Totality
This week in Maine is the first week where it feels like hibernation season is coming to an end. I find myself wanting to rip off the sweatpants that I’ve been wearing since January. I’m craving to see my skin. To tan my toes. To shade my eyes.
For the past few weeks here, the topic of conversation has been centered around the eclipse. On dog walks, neighbors routinely asked each other about their plans and weighed the choice of staying in Portland to see it at 95% or driving north to experience totality. I have to thank all those people who expressed sincere excitement at the mere notion of watching the moon eclipse the sun, otherwise I wouldn’t have known that I, too, should have been planning to make a day of it. I mean, there are people who literally chase totality around the world, knowing that even a few minutes of feeling pure presence is worth a trek.
So, early Monday morning, on a perfect spring day with not a cloud in sight, T.J. and I headed north on what felt like a scavenger hunt of joy. Despite warnings of high traffic, the roads were pretty much clear. The longest line we found was waiting for the bathroom at a gas station, where I had a lovely conversation with a fellow Mainer who had a similar attitude as we did. “I wouldn’t travel out of state for it,” she said with such a smile that I could bottle it to share. "But, my son told me it is worth it, so we are going up to Rangely.”
The eclipse was not only marking a unique and unlikely astronomical event, but also a shifting season for us here in New England. If you live somewhere that’s dark and cold a lot, you’re probably familiar with this time of year when the weather turns and suddenly everyone is friendly. It’s when we all have our annual existential crisis, asking ourselves if we’ve unknowingly been depressed for the past six months. This day, April 8, 2024, was full of that energy. A woman outside of the gas station was so enthused by the warming sun that she yelled out to herself, Wow, it’s a nice day. She wore a t-shirt and had her arms raised as if to give praise to it all.
It’s for moments like this that I love living in a winter-centric place. Four times a year, we get to change. We change our style, our social energy, and our priorities. When we enter spring and get excited for summer, the season of shedding begins: we unbind ourselves from a certain set of needs and expectations that were nurtured in the winter months. It is a time of lightening our thoughts and loosening our bodies.
We had stopped at this specific gas station because friends of ours, who were headed to hike a mountain, had hidden some extra eclipse glasses there for us (a sign of how poorly we prepared for this cosmic event that other people spent years waiting for). From there we went further inland to a small town, called Kingfield, to meet other friends. T.J. and I drove along the backroads listening to a playlist dedicated to the eclipse, singing our little hearts out to all the classics one would expect: Total Eclipse of The Heart, Black Hole Sun, Rocket Man. With the windows down and the dog in the back, we sang out of tune and totally in harmony.
Once in Kingfield, the four of us friends found ourselves a little spot of grass by a playground behind a school. We laid out blankets and set up chairs and a hammock, and spent the next couple hours basking in the bright sun and eating snacks. It was the light we needed, amplified by the grounding force of togetherness that we all require. Time felt like a container that afternoon. We were patient and content in the presence of the growing number of strangers around us. It was quiet, as Mainers often are. A couple bouncing basketballs soundtracked a narrative of waiting.
It’s starting, one of us said around 2:20. Everyone put on their glasses and looked up. A little piece of the sun was gone. We took our glasses off and returned to conversation. How cool! I can’t wait. Every so often, one of us looked and told the others to check it out. Little by little, the round sun became a crescent. Is that a greenish color? That weird glow around it? Wow. How fucking cool!
Then, sometime a bit past three in the afternoon, the shadows became more interesting and the colors oddly vibrant. Then the air started to cool. We layered our winter attire on - sweater, then hat, and finally a thick jacket. The yellow and red and green of my friend’s clothing popped in a way that made me feel like I was high. Then the world turned sepia as everyone said it would. I felt a wave of god pass through, understanding how before science—or even with science—people might feel like the world was about to end. I certainly did. And weirdly, I felt like if all of it went away right now and this was goodbye, I’d be okay.
Then 95% became closer and closer to totality. The crescent of the sun slowly and miraculously disappeared, revealing the otherwise hidden corona. The spirit of light showed itself for those who were willing to look.
The sky turned dark and became reminiscent of the lingering minutes of a sunset. I wish I could have frozen that moment. Examined every detail. Heard every gasp. Seen every awestruck grandson and grandfather. Smelled the air, touched the trees and watched the wind flow through the flowers. I wish I had scanned the entire sky and seen it all. I wish I had hugged my friends and given T.J. a kiss. I wish I could have looked into the eyes of everyone I loved, past and present. To be in community this way—not because we were grieving a loss or reckoning with the past, but because we were celebrating our mere presence—is a place of being that I want to chase forever.
Some Music For Your Days:
Last fall, just a week before the war in the Middle East broke out, a friend in my meditation group introduced me to this song by Aly Halpert, a songwriter who describes herself as writing songs for “community, collective liberation, & visioning different worlds.” I’ve listened to it regularly since then and it’s helped me a lot. I’ve found it to be a meditation on some days, a lesson on others, and on those really tough days, an aspiration. The song is mostly a repeating set of words that read:
Loosen, loosen, baby
You don’t have to carry
The weight of the world in your muscles and bones
Let go, let go, let go
I leave it here as another contribution to the playlists that help soundtrack an eclipse.
Thank you for sharing this beautiful reflection on the season, the eclipse, and so much more. Your words have helped me experience a moment that I didn't witness directly --- but now I feel as if I participated too.