The night before last I stood out in the parking lot of our apartment building and marveled at the moon: a total lunar eclipse. The temperatures were in the single digits, and dh Eddie went inside before it got to the totality stage, but I hung around until the eclipse was complete. It was beautiful!
I saw a total eclipse of the sun once, in Mexico City in 1991. It was so gorgeous it actually made me gasp. This lunar eclipse was much less flashy, but equally lovely in a low key, heartwarming sort of way. It made me reflect on how our ancestors must have felt about the heavenly bodies. They had no way of knowing, like we do today, that the moon is basically a big, floating rock. How mysterious and awe-inspiring it must have been to see round objects in the sky
I noticed that the moon looks quite two-dimensional to my naked eye, but seen through binoculars it is much more spherical -- and more real. How much closer can a pair of cheap binoculars actually get you to the moon? Not much -- and yet, even that small amount makes a big difference in perception. That was something I wasn't expecting at all
And the eclipse, like many natural events, made me think once again about the endlessness of God's imagination. Ladybugs and lilies, DNA and diamonds, chlorophyll and caverns and cats' whiskers ... and satellites that turn blood red when eclipsed by the earth; and to think we haven't even scratched the surface of what exists in the universe.
Wow.
God, you seriously rock!
[The following are some good photos of the eclipse I found on the web.]
I saw a total eclipse of the sun once, in Mexico City in 1991. It was so gorgeous it actually made me gasp. This lunar eclipse was much less flashy, but equally lovely in a low key, heartwarming sort of way. It made me reflect on how our ancestors must have felt about the heavenly bodies. They had no way of knowing, like we do today, that the moon is basically a big, floating rock. How mysterious and awe-inspiring it must have been to see round objects in the sky
I noticed that the moon looks quite two-dimensional to my naked eye, but seen through binoculars it is much more spherical -- and more real. How much closer can a pair of cheap binoculars actually get you to the moon? Not much -- and yet, even that small amount makes a big difference in perception. That was something I wasn't expecting at all
And the eclipse, like many natural events, made me think once again about the endlessness of God's imagination. Ladybugs and lilies, DNA and diamonds, chlorophyll and caverns and cats' whiskers ... and satellites that turn blood red when eclipsed by the earth; and to think we haven't even scratched the surface of what exists in the universe.
Wow.
God, you seriously rock!
[The following are some good photos of the eclipse I found on the web.]
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