the diamond ring was the most spectacular of it all. Folks around us happily waved goodbye as everyone packed up – one fun, flowery lady commented “there was my life before, and after, the eclipse”.
We managed to make a couple fantastic pictures, thanks to Steven’s foresight. A simple thin-foil like filter, attached to our camera with kitchen rubber bands did the trick.
Time for us to hit the road to Canada. We have a couple heavy driving days ahead of us, but we are in good spirits. How could we not be, after this?
