Following a Moon Shadow

Clouds have obscured Portland’s skies for days and weeks on end. Even our one clear-ish night to enjoy the Perseids was thwarted when a thick blanket rolled in just as the streaking meteor show was getting started. It’s been a frustrating and hazy end of summer, so I’ve gone looking for some astronomical fun to anticipate.

Did it take long to find me?

I asked the faithful light

Oh did it take long to find me

And are you gonna stay the night?

Moonshadow by Cat Stevens / Yusuf Islam

I’ve got my sights set on the coming lunar eclipse on September 17th.

It’ll be a partial lunar eclipse and not much of one at that. Here in the Pacific Northwest, we’ll glimpse less than 4% of the Moon in shadow as it rises. Still, it’s sufficient to have me marking my calendar and making plans to observe this itty-bitty shadow on the Moon.

I’ve been wanting to spend more time with the Moon anyway, and this spot of potential excitement has hooked me.

Lunar phases tend to sneak up on me. I love the Moon, but I lose track of it. When we’ve had clouds for days, or weeks, it can outright startle me when the skies clear again: Here’s our bright Moon waxing toward full when I’d expected barely a dim crescent. Sometimes, I pledge to pay regular attention to our planet’s only natural satellite, to spend an entire month focused only on lunar phases and features, but it hasn’t happened yet. I inevitably get pulled off task by something momentous like a comet, a planetary conjunction, or a surprise supernova.

Compared to those sights, a partial lunar eclipse doesn’t seem much of a spectacle. That’s all the more true when contrasted with the daytime darkness of a total solar eclipse. During a lunar eclipse, there are no cool crescent-shaped shadows on the ground, no Baily's beads, and no crowds gathering in parks and stadiums to marvel at celestial mechanics in motion. It’ll probably get little in the way of news coverage, too. I mean, eh, it’s just the Moon.

When a full Moon turns red, it’s worth watching. Unlike its solar cousin, you don’t need protective glasses or special telescope filters, and everyone on the night side of the planet can see it — versus the restricted swaths of visibility for a solar eclipse. Fully half the planet can look up and watch the deepening copper color through a telescope or binoculars, pretend we're in an apocalypse movie, or just snap some neat photos. Still, many don’t seem to get excited when it happens.

More than 20 years ago, I was at my Dad’s house helping to prepare dinner while the Earth’s umbral shadow slid slowly over a full Moon. It was my birthday, and I kept ducking outside to check the eclipse’s progress from the sidewalk. The sight of the “Blood Moon” was spooky and spectacular, lending a delightfully eerie and witchy feeling to the night. The sight made me think of ancient Incas, who shook their spears at the Blood Moon to frighten away the solar jaguar who’d attacked the Moon and made it bleed.

Yet no one around me was even looking up! When I’d report back to the kitchen on the passage of the Moon’s red tinge, my enthusiasm was appreciated but not shared.

And that was a total lunar eclipse. With only a partial lunar eclipse on the way, I seem to be alone in looking forward to it. From Portland, the Moon might look like it’s wearing a miniature, shady beanie at a jaunty angle. At a recent astronomy club meeting, the consensus was that it’s hard to get excited about a 4-degree shadow. But I like small delights. They’re kind of my thing. So, like Cat Stevens, I’ll be following the Moonshadow.

I don’t need a meteor shower, the aurora borealis, or a total eclipse every time I step outside. I mean, YES! I love witnessing grand cosmic exhibitions, but I enjoy the smaller and more nuanced versions, too. I’m looking forward to a quiet night without fanfare. Just me and the Moon on a cloudless night (please!) as my planet occludes a minute fraction of the craggy lunar surface. I might spot a gray tinge over a tiny sliver of the lunar disk. It will be a subtle shift rather than a dramatic display, and that sounds about perfect to me.

I’ll probably be humming that catchy song, too.