Totality Experienced

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Three hours before totality, I already sense a deep pervading stillness as I prepare for the longed-for experience of totality which I first read about in Annie Dillard’s account in Teaching a Stone to Talk. Each of us has our unique experience. Here’s mine:

Just before leaving home, I notice the neighborhood fox bedding down in the tall grasses in our yard, the tips of her ears barely visible, then gone as she settles. On the five-minute walk to the greenbelt, we see neighbors in the street with their special glasses. Everyone is looking up. The weather forecast calls for mostly cloudy but there are periodic gaps in the clouds where the deep orange crescent is clear as a bell. Seeing it, I feel a quiet joy. We settle on our sitting rocks in the dry creek bed, along with a few other folks. Everyone is silent or talking softly. Birds continue to chirp. The trees stand by in witness—absolutely still, as still as the stones beneath us. Slowly the moon moves across the sun until, finally, only a tiny sliver of the sun remains visible.  I’m amazed that it is still fairly light. We hear ritual drumming in the distance. At 1:31 the sky darkens into dusk and at 1:35 it reaches its darkest point though still not completely dark, probably because the clouds are reflecting light. We barely breathe as the sun and the moon become one being. For almost two minutes, the birds stop chirping. A coyote howls once in the distance. Regretfully, the clouds have covered the corona and we experience no temperature change as was predicted.

Time is flying past. I was hoping to feel the timeless bliss a bit longer because a direct encounter with the mystery is such a rare and precious event. The silence. The stillness. It’s all going too quickly. I’m reminded of the early days of the pandemic when, after lockdown, the world turned still and quiet and we waited for our hearts to be forever changed. And in a way, they have been though the machinery of war and waste continues on.

But just as predicted, the moon begins to withdraw on schedule, and as the first tiny sliver of sun is revealed, the sky quickly brightens. My heart feels forlorn—torn from the darkness. For several minutes we sit in silence touched by the reverence induced by this remarkable cosmic event. As we walk on, I notice the morning primroses have turned their tiny faces to the sun, still unveiling, and the pollinators are working diligently to gather the sweetness of the moment. Perhaps our purpose in these cosmic events is simply to be present, to witness and, like the primroses, to gather the sweetness of our own brief moments and hold them close.

Paméla