Blood Moon

So, who wants to watch the October 27th lunar eclipse with me?

Last time I stayed out to watch a full lunar eclipse was a long time ago. It was mid-May, 2003. The day before I left New Mexico for good. I was taking a walk that evening, because the weather was beautiful, warm, the air scented with the honeysuckle that grew in the flowerbeds around campus. This final walk, I was trying to cement the place in my memory, because I knew I would not return. So I circled the dorms and filed away the mission-style adobe architecture. I made a spot in my mind for the red clay roofs that reminded me of terra cotta pots cut in half and laid to interlock on top of the buildings. I kept the image of Workman Hall, with it's modern sharp angles and lines and glass. I walked past Richard's window for a final time as homage to the nights I would walk by, hoping to see his light on so I could talk to him. I passed under the hedge arch that covered the red brick sidewalk between the student union and the octagonal computer science building. And finally, I walked past South Hall, where I'd first heard someone playing Nirvana on an electric guitar while standing out on the covered walkway in a rainstorm.

On the way back to my apartment building, I saw a crowd of people gathered in an unused part of the parking lot. I recognized a few of them; my roommate Maggie was out there. All were staring up into the sky. I looked up myself, and saw a crescent moon that I knew should have been full. At once I knew what was happening, and joined the crowd sitting on the curb, watching the moon go from pale white to rust over the course of perhaps half an hour. We cheered when the eclipse reached totality, and for the first time in my life I felt the primal fear of the unnaturally darkened, blood-tinged moon, as well as awe and reverence for the forces of nature that brought such strange beauty into existence. We watched until the shadow of earth lifted from the moon's surface, bringing it's color back to pale bone white.