An Eclipse and a Basketball Game

The past couple of weeks there have been two major events in my little swath of the Midwest, both of which brought many together in unity.

The first one was the women’s NCAA basketball tournament, when the University of Iowa team went all the way to the championship game. And while Caitlin Clark and the Hawkeyes lost, the series had many people talking and commiserating together. Even I, as decidedly not an enthusiast about almost any sport, found it hard to avoid the basketball talk that swarmed around me and the elation people felt as the wins came. The games drew nearly twenty million views and tickets to see them live were hard to come by.

The second event was the solar eclipse. While my little swath of the Midwest was not in the path of totality, we did have a partial eclipse here that left the afternoon sun looking like dusk. People stopped to gaze at the sun, using whatever tools they had to see the moon track across its path. Friends shared what they had, be it homemade box gazers, solar glasses or other means. Photos of the eclipse were shared on social media and I know of a handful of people from my circles that traveled to see totality, wherever they could.

Both events unified communities, if only for a moment. We all stopped. We all watched or listened. We all rooted. We all were in awe.

We need more moments like that. We need those experiences to remind us that, even though we are all different, with varying walks of life and stories that are night and day, we can find the moments that unify us. We need to remember that we cannot choose our neighbors, but we can find a common ground with them and share in moments like these with them. We need more moments that transcend ourselves and remind us there is something greater in this world, a story that is much more than that of our own, a magic that makes this world a bigger and better place.

If only they were more than just an eclipse and a basketball game.

Stay magical, friends.

Write your own story.

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