On the night of August 30, 2023, the sky was graced with a gorgeous “blue moon,” the second full moon in the calendar month. I happened to snap a highly unsatisfactory picture of it:
A shy Super Blue Moon, hiding in the clouds. August 30, 2023.
A blue moon is a rare astronomical occurrence, and this week’s blue moon (you can see it through the early morning of September 1) is rarer still as it is also a super moon.
Science is far from my best subject. Will you please explain the significance of this?
Certainly, Lily. According to NASA, about 25% of all moons are super moons, when the moon is both full and syncs with the perigee (that is, when it is nearest to earth in its orbit). 3% of all moons are blue moons. With those percentages I believe less than one percent of full moons (.75% as I calculate it) are Super Blue Moons. The next one occurs in 2037!
Wow, how old will you be then?
No need to go into that, 9. But I plan on enjoying the Super Blue Moon when it comes again.
This is not the first time I’ve blogged about a blue moon. The first time was July 31, 2015:
https://www.susandmatley.com/official-blog/blue-moon/
Reading this early blog it’s interesting to note how many things have changed (moving to Walla Walla, death of spouse, and much, much more) but also that many things have remained the same.
Besides the occasional blue moon, you mean?
Besides that, Lily. In the 2015 blog I had just sent final revisions for the first book in my “G” fantasy/mythology series back to the editor. This time, I’ve recently announced the release of book four in the series. Eight years, four books, the first draft of book five nearing completion and the realization that, though I thought number five would be the last in the series, there needs to be a book six!
Day to day it’s easy to believe that human existence isn’t all that exciting or interesting, but looking back a decade or so it’s clear that many rare and beautiful things happen in life, some joyful, some deeply sad. The sameness, the normal, is where we get to rest and pull ourselves together for whatever comes next.
Your last paragraph has left me awash with memories of the last decade. I took it in with the vulnerability of life review. 10 years ago began with a near death experience due to sepsis. And a sort of near-birth or re-birth to be alive again. All those parts of life, the beloved, the terrifying, the lyrical, magical, and mundane all find a way toward expression with each breath. Like you, I’m still enchanted by the Super Blue Moon. I put the top down and drove home in the moonlight from an unexpected rendezvous with a good friend. Enduring friendship, now that’s a worthy topic. What brings us together regardless of time and space?
I saw your Fb post about the Super Blue Moon, Tom. Fantastic! As for enduring friendship, I think it’s a combination of having a shared past at a formative time when friends experience the same reality and it gives them a deep common point of reference/vocabulary, plus that extra something that comes to us from only a few folks in our lifetimes: to see us as we truly are and accept the person we are with joy instead of expectations. To be received with joy, delight and curiosity. Those types of friends you may not see for years, decades, even, but you pick up as if you’d seen them yesterday, yes?