REFLECTIONS
Reflections
DO WE NEED ANOTHER ECLIPSE?
Teresita Bacani-Oropilla, MD
O
n August 21, 2017, across the USA
and especially along the path of
totality, people gathered in small
or citywide groups, their up-
turned bespectacled faces to the
skies. The mood was jovial, almost celebratory.
Despite unpaved roads or traffic jams, lone-
ly farmsteads or crowded accommodations,
there was camaraderie. None of those uneasy, suspicious or hateful
attitudes, which seem to have pervaded the country lately, reared
their ugly heads. Anticipatory peace and order personnel blended
with the crowds. It took a celestial phenomenon, the moon covering
the sun from shedding its radiant light on our planetary home, the
Earth, to accomplish this. A happy hoi-polloi joined in grabbing the last eye-shielding solar
glasses from the local stores or Amazon, or had to concoct their
own contraptions to project the “Now you see it, now you don’t,
and now you see it again” show!
It was an amazingly expectant moment of peace, non-contro-
versial, of nobody’s bidding nor fault, something to look forward
to by all. Scientists made great efforts to gain maximum views and
data for all to share. Families and friends planned vacations and
get-togethers. Schools prepared their students for a great lesson. Dr. Oropilla is a retired psychiatrist.
One thing the eclipse did reveal was the fact that we, earthlings,
still have the capacity and the ability to universally accept an event
and ourselves with equanimity. And the next natural event, Hurri-
cane Harvey, devastated parts of Texas, and Irma impacted a large
section of the Southeast. Both of these storms affirmed the good in
us is lurking just beneath the surface, ready to come to the rescue
as needed, pro renata, PRN.
Do we need another eclipse to release that good spirit even more?
OCTOBER 2017
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