I did an entirely reasonable thing but followed through with (at least on my blog) nothing. Twelve days ago (holy crap has it been that long?) I rolled out for the eclipse.
I left the blog with a bunch of links to the 2017 eclipse and just… vamoosed. It’s good for the soul to bail out; maybe not always but perhaps periodically! Skip town! Hit the road Jack! It’s a thing I have to do once in a while simply to be me. While there are advantages to staying put, I still relish the simplicity of reducing your immediate life to the road and a vehicle.
It was a long trip. This eclipse’s path was far more inconvenient than the 2017 path.
But who am I to complain? The moon does what the moon does. Us monkeys beneath can observe or not. Which, it seems lots of people did: not observe I mean. I was there. All predictions of heavy traffic and unmanageable crowds were bullshit… as anyone who’s paid attention in the last few decades already knew. Here’s a video of the news leading up to a four minute dimming of the sun:
Don’t let it get to you! There is nothing the news can report without freaking out. Absolutely nothing! Trump tweets covfefe, two nations that have been at war since humans wrote on papyrus are pissed off at each other, it snows in the winter, it rains in the summer, it doesn’t rain in the summer, there’s a tornado in a trailer park, an old polar bear gets sick, a dude in a dress wants to take a shit in Target, Chick-Fil-A closes on Sunday, the DOW goes down, the DOW goes up… every fucking thing under the sun (including people looking at the sun) is discussed by hyperventilating dipsticks like it’s the end times. Is it not 24 years after we all died in Y2K? Why would anyone listen to any media about anything ever?
The fact that people (possibly spooked by the press) were reluctant to go is completely OK with me. As for myself I was all in. In 2017 I decided “I’ll see every total eclipse for which I have a shot”. I meant it and I did it.
The eclipse was just as awe inspiring as before. Also, it felt good to “do a thing”. There’s a goodness in pursuing an event totally beyond the realm of mankind. Nor was it without uncertainty. I spent umpteen zillion hours at the wheel wondering if I was heading for a cloudy disappointment. But I did it anyway.
Doubt is normal. Uncertainty and risk are part of God’s plan. But just plain wimping out is when you begin to die inside.
Suppose you drive there and it’s cloudy. So what? You tried. You were there; at the time, at the place. Through no fault of your own it didn’t happen. That’s just life. Life has disappointments. Clouds are not a flaw in yourself. To do naught, lest you fail, is the thing that’ll kill your heart. “I won’t ask that pretty girl to dance because she might turn me down.” “I won’t get a dog because it’s sad when they die.” “I won’t go look at the sky because it might be cloudy.” Our current society that can barely keep it’s pants on and therefore following their depressed sad-sack bullshit is just a way to become another NPC. I am not of that. You shouldn’t be either. They hate beauty, they hate joy, they hate love… in the end, they hate life itself. If you drive a thousand miles to look at a cloud, have a hearty laugh and continue being awesome! Never let them wear you down.
I did the thing. I didn’t watch it on TV or listen to talking heads freak out about traffic, I just went there. It was glorious and I came home fulfilled if somewhat exhausted from the long drive.
What better thing would I have done in those days? Surf the internet? Listen to America’s ongoing and slightly tamer version of Stalin’s show trials? Fret over war in the Mideast, a place that’s been at war or near war most of my life? Watch my driveway ice melt?
It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness. There’s no brighter candle that roaming great swaths of our huge nation just to get a peek under the Universe’s dress!
At the “zone of totality”… a bad ass phrase only eclipse viewers can use non-ironically, the sky was gloriously clear. The view was perfect. I saw, once again, something that can be experienced no other way. Here’s a hint, if you see an eclipse on TV you have not seen an eclipse, you’ve seen a 2 dimensional representation of it. The same could be said of sex or battle, watching is not being.
I’m covered for the next 20 years. Unless I get so rich off my squirrel book (which isn’t finished… damn it!) that I buy a Learjet, I’m not likely to see another eclipse for a very long time. Statically I might never see one. But I have seen two. Is that not a blessing?
So you’d think I’d get home, rest up, and then write my usual giant serialized wall of text about the thing. That was my plan. I just… didn’t. Maybe I will later, for now you were there or you weren’t.
However, something interesting happened right after I returned. I was at work and absolutely road weary when I got a text from Mrs. Curmudgeon. “So, you’re going camping this weekend?”
That was the furthest thing from my mind.
Mrs. Curmudgeon is a wise woman. I reflected on all those hours we’d sat in a car, blasting across time zones to and from the eclipse and I’d been chatting about camping non-stop. I pretty much couldn’t shut up about it. Clearly my subconscious knows I need “outdoor time” even if the rest of me is dumb as a post. I texted back. “Good idea!”
It was no longer the furthest thing from my mind.
Now, don’t get too excited. I didn’t do much. I was beat and on a short schedule. But I did make an awesome camp breakfast. So, in the next post, I’ll ignore the massive once in a lifetime (or in my case twice) celestial event and talk about my tame little overnight at a State Park.
