On Missing The Lunar Eclipse

The clearest barometer of how out-of-sync you are with nature is your track record of catching the “eclipses” that occur in your lifetime. I have a rotten record. You too? Missed it? Such an easy thing to catch. It wasn’t one of those crazy 3:00 am times. I heard the eclipse was stellar too. Not a cloud in the sky, and a crystal clear view.

You would think, someone as addicted to “sky” as I am, I wouldn’t want to miss it. (The last “summer sunset” at the lake.)

Sadly, I learned that the boys knew about it all along, in advance, and just “planned” to watch it on YouTube.  Which they did — and forgot to mention it to me.

Still, I should have been looking up. Remembering that the crazy constellations in the sky, are always there during the day.. just hidden by the light.

Each morning, when I drop by kids off at school I see this cornfield, smack dab in the middle of the city, overlooking The Ohio State University.

The University is under increasing pressure to turn this farmland into money-making real estate for the university — with a new “complex” of buildings. But Ohio State’s roots date back to its origin as an agriculture school, and this “farm” is part of the University’s teaching and research efforts. Every year, as land prices rise, it becomes increasingly difficult to justify keeping the space as farmland.

I failed to take a picture after the cornstalks turned golden, and then again when they were sheared, cut to the ground and the corn harvested.

And this morning? I saw cows, real live, cows, grazing along the cut stalks, with the sun rising in the background. You’ll just have to imagine it, because I didn’t want to risk getting rear-ended again as I stopped to take the photo.

Could that have been the very last time cows will grazed on sheared cornstalks? Will the field by gone by next near?

They say that lunar eclipses are “signs” of the coming Armageddon, or something else more sinister.

I agree… it is a sign. A bad sign. When we miss those stellar and lunar events, it’s a clear sign that we’re too busy looking down, and forgetting to look up, loosing touch with the earth, and our small, tiny significance in the whole scheme of things…