Reactions to the Total Solar Eclipse

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC and listeners what about you? After all the build-up to yesterday's eclipse, how was your experience? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. We're inviting you if you are in town or if you travel to be in totality in Indiana where there was up in the Adirondacks or the Burlington area or wherever you may have gone call up and share your experience of yesterday's total solar eclipse. Where did you go? Who were you with is another thing.

It was cool for me to be out in my local park and see a lot of people had come out to enjoy the experience. I know people who are parents of kids currently in school who had feelings of community with the kids whether it was out in the schoolyard or out in the park, wherever you were. What are some of the memories of the total solar eclipse that you'll carry on with you? What do you think you'll remember from yesterday? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.

I talked on yesterday's show about the one time that I was in a total solar eclipse and that one of the things that I've remembered ever since was the birds freaking out when it became dark in the middle of the day. Yesterday, for me, in New York City, it was underwhelming except for the actual looking at the sun through those special glasses and seeing the moon actually pass over the sun. That was cool. What I had said yesterday was, as my tip, if you go out to experience the eclipse, it's not only about the sun, it's about what's going to happen as it gets dark, maybe animals are going to move, birds, it's going to feel weird, there are going to be these interesting shadows.

I'm not sure that happened very much in the greater New York City area specifically. For me, a little underwhelming in that respect, although it was still totally cool to see the moon almost totally cover the sun, though interestingly surprising to me that since it was 90% covered at some point in the New York City area, it didn't really get dark. Maybe some of you who are more attuned to the subtleties of that can call up and say, "Yes, well, it did kind of got dark, and it was inspiring in that respect." We want to hear your experiences of the total solar eclipse, whether you were in the path of totality or just on the periphery like here in New York. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, and we'll take your calls right after this.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC and now to your experiences of the eclipse. Mary in Point Pleasant, you're on WNYC. Hi, Mary.

Mary: Hi, good morning, Brian. I flew out to Indianapolis on Friday afternoon right after the earthquake. Took the train out of Bayhead to Newark Airport. It took me 12 and a half hours to end up out in Indianapolis because they didn't have the air train running because they had inspectors checking the air train. All the bridges the train went over in Broadway, in Belmar wherever you were going on the train all had to be inspected so only one train could go over at a time. Got to the airport finally, took a bus.

Finally, the flight was delayed because they were checking CarMax. I eventually get out to Indianapolis, and we were seeing that it's going to be so beautiful and so many people, so we decided to drive to Batesville, which was in the totality section. We drove down to Batesville, went to this beautiful park, hung out for an hour and a half, and then we started thinking, "How am I going to get back to the airport in time for my 7:00 PM flight?" We decided to drive closer to Route 74, the interstate.

We pulled into a giant tractor supply with a strip mall and a McDonald's in the parking lot, hanging out with our chairs. Everybody was festive. It was absolutely a magical, undoubtedly the most beautiful, natural thing I've ever seen. As it got dark, all of the lights came on on the highway, in the McDonald's, all of the parking lots. All of the lights came on because they-- [laughs] You weren't expecting it.

Brian Lehrer: They're programmed to respond to light.

Mary: Yes. It ended up in the end not being totally black, but you could look to the northeast and you could see the sky was black up there, almost like a bad storm was on its way.

Brian Lehrer: That's a great story, Mary. For one thing, the earthquake and the eclipse will forever be connected for you because of the travel experience. Then even if you didn't see birds freak out, you saw the streetlights freak out. That's really funny. Mary, thank you very much. Kerry in Clinton Hill, you're on WNYC. Hi, Kerry.

Kerry: Oh, hi, Brian. First-time caller, long-time listener.

Brian Lehrer: Glad you're on.

Kerry: I love what you do. I listen every day. I actually was listening yesterday and I heard that if you bring a colander to the eclipse, something magical happens. My husband, my six-year-old, and I went to the park and my husband was very skeptical about bringing the colander, but I insisted. We brought it and we walked all the way to the top of the hill at Fort Greene Park and we situated ourselves next to this whiteboard, took the colander out, and started looking at it. The shadows on the whiteboard, and all of a sudden just like all of these people were like, "Whoa, that's so cool." Everyone was crowding around and everyone was taking turns looking at the eclipse through the colander. It was really special.

