The Eclipse
A total lunar eclipse isn’t that uncommon, but it’s still an event worthy of notice and this one was especially pleasing in the night sky. Even if you’re not an astrologist it’s a time when one can’t help thinking about change, movement around us in the larger sense, and that sense of relief when the moon pops out again and all returns to normal.
Thirty odd years ago I arrived in Madagascar and that same night the moon went through an eclipse. Since local papers were all in Malgasche - if you could find one - this took me by surprise, and the huge orb glowed red, unspeakably large in the tropical night, making the occasional naked light bulb swinging over heaps of fruits at roadside stalls seem even more puny as a defense against Nature (with a capital N) all around me.
Whatever it is eclipses do they appeal to something primal within us and reconnect us (if we are willing to turn away from the TV set for a moment) to the vastness of what is. The ego has to take a back seat, perforce, and that is salutary. It would take an insensitive soul indeed to ignore it….
