Sun, moon and stargazers align for unique experience

There was no better excuse for a party. Sunshine, blue skies, temperatures in the mid-60s, and a natural phenomenon that wasn’t going to happen again for 20 years.

Well more than 200 people gathered Monday morning in Laguna Woods to sit in the grass, mingle with friends and neighbors, munch on goodies, and look up to the sky to see the moon making a painfully slow path across the bottom half of the sun.

Across the nation, it was dubbed the “Great American Eclipse,” and tens of millions converged on a swath from Mexico to Maine that was the path of a total solar eclipse, with the moon completely blocking the face of the sun.

California didn’t get the full deal: The moon ate up roughly 50 percent of the sun at maximum coverage just after 11 a.m.

“It looks like a croissant,” Laguna Woods resident Lucy Bilinski exclaimed when the dark orb of the moon first sidled into the golden-haloed sphere of the sun.

Peering through special eclipse glasses, Muriel Ash opined, “It reminds me of the Apple logo.”

The viewing party was the brainchild of Joe Camera, president of the Astronomy Club. His goal, he said, was to bring the event close to home for residents and to make it a community affair. The club even provided nearly 200 eclipse glasses for free.

“To share this unique experience with the community, to experience it with friends and neighbors is the special part,” Camera said.

The club’s mission is to study celestial objects and astronomical phenomena through modern technology and techniques.

That’s just why Ash became a member. “I joined to listen and stretch (my mind) and learn things that I did not know before,” she said.

“I am so into astronomy,” said Helene Siegel. “The sun is 400 times bigger than the moon and its distance from Earth so much larger – amazing.”

But for many people it was the social aspect of the gathering they enjoyed.

Ruth Reyes liked “the excitement of a phenomenon that doesn’t happen very often. And it’s exciting to be enjoying it with so many people.”

Jeff Lawrence said he “came to see the eclipse with all my friends and am making new ones.”

Denise Rapp came with French bulldog Minnie Moo Brown. A member of the Astronomy Club, Rapp said she loves all things science. But she especially liked that “people all got together to share something. No politics involved.”

As residents stared up into the sky through the eclipse glasses, chewed mini banana muffins and biscotti made by Camera’s wife, Ruth, and sipped coffee, tea, even wine, Astronomy Club Treasurer Stuart Fried scurried back and forth between a rec room and the patio outside.

On the patio he monitored the club’s NexStar telescope, which was pointed at the eclipse and gave residents an up-close view of the sun – spots and all – no glasses necessary.

Fried also watched over a Dwarf II Smart telescope that was connected via Bluetooth to his iPhone, which was connected to a projector inside the rec room that beamed real-time images of the eclipse onto a large screen.

So, anyone not inclined to sit outside in the sun could remain in the darkened room and get a full view of the eclipse – again, no glasses needed.

For several partygoers, it wasn’t their first eclipse on Monday.

“I am impressed so far even though I saw the full eclipse in 2017 in Jackson Hole, Wyoming,” Lawrence said.

Steve Grogan saw the phenomenon in Missouri.

“It was unbelievable how it changed the atmosphere – it was so strangely beautiful, something you don’t forget,” he said. “Today’s is also so beautiful and so clear.”

It wasn’t lost on the residents of the retirement community that Monday’s eclipse might be the last one they would see in their lives. The next solar eclipse to be visible in the U.S. is expected in 2044

“Chances are that we’ll never see anything like this again,” Pat Freeman said, as her friend Crosby Allison added wryly, “I’ll be expired by the next one.”

At age 91, resident Barta Gaywood was witnessing her first eclipse.

“I am absorbing everything,” she said. “I’ll probably never see another one. I am so glad I have this opportunity.”

Ricardo Robinson added a bit of spirituality to the event.

“People are enjoying life,” he said. “God made this here for a reason and brought the people together like this.”

Astronomy Club President Camera was simply thrilled with the turnout, having initially expected perhaps 50 people to show up to the party.

“We tapped the stone of what Laguna Woods is all about,” he said.