Tripping the Light Ecliptic

If you could choose to watch a once-in-a-lifetime total solar eclipse with a huge, diverse crowd or with just your best friend, which choice would feed your soul?

Mike and I (Marsha) found the answer for ourselves on August 21. We had arrived at the Hampton Plantation in South Carolina at 8 a.m. after a 4.5-hour drive. (Yes, we were crazy enough to get up at 3 a.m.!) We chatted throughout the morning with people from different states, ending up at a shady picnic table with a family from Apex, just 20 miles from our home. But as the time of the eclipse drew near and the mass exodus from the shade to the open fields began, we made a snap decision to head 200 yards down the plantation’s wooded trail toward a beautiful boardwalk out onto the South Santee River that we had discovered earlier.

Mike viewing the eclipse from a boardwalk on the South Santee River, South Carolina.

To our absolute delight, we spent the next 90 minutes totally on our own, with no other humans in sight. We spent the time alternately using our funny glasses to watch the moon eat the sun, and stripping them off so that we could focus on listening and looking at the incredible diversity of wildlife around us, from fiddler crabs to flycatchers. Our conversation was muted – mostly a theme and variation on “wow!” The bubbling clouds crowding the horizon conveniently kept their distance until just about 30 seconds before totality. That meant we didn’t see the sun’s corona. But as the eerie darkness gathered, our quiet conversation grew even more hushed. When the cicadas began their nighttime song in the mid-afternoon darkness, we simply smiled at each other. The stillness was profound.

As the light returned and the dawn chorus of birds sounded briefly, we found ourselves reluctant to leave our quiet corner of the world and venture back into the crowd. (And what a crowd it was:  the 36-mile drive back up the coast to our campground took several hours!)

As introverts – people who recharge in private rather than in public – we aren’t surprised by our experience. But the delight of viewing the eclipse on our own brought to the foreground an edge we have named for ourselves as we prepare for our time in New Zealand: navigating the borders between private and public life while serving as Friends in Residence in Auckland.

How do we find the sweet balancing spot between service to the community and time for recharging? How will serving as the managers of a bed and breakfast change our pattern of a quiet cup of tea to start the morning? How much truly private space and time will we discover we have? Where will we find the time and space to recharge as individuals as well as a couple?

We know won’t know the answers to these questions until after we arrive in New Zealand on Sept. 29. We expect to find surprises in the answers we discover and in the manner that we discover them. And we trust that learning where these edges are and how we respond to them is part of the awesome adventure we are embarking on.

And I also know that if anyone in New Zealand asks whether I’m an introvert or an extrovert, I have a great story to tell them!