Too Much Tequila, Too Little Sunscreen

Something happened yesterday I can’t explain. Venus passed in front of the sun, and I was content with just seeing the pictures on TV. I didn’t race out looking for filtered glasses, or research how to make them at home; I just sat on my butt and went about my humdrum life like nothing unusual was happening. I missed this rare astronomical occurrence even though I’ll be 372 years old when it happens again.

I’m the guy that stood in line for hours to see Mars at its closest point to Earth through a telescope at the local university, and spent my teenage years frantically swinging my crude telescope from striking views of Saturn to even more interesting views through a nearby bedroom window.

And I once spent an entire cold, winter night capturing a total eclipse of the moon in time-lapse photography. Since the moon is moving across the sky while all of this is going on, you have to shoot, wait the desired amount to time, move the camera to the moon’s new position, and shoot again, and so forth, over and over and over.

But nothing tops the night my cousin and I drug a telescope up a peak in the dark to get a better view of Haley’s Comet. We knew that, that evening was our only shot at seeing Haley’s in our lifetimes and we weren’t going to miss it.

But I just missed the once-in-a-lifetime chance to see Venus pass in front of the sun and I didn’t seem to care. Do you think I’m just getting old or…or am I finally growing up.