Brian Lehrer: Wow. Right there in Brooklyn, you got a shadow effect by putting a colander out.

Kerry: Yes, it was so cool. It was really, really beautiful and unexpected. Especially because my husband was like, "You're crazy." When we got to the top of the hill, he was like, "Look at everyone and their colanders." Nobody had a colander. We were the only one.

Brian Lehrer: Kerry, that's a great story. I wish I knew about the colanders. Let's see. Here's a text, Juan from West New York writes, and you know that's in Jersey even though it's called West New York, right? "I surprised my son, Troy, and picked him up from school. I wasn't going to miss out on this once in a lifetime moment to share with my nine-year-old. We went outside our house, it did get dark and windy, and there was a moment of quietness that I enjoyed where it felt like it was just me and my son, a moment I nor hopefully him will ever forget. He really enjoyed it." That is so sweet. Elizabeth Ann Hartsdale, you're on WNYC. Hi, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Ann Hartsdale: Hi Brian. Wow, I'm so excited. I went to Nebraska for the 2017 totality and I was in a national park with thousands of people and Bill Nye, the science guy. This time I went to Stowe, Vermont, and I was completely by myself. It was so, so incredible. I cried. The birds I noticed freaked out when the eclipse started, not so much when it was dark. Although I did hear them. I did hear people cheering in the distance, but it was magical. I can't wait to go see another one.

Brian Lehrer: Beautiful, Elizabeth. Thank you. Savannah in Westchester went up to the Adirondacks, right, Savannah?

Savannah: Yes, Brian, we went to Old Forge, which is a town I've been going to my entire life in the summer for July 4th holiday. I've actually never seen it with no green. I've never seen it in any other season. My husband was excited and he booked this three years ago and we went and sat on our deck and my entire family, I pulled the kids from school, my cousins 6 month old up to our 97-year-old great aunt, and we all sat there together and it got totally completely dark.

What I experienced mostly was like a sunset, felt like a 360-degree sunset, which is my favorite time of day anyway. I am sensitive to all the light, and I'm a painter, so the shadows and it was-- I have to say, I snickered, I think it was on your show last week when I thought of these people who have these spiritual experiences. I was like, "It's cool astrologically," but I completely, total, I just cried. I didn't know what to do. It was just so beautiful and so weird. We saw the Corona. I was totally blown away by it.

Brian Lehrer: I'm so glad you had the full experience. That 360 sunset effect, of course, typically the sun goes down in one direction and so you see the sunset over there, but when you're seeing that all the way around you 360, what an experience. Savannah, thank you for sharing it. Dawn in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Dawn.

Dawn: Hey, Brian. I was able to get a group of friends to come with me and we went to Green-Wood Cemetery and we found the highest point and sat up on a hill. There were all kinds of people around on blankets and folks with big telescope cameras. Everyone was really friendly. As the eclipse progressed, the quality of light was changing. You could sense it. The birds quieted. Then at one point, everybody started cheering. All these people around were cheering and a couple kids started howling at the moon. Then everybody around started howling like wolves howling at the moon, obscuring the sun. It was incredible.

Brian Lehrer: A lot of people at Green-Wood Cemetery, I heard.

Dawn: Yes. There was a lot of space to spread out, but definitely a lot of people.

Brian Lehrer: Dawn, thank you. Beautifully described. Jim in Yonkers is going to get the last word. Jim, you're on WNYC. Hi.

Jim: Hi. What I thought was really profound and moving was just the sense of how small we all are in the universe and we're just here for a brief sliver of time. Also it's a painful time on earth right now with the wars and politics and division. I think it was more about the people and just being this sense of connection to the world as opposed to just an event in the sky. It just made me think of connection to all the people in the world.

Brian Lehrer: A perfect way to end, because what was more important than that yesterday? Jim, thank you very much. Thanks to all of you who called and shared your eclipse experiences or your earthquake/eclipse experiences. That's The Brian Lehrer Show for today, produced by Mary Croke, Lisa Allison, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond and Esperanza Rosenbaum. Zach Gottehrer-Cohen edits our national politics podcast. Our intern this term is Ethlyn Daniel-Scherz. Megan Ryan is the head of live radio, and we have Juliana Fonda at the audio control. Stay tuned for All Of It.

 

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