The Lunar Eclipse is the unpopular sister of Solar Eclipses. They come around way too often like that one family member that doesn’t know how to go home. So naturally, I never sought them out, only crowding around with the masses during the more popular Solar Eclipses. But since I’ve been writing sci-fi again, I’ve fallen back into an old love of space. Consuming short stories on Clarkesworld. Getting updates on today’s space race on Space.com. And a lot of looking up at the sky at night trying to catch the ISS going by.
It’s funny, as we get older if an interest doesn’t make you money, we are encouraged to disregard hobbies and interest so easily. Leave it behind like bad relationships. But I used to love looking at the potential of what is beyond Earth. I even had a telescope I never learned to use correctly. But the desire was there. And when I did get creative enough to write, the content was based on different otherworldly scenarios. A hodgepodge of favorite stories from books, tv shows, and lived childhood experiences. And since picking back up my first love of writing, anything space related has been high on my radar.
Well at least I thought it was. Like I said, the lunar eclipse is the unpopular sister. Not a lot of coverage. You won’t see mention of “5 Ways to Enjoy the Lunar Eclipse” articles on every major news site for one of these. So it hadn’t crossed my radar. My mind was currently elsewhere in the galaxy focused on a short story I’m aiming for submission.
And I was going to continue that focus and sleep through this lunar eclipse. It would come back. I would catch another one.
My bladder had other plans.
I woke up to pee at 5:20am and as I was sighing relief I realized “I’m just in time for the Lunar Eclipse.” My bladder woke me up before the 6:15 alarm so naturally I thought this was a kismet moment and to take advantage. So I put on cold clothes and walked out the front door to a crisp Tuesday morning.
I saw nothing. Kezia and I went outside right before 12am to see if we could see anything. Once located in the sky, just over the skeletal fall treeline, we spotted the white, no different moon in the sky. We recently went to a cabin up in Asheboro and sat outside for hours looking up like tourist. Even from our light polluted front porch, we still marveled at how many stars we couldn’t see but knew were there. But the Moon was no different from that time, just minus a couple hundred stars.
This morning while going out, I tried to relocated the Moon. The chill of the morning was brightening. An early Fall morning in the Carolinas. Enough to wake you fully. When I couldn’t find the orb once visible just a few hours back, I was about to give up, excited about the “hour after an alarm” sleep that was going to hit just right. But then I saw it, through the branches of leafless trees, now below the treeline.
I walked down the sidewalk to get a better view, unobstructed by branches, light poles and roofs. The corner of a major intersection seems to be the best spot.As I got into a clear view, it was eerie seeing a very dear and needed celestial body of Earth cast in shadow.
Learning how the moon affects the waves of the ocean in elementary school, you come to think of it as being important. Being needed. And it’s now in shadow. I mean, anyone who can see the Moon at the time of a lunar eclipse sees this exact phenomenon, unlike with a solar eclipse, where you have to be in the right position on Earth to see those cool crescent moon shadows. Can you imagine the effects this would have instigated for humans of the past? From lore to possible terror, all inspired by this unknown occurrence that happened in the darkness of night.
But as I continued to look, trying to be inconspicuous and not seem like I’d slept walked out of my home, I became in awe of how weird this thing looked. Even though logically, I know Earth is casting its shadow onto the moon, for the moment, it is a floating orb in the sky. It could be the Moon or a spherical blimp, somehow making its way around the city. It appears closer, unnervingly so. Like a Death Star had been painted in realism on the night sky. The dark reds of the reflected sun fade into pale gray, light enough to make out the full circumference. It looked out of place, like someone putting toilet paper on the paper towel roll. You know something similar is supposed to be there, but this isn’t it.
The next Lunar eclipse will be 2025, a year and half from now. As I’m walking back to the front door, reflective of my short but mentally imprinted experience, I wonder about an alternate reality in which we celebrated the lunar eclipse like we would a New Years. We base so many life changes and goals on the popular opinion of what is considered a changing year. Sure we have seasons, but not all of humanity has four seasons. And sure New Years may coincide with some other celestial happening, but do you ever see it? Like having a physical representation of great transitioning that is always going to occur.
And knowing that this coordinated dance happens in the hostile environments of space is both mesmerizing and belittling. The human make up isn’t built for space. Even with the precautions and precisions taken to send people to the soon to be decommissioned ISS, it's still a gamble with the vacuum of space.
There is something, a release, an unboundness, about not being in control of something that ultimately runs your life, our lives. If Earth, Sun and the Moon had a meeting and decided they wouldn’t follow their spins and dips in space, we would all be fucked, and the universe would continue on. Planets have come and gone, and we would be no different if calamity not in our favor occurred. Because at the end of the day, it’s all calamity. One long, barely understood bundle of calamity and chaos that continues our existence on our water planet.
And as I stared up at this wondrous planetary dance, borne out of a cosmic explosion before time was time, I, like many humans, have the incurable condition of thinking of my own personal chaos. The uphill battle of writing consistently, not to mention for income. The societal pressures of obtaining traditional employment to be accepted. The changing of my queer body as I get older. It all creates mental chaos and doubting questions of abilities, time and resources.
But chaos created Earth. Chaos continues to sustain Earth. And from the chaos of space, Earth has maneuvered through the chaos, pulling what it needed into it’s preciously thin atmosphere and shielding away what needed to be kept in the cosmos. In this vast unknown of cataclysmic phenomena, Earth has found a way to not only sustain us in a physical sense, but continued to do so until we found, understood and sought to interpret its beauty as a way to protect it, whether it be through arts, science or simple discussion. We seek to encapsulate the experience in fear that it won’t happen again. And it may not. Even with our best efforts towards reversing climate change, we can’t stop the chaos of space. But somehow we live in this tenderly constructed bubble of protection, with a perfect view of the life sustaining tumult that happens around us.
And if sustainability can be found here on Earth in the middle of the cosmic shift of space, surely I and we can find life and sustainability in the chaos that is our lives. Hoping we all find it soon rather than later.
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