Experiencing Totality: My Solar Eclipse

I Wasn’t Gonna Go

I never intended to drive 150 miles to Totality during Monday’s solar eclipse, not when I read that 200,000 people were expected to flood the parts of northern Vermont that would go dark. I thought 97% dark in my own back yard would be enough. With a pair of protective glasses distributed by my local library and a lawn chair in the hayfield, I was all set. But six days before the eclipse, a friend who’d experienced Totality in 2017 waxed eloquent. I began to wonder if maybe this was worth leaving home to experience.

I’m Traffic Adverse

I first learned about the 2024 eclipse in the Long Trail News, the quarterly publication of the Green Mountain Club. The GMC followed up with weekly emails, advising that anyone driving north to see the total eclipse should plan to arrive a day in advance and plan to stay until the day after or risk being stuck in a state-wide traffic jam.

This was sufficient reason for me to stay home and work on the final novel in The Orton Trilogy. I was starting Section Two, which felt like shifting into first gear with a cranky clutch. Then a friend who’s a known eclipse junkie emailed to say he was headed to Mexico, where Totality would last four minutes. He wanted me to know the weather in Vermont was predicted to be spectacular on April 8. “You cannot miss it,” he wrote, listing all the equipment I should have for best viewing, including a telescope with an alpha hydrogen sun filter. Not likely. I’m no gear head, but I love this friend’s enthusiasm, and my resolve to ignore the eclipse started to crack. But where would I go? And would my boss give me the time off?

I Am My Own Boss

I’m my own boss. I could escape the uncomfortable, liminal place between chapters, a place where I was avoiding writing with research—reading a half dozen books and chasing down obscure information about the Modern Language Association Convention in New York City at the end of December in 1986.  While calling it research makes this paper chase sound necessary, I’ve been down this rabbit hole before and recognized it as elaborate form of stalling. I figured I might as well watch the eclipse while I was stalled. I texted friends who live in the path of totality and asked if I could come and watch with them. These  gracious hosts reminded me to pack a suit for the hot tub.

I timed my departure for 3 pm on Sunday, when the much anticipated final game of the women’s March Madness was scheduled to start. I traveled on Vermont’s two interstates, which are beautiful both for ease of driving and for the natural landscape they pass through. As is usual for a weekday afternoon, traffic picked up between Montpelier, the state capital (population 8,000) and Burlington, the Queen City (population 44,500). But this was Sunday, the first sign that something unusual was afoot. I exited the highway before Burlington and turned into my friend’s quiet neighborhood. Over dinner on Sunday we exchanged family news, work updates, and observations of personal growth–better known as aging.

The Eclipse

Eclipse Day dawned clear and warm. We soaked in the hot tub, barbecued a hot lunch, rechecked the safety instructions, and donned our glasses for the 2:14 start. Even with the moon moving somewhere between 1,100 and 5,000 miles per hour, watching the eclipse takes time—about an hour and a quarter from start to finish where I was, with a little over three minutes of totality. The way the moon’s shadow dimmed the daylight was one of my two favorite moments. The other was when the sun began to reappear, looking like the Cheshire Cat smiling down from outer space.

This Earthling

Even though I traveled with one of the several books I was reading for work, I never opened it. For me, the best part of the celestial event for this earthling was the enforced leisure: waiting for the eclipse, and then waiting for the roads to clear. As predicted, the traffic following the eclipse clogged both Vermont’s interstates and several state highways. I slept through it all and left the next morning, arriving home in under three hours, as usual, and happy to be back at my desk.