Since we're waist-deep in packing, signing closing documents and getting ready to move, it made total sense to do something completely different.  In this case, it was drive 6 hours to Reno, Nevada for two days in order to watch the "Ring of Fire" eclipse on Sunday afternoon.


Sometimes you need to do these things, and you can't reschedule an eclipse for a time that's more convenient for you.  You either show up or miss it.  And actually, you may miss it even if you do show up, because an eclipse it a totally weather-dependant event for us here on earth.  Get enough clouds aloft and the show will be over before it even gets started.  But luckily for us, Reno was mostly sunny on Sunday, and we got a phenomenal look at the moon passing in front of the sun.

I've known this eclipse was going to happen for about 18 years.  That's because the last one we went to see was in 1994, and it was mentioned many times that the next one visible from the Western U.S. would be in May, 2012.  Of course at the time my son was 8 months old, and 2012 (the year he was expected to graduate from high school) seemed like a very long ways away.  It came up faster than I ever thought possible.  And so last Saturday, I found myself on Interstate 80 with my son, taking him to see an event I'd promised myself we'd go to for 18 years. 


The eclipse did not disappoint.  Eclipse light is eerie, beautiful, and soft, and the images we got both on camera and in our memory banks will be with us a long time.  Reno was more of a disappointment.  Occasionally I see internet broadcasts from a pastor from Reno, and while he's a great theologian and speaker, he's also somewhat obsessed with the Rapture, and now I understand why.  I'd be obsessed with it too, if I had to live in a place as spiritually dark and desperate as Reno.  Never seen so many lost souls in one place, and that's saying something considering I grew up in Los Angeles.  There were people walking down the street, drunk and with drinks in hand, zig-zagging around the homeless, the mindless, and the addicted to head into the casinos and strip clubs to spend what little money they had.  There are more 7-11's per square block than anyplace else in the country.  There were street people everywhere, wandering around in the dry heat looking for some shade.  


It was an odd place to see one of nature's and God's true graces -- a solar eclipse -- but that's where it was happening so that's where we met it.  And on the campus of the University of Nevada Reno, it was more of a family-friendly environment, anyway, so all was well.


And it was a couple of days spent in the absolute elsewhere with my son.  In two weeks, we will be moving 90 miles west of here, and he will be staying here to work for the summer.  That may not sound like a big deal to most people, but leaving him here is a very big deal to me.  I know, I know, come fall he's off to college anyway, and he's with his dad and will therefore be well-taken care of, but it's still hard.  


Because it wasn't that long ago we were driving along the Arizona/Mexico border with an 8-month old baby in the car seat, heading down to Douglas to see a mid-morning eclipse of the sun.  And at the time, I promised him we'd see the next one together, in 18 years, in May of 2012.


And now he's 18, and I'm sending him out into the world that is Los Angeles, is Reno, and has all the darkness I hate and the wonders -- like solar eclipses -- I love.  And those 18 years went much, much too fast.


And now, we return to our regularly scheduled moving madness.