When the stars align: An Eclipse Story

"OH MY GOSH!" I gasped, my throat stuck in my chest. I repeated this over and over. "HOLY...!!" When I wasn't spouting off expletives and repeating phrases out of utter shock and amazement during totality, I was trying to breath.
  I looked at the sun, then at my camera LCD display, back at the sun, then at my boys, then my wife, then back at the sun and the sky, then to the horizon. My breath was literally taken away.

Lets back up a bit. All my life, I have been interested in all things outer-space; the sun, the moon, the planets, the stars, etc. I have very early memories of watching partial solar eclipses, lunar eclipses, meteor showers, and even camping in the desert and staring at the sky, watching satellites slipping silently between the stars. I thank my dad for sparking my interests by always waking me up to see a lunar eclipse at night, or having a telescope set up to project a partial solar eclipse for us to watch. I have always been fascinated by this stuff and my fascination has grown over the years. Now, I seize every opportunity to share these things with my boys. If I have learned one thing in my 49-years, it is to not miss a chance to experience something unique. Regret is often the result of a failure to act.

  On May 20th of 2012, In Santa Rosa, we experienced a partial annular eclipse.

05.20.2012

A mere 4 hour drive, and I could have been right in the path of this eclipse. I was upset with myself that I didn't make the drive. As cool as it was in Santa Rosa, I wanted to see the full annular eclipse. In the days that followed, I did an internet search and found that we would experience a partial annular eclipse on October 23, 2014. This one was too far to travel to, to be on the direct path but as I explored further, I discovered the August 21st, 2017 Eclipse that would pass through Oregon. I vowed that we would not miss this one.

10.23.2014

After the 2014 partial Eclipse, I revisited the internet to find the exact path through Oregon in 2017. That is when I realized that the path of totality was going through Madras, Oregon...my wife's hometown. Come hell or high water, we would be in Madras on August 21st, 2017. When I began to announce to friends and relatives that we were coming up for this total eclipse in a few years, I think they all thought that I was a bit crazy.


Fast forward a few years to 2017.

Everything fell in to place for us and we even made  a few concessions to be in Madras for this opportunity of a lifetime. We had to take the boys out of school for 3 days, after only attending their 1st day the school year. I would rather they miss a few days of school than miss something like this.

The setting was perfect. We stayed at Melanie's grandfathers estate, on the outskirts of town. We spent a couple days leading up to the eclipse visiting with family and friends, hiking the property, riding bikes, and enjoying time together as a family. Our time at the house and property was of special significance to Melanie as she had lived here herself at different times while growing up, so for her, it always feels like coming home. For Apollo and Orion, they had so many questions about the house, the property, and their great grandparents. Apollo made a comment to me one evening, "I feel like Grandpa Joe wants us to be here." I felt that too, the very moment we stepped out of the truck.

I brought all the camera gear that I figured I would need to capture the eclipse. I set my camera up and tested the lenses and filters the day before.

We were ready. 

I woke up before the sun rose on that Monday morning. I checked my gear and then sat and watched the sun rise from the back deck of the house. Owls were hooting softly in the canyon, but beyond that, it was still and quiet. I was excited and couldn't wait for the eclipse to start. Three years of planning and waiting, and today was the day. After a morning hike with Orion, I set up my cameras, had a light breakfast and then we waited.

The eclipse began as all the others that I had seen. The sun was slowly being eaten away by an unseen moon. There were no surprises at first. Once the sun was 50% covered, the sky began to be noticeably darker. The temperature began to drop and a light breeze picked up. I expected all that. Apollo and Orion were playing around close by and came over to look at the camera screen and check in with me from time to time. Once it got past 75% and became much darker, the boys stood by me staring at the sun through eclipse glasses. And then it happened. The crescent of the sun became smaller and smaller...and then vanished. It was here, in this brief moment in time, that time froze. I expected everything to go dark and the sun to be basically gone from sight with only a faint glow left to outline the moon...that's not how it happened. I can't say for sure what happened in that fraction of a second but I can tell you that it was surreal and I can tell you how it felt. It was the twist in the plot, that unexpected twist in the story that changes everything. I saw, I felt, I experienced, and I was left speechless. The darkness came, but with it, I felt a rush of energy, maybe I even felt a gust of cool air, then a flash like a strobe light. As soon as the last sliver of sun vanished, a bright radiant ring of white fire appeared in the sky. My mouth fell open and I gasped loudly. It was like being awoken abruptly from an intense dream where in those first few moments you aren't sure if you are awake or asleep and you are completely disoriented.

I was utterly unprepared for what I saw and felt. It was sensory overload on a level I have never experienced. The reason I was so taken by surprise is that, I really didn't take the photos that I had seen from other total eclipses as being genuine. By which I mean, I assumed that they were heavily photoshopped or that they were captured by using specialized cameras that pick up light not visible to the naked eye. That coupled with the media's propensity to exaggerate things and the stage was set for me to be floored...and that is exactly what happened. As to the things that I felt, they may have been my own senses compensating for the shock and emotion of what I was seeing, or maybe it was all real and part of the eclipse experience. Either way, it was real to me.

Apollo and Orion were beside me during totality. I heard Apollo say, "Whoa! That's so cool!" While Orion was giggling and saying, "WHOA!" Melanie, came up behind me and pointed out that the stars were out. She asked me, "Can you believe how cool the pictures are that you are getting?" as we both looked at my LCD display. I am not sure if I answered her or not. I do remember her and Apollo laughing at me for repeating the same thing over and over; "OH MY GOSH, OH MY GOSH, OH MY GOSH!!"

I can say with certainty that this may be the coolest thing that I have ever seen. It is right up there with the birth of my children, my first skydive, the first time I experienced bioluminescence swimming in the ocean at night, or my first time coming face-to-face with a bat ray unexpectedly while snorkeling on Anacapa island at 12-years-old. Shock, awe, and loss of breath in that order, each and every time. The snorkeling one found me 15 feet underwater and seriously out of breath because I expelled all my air screaming when I saw a large mouth and wings coming right for me.  "AAAAAAAHHHHH!" Im not sure who was more frightened; me or that fish. I wanted to scream like that again. So impressed were we, that the boys and I are planning for the next one in the US in 2024.

The math, geometry, and science behind a total eclipse is astounding. The fact that it happened when and where it did, is a coincidence that I can't wrap my head around. Because I experienced it with Melanie, Apollo and Orion (and other family and friends), was a small miracle in itself. A miracle that can only happen when all the stars align.