Blue Moon, Now I'm No Longer Alone
This morning saw the lunar eclipse, my wife reminding me at 4:30 AM (I was already awake) that the event was appearing now and not tomorrow as I had thought. At that time, the moon was already 7/8 covered, a sliver of light at the bottom, one which moved over slowly and steadily into darkness...only that didn't happen. Twenty minutes later the light was gone but a tint began to show...the blood moon. It was as if an old-time camera man was sliding a disc over the moon and was now reversing the process with a maroon reddish filter slowly coming up from the bottom. There it is, I told my wife, totality. She peeked out from her bed, then sat up and came to the window; it looks like Mars, she said. The moon showed a sliver of red, then more, then more until it was halfway up, and then it stopped. It was time for darkness to take over.
This was an exercise in patience, not the quick solar event that stretched out to an exceedingly long two minutes. For the moon, now an hour later, it was still hidden in the night sky. Looking up now you'd be hard pressed to even find its outline. For all intents an purposes, the moon had been swallowed by the night. The moon hid in the darkness. My wife fell back asleep, only to awaken with a puzzled look and ask, where is it? The moon lay hidden, the sky now completely dark as if there was never any moon at all. Soon the sun will peek over the top, I told her, but even I was starting to have my doubts. Thirty minutes had passed and I could only imagine how large our earth must be to be still blocking out the sun, to keep it at bay while the moon had its own extended show. Another fifteen minutes and I was out the door for some coffee. It was still dark and if my luck held I would be able to walk over the parkway, grab a quick cup and be out in time to catch the moon's last encore. But alas it would not be so; the sun was too strong and within what seemed like minutes, the sky had changed and with it, the moon. Like being caught naked, the moon had run away with the coming of light, now not visible anywhere in the sky and the sun was brightening up its intensity...daylight had arrived.
We were back in Vegas, our first escape of sorts, a chance to forget what "was" for a day or two before returning home to the real world, one where people were calling me an orphan albeit with the best of intentions (our earlier getaway to here, one meant to surprise my brother for his birthday, had to be cancelled due to my wife's mother being rushed to the emergency room). So now we were back in Las Vegas, although it all seemed a bit hollow; no longer were our relatives here, my aunt and our moms regularly rendezvousing with us in this city, their own chance to escape and press their luck and break normal eating patterns, all guilt-free even as we all knew that we would be going back home some $100 poorer (none of my family are big spenders, content to play penny machines and grumbling when our $5 vanishes within a few minutes). But despite all of our and their ages, the laughs were as regular as the full bellys, our catch-up conversations peppered together with tales of wins and losses, our intentions to stay and chat mixed equally with our desire to return to the flurry of lights and sounds that were once again tempting us. It was all as unreal as the video "reels" that moved before our eyes, a visual trick that satiated our desire for the old now interlaced with the new. And here we were again, my wife and I hiding our desire for the same thing, the old almost frustratingly being nudged out by the new. But this time our luck was with us, not on the casino floors or from the garlicky odors hitting our noses, but from the window of our room high on the 18th floor, an unobstructed view westward giving us the greatest jackpot we could have hoped for on this trip, a true window seat to something 150 years old and yet still as young as ever...the moon shedding its skin.
A few nights back I had a dream, one of those dreams where a song suddenly appears and seems as natural and familiar as when you're awake. It came out of the blue and of all things, was being sung by a young Paul McCartney, a Beatles'-sounding tune titled Baby Tears. I'd never heard it before, even in my dream world, and yet it was as recognizable as any other Beatles song. I just listened, even playing it over again in my head when it was over, as if I knew that the haze was lifting and soon it would be evident that the worlds were separating and my dream world would begin fading as quickly as steam hitting the sky. And yet the song was so distinctive, so easily hummed, so easy to recall...and of course, it was gone. I couldn't help but think of that dream (in real life Paul McCartney told of the song Yesterday coming to him in much the same fashion, complete and so finished in both words and music that he asked a variety of people where they had heard the song before; of course no one had, only Paul, who remembered it in its entirety and the rest is history). For me, there would only be "baby tears," as the song and its melody faded away with my eyes opening. But I remember that the words had nothing to do with a baby, the chorus being one of tears trying to fall, tears that should fall and yet, there were only small traces, little inkling of eyes becoming watery...baby tears.
From our room, when the moon was full and slowly being concealed by the earth's shadow, I kept looking out to the freeway in the distance, the lights of the cars and trucks moving by at a steady pace like blood cells in a body, oblivious to what was happening, there just to do their job and get to where they needed to be. That world outside didn't matter, any more than it did to someone fast asleep or someone or something who didn't care...like the moon. It was always there and always would be, at least to us. But in that long period of darkness, that magic act of disappearing both in the dark and the night, I would learn that nothing is here for always, that perhaps this was meant for me to be seen at this point in my life, to realize that there is much that I take for granted, from the ease of an elevator taking me up 18 stories to the jet that got me here, from the friends and family who have taken he time to write or stay in touch, from the animals who patiently wait for a walk or a bit of attention, from my wife who would love me to sleep in instead of getting up so darn early, even for me who lives a life relatively pain-free and carefree. I've been very fortunate and yes, naive in expecting little to change, just as I felt with my mother, even as she turned 92. Tomorrow would be another day and like the moon it would be full or new or a sliver but it would be there. Little did I realize that one day I would just step out for something as simple as a cup of coffee, just for a short time, and find that all of it had vanished.
