Keep Looking Up, at least until you're tired

Dear Sunward Gazers,

As I write this we are anticipating a solar eclipse, which reminds me of my brief childhood hope of becoming an astronomer. It was the height of the Space Race, and Apollo missions were already in full gear, inching the United States closer to planting the first human feet on the moon. My neighborhood buddies and I were well aware of the tragic Apollo 1 accident on February 21, 1967, in which Command Pilot Gus Grissom, Senior Pilot Ed White and Pilot Roger B. Chaffee perished in an awful fire during a launch rehearsal. An electrical spark ignited nylon insulation, and the conflagration was accelerated by the use of pure, high-pressure oxygen in the cabin. A congressional investigation resulted in several changes to the module’s design, particularly the use of a far less explosive nitrogen/oxygen mixture. They had briefly experimented with an even more inert helium/oxygen blend, but that combination made the astronauts sound like Alvin and the other chipmunks, so it was scuttled in the name of dignity.

Most of my friends aspired to be astronauts, but I was a risk-averse kid. As with the high dive or the zipline, I preferred to be an observer rather than a potential stain on the pool’s bottom or cautionary splat on a camp trail. Astronomy was for me—it was a profession that involved sitting and looking, something I had mastered at many a child’s party.

I consumed books about astronomers, Copernicus, Galileo, Tycho Brahe and his brass nose, and Johannes Kepler, who had studied for the clergy but thought himself too skinny to be a Lutheran pastor. My brothers bought me subscriptions to Sky & Telescope, and I saved my paper route money to buy a Jason 316 telescope, which came with a wooden tripod, three lenses, a doubling Barlow inversion scope and solar filter. Thus equipped, I stomped out into the evening with a notebook and my prized purchase, ready to embark on great discoveries in the heavens. I successfully tracked two of Jupiter’s moons and could discern multiple rings on Saturn; and using the filter during the day I was able to note a few sunspots. But oh, my precious Lord, was this mind-numbingly boring. These many years later, I have yet to make it through an entire sky show at the Adler Planetarium without falling asleep.

Still, when a random occultation is noted or an eclipse is imminent, something inside me is inspired, and I wonder what my life could have been if my attention span wasn’t like that of a flea on crack.

Chicago will not benefit from complete totality; we’ll only receive 94%, which is a solid A- in eclipse terms. According to my deep research dive into Google, things should begin around 12:50 p.m., with the last wisps of lunar shadow departing about 3:20. That gives me a few hours to see if the old Jason 316 is still in the garage. Or I could just wait to watch the time-lapse online later this afternoon. I’d have been a great astronomer—or perhaps geologist—if this stuff wasn’t so slow.

Briefly fascinated by so many things, I remain,

With Love,
Jonathan Krogh
Your Pastor