A few days from now, beheaded mythical creatures, absent a body, will swallow the Sun only to have it reappear shortly after. Roughly three minutes, give or take.
In some ancient cultures, a dragon (puma, bear, or wolf) swallows the Sun, relenting only after the people whose myth it is perform a preordained rite or ritual.
One source cited a Choctaw legend in which a black squirrel (Funi Lusa) gnaws on the Sun.
And it is not just in what passes for modern America that you are told not to look directly at the Sun. Navajo elders have long advised against it. Instead, put a hole in a piece of paper or a paper plate and look at the dot of light it projects onto another surface to watch the moon’s shadow advance over good old Sol (until it is actually safe to look up at the eclipse). Okay, that was my 6th grade teacher, Mrs. Hoag.
These stories exist from every culture (dragons and bears, not paper plates), and like most mythology, they share similar threads tied to common beliefs that manifest in different forms. People, wherever they may be, whatever environmental, social, or other factors, are still people. But my favorite solar eclipse lore is less mythological and more practical. It is attributed to Transylvania, in which the angry Sun turns away and covers herself with darkness in response to men’s bad behavior.
Congress is full of them, including men in the general sense of mankind, which includes women’s bad behavior—their idolatry of the cause at the expense of common sense but with a common purpose: to centralize decision-making inside the 61.4 square miles of Washington, DC. A much smaller part of that, to be sure. An object, tiny compared to the heaving masses of a nation but capable of blocking out all of their light.
We must do something about that, you and I, and it is not a topic new to these pages. Changes must be made, and we can’t expect much from the heart of darkness 493 miles from Concord, New Hampshire (or whatever driving distance separates your state capital from Congress). The Federal government is powerless against the states if they are themselves not committed to their own sovereignty and protecting that of their people. That is why they exist.
We’ve had a saying around these parts for a while: Screw DC, Save New Hampshire. It sounds good, and while we have made small strides, Republicans continue to prove themselves lighter versions of Democrats instead of stalwart defenders of those who elevated them to state office. New Hampshire keeps taking federal money and then lying about obligations to their sugar DC daddy. They are whoring us out, and not just us but our children and grandchildren.
Not the national debt, though that is the voting rights issue of our time. Millions yet born slaved to a generation of spending that burdened them without a voice. Not that. I’m referring to the obligations created by state budgets filled with DC money backed by that federal debt. When the feds fail, and at this rate, they inevitably will, all that “free” money stops. If you’ve created a society in which promises cannot be kept unless you now tax the crap out of the locals, you were never all that low tax to begin with.
Will we shout until the Sun emerges from behind that dark object of deception so that the false vision is burned out by the rays of truth? I know it’s a bit heavy on the metaphor, but as candidates campaign for governor, we should consider asking how they plan to protect us from that disaster and if it has ever occurred to them.
And not just how we stop racing toward more dependency but how we claw some of our independence back.