This was an exercise in patience, not the quick solar event that stretched out to an exceedingly long two minutes. For the moon, now an hour later, it was still hidden in the night sky. Looking up now you'd be hard pressed to even find its outline. For all intents an purposes, the moon had been swallowed by the night. The moon hid in the darkness. My wife fell back asleep, only to awaken with a puzzled look and ask, where is it? The moon lay hidden, the sky now completely dark as if there was never any moon at all. Soon the sun will peek over the top, I told her, but even I was starting to have my doubts. Thirty minutes had passed and I could only imagine how large our earth must be to be still blocking out the sun, to keep it at bay while the moon had its own extended show. Another fifteen minutes and I was out the door for some coffee. It was still dark and if my luck held I would be able to walk over the parkway, grab a quick cup and be out in time to catch the moon's last encore. But alas it would not be so; the sun was too strong and within what seemed like minutes, the sky had changed and with it, the moon. Like being caught naked, the moon had run away with the coming of light, now not visible anywhere in the sky and the sun was brightening up its intensity...daylight had arrived.
We were back in Vegas, our first escape of sorts, a chance to forget what "was" for a day or two before returning home to the real world, one where people were calling me an orphan albeit with the best of intentions (our earlier getaway to here, one meant to surprise my brother for his birthday, had to be cancelled due to my wife's mother being rushed to the emergency room). So now we were back in Las Vegas, although it all seemed a bit hollow; no longer were our relatives here, my aunt and our moms regularly rendezvousing with us in this city, their own chance to escape and press their luck and break normal eating patterns, all guilt-free even as we all knew that we would be going back home some $100 poorer (none of my family are big spenders, content to play penny machines and grumbling when our $5 vanishes within a few minutes). But despite all of our and their ages, the laughs were as regular as the full bellys, our catch-up conversations peppered together with tales of wins and losses, our intentions to stay and chat mixed equally with our desire to return to the flurry of lights and sounds that were once again tempting us. It was all as unreal as the video "reels" that moved before our eyes, a visual trick that satiated our desire for the old now interlaced with the new. And here we were again, my wife and I hiding our desire for the same thing, the old almost frustratingly being nudged out by the new. But this time our luck was with us, not on the casino floors or from the garlicky odors hitting our noses, but from the window of our room high on the 18th floor, an unobstructed view westward giving us the greatest jackpot we could have hoped for on this trip, a true window seat to something 150 years old and yet still as young as ever...the moon shedding its skin.
A few nights back I had a dream, one of those dreams where a song suddenly appears and seems as natural and familiar as when you're awake. It came out of the blue and of all things, was being sung by a young Paul McCartney, a Beatles'-sounding tune titled Baby Tears. I'd never heard it before, even in my dream world, and yet it was as recognizable as any other Beatles song. I just listened, even playing it over again in my head when it was over, as if I knew that the haze was lifting and soon it would be evident that the worlds were separating and my dream world would begin fading as quickly as steam hitting the sky. And yet the song was so distinctive, so easily hummed, so easy to recall...and of course, it was gone. I couldn't help but think of that dream (in real life Paul McCartney told of the song Yesterday coming to him in much the same fashion, complete and so finished in both words and music that he asked a variety of people where they had heard the song before; of course no one had, only Paul, who remembered it in its entirety and the rest is history). For me, there would only be "baby tears," as the song and its melody faded away with my eyes opening. But I remember that the words had nothing to do with a baby, the chorus being one of tears trying to fall, tears that should fall and yet, there were only small traces, little inkling of eyes becoming watery...baby tears.
From our room, when the moon was full and slowly being concealed by the earth's shadow, I kept looking out to the freeway in the distance, the lights of the cars and trucks moving by at a steady pace like blood cells in a body, oblivious to what was happening, there just to do their job and get to where they needed to be. That world outside didn't matter, any more than it did to someone fast asleep or someone or something who didn't care...like the moon. It was always there and always would be, at least to us. But in that long period of darkness, that magic act of disappearing both in the dark and the night, I would learn that nothing is here for always, that perhaps this was meant for me to be seen at this point in my life, to realize that there is much that I take for granted, from the ease of an elevator taking me up 18 stories to the jet that got me here, from the friends and family who have taken he time to write or stay in touch, from the animals who patiently wait for a walk or a bit of attention, from my wife who would love me to sleep in instead of getting up so darn early, even for me who lives a life relatively pain-free and carefree. I've been very fortunate and yes, naive in expecting little to change, just as I felt with my mother, even as she turned 92. Tomorrow would be another day and like the moon it would be full or new or a sliver but it would be there. Little did I realize that one day I would just step out for something as simple as a cup of coffee, just for a short time, and find that all of it had vanished.
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