08/29/2026
Last night, the shadow of the Earth moved across the moon.
Some will look at this and see only an eclipse.
The sun.
The Earth.
The moon.
Three bodies moving into alignment.
And that explanation is true.
But our old people understood that knowing how something happens is not the same as understanding what it can teach us.
We did not learn only from words.
We learned by watching.
The sky taught us.
The water taught us.
The animals taught us.
The changing seasons taught us.
Everything within Creation carried something worth noticing.
Last night, the moon did not create the darkness that moved across its face.
That shadow belonged to the Earth.
It belonged to the ground beneath our feet.
It belonged to the world we share.
For a little while, our shadow touched the moon.
There is something humbling in that.
We often speak about the darkness we see in other people.
We name their failures.
We remember their mistakes.
We point toward the places where their light appears to be missing.
But how often do we stop and ask whether some of the darkness we see upon them is a shadow we have cast?
Perhaps through something we said.
Something we did.
Something we refused to understand.
Or something we carried for so long that we no longer noticed its weight falling upon others.
My relatives, having a shadow does not make us bad human beings.
Every one of us has one.
But growing older has taught me that wisdom begins when we stop pretending the shadow always belongs to someone else.
The Earth did not destroy the moon last night.
It did not take away its light.
The moon remained whole, even while we could not see all of it.
And when the shadow moved on, nothing had to be restored.
What had always been there simply became visible again.
Maybe there are people in our lives like that.
People whose light we have forgotten because pain, anger, judgment, or misunderstanding passed between us.
Maybe there are parts of ourselves like that too.
Still whole.
Still carrying light.
Only waiting for the shadow to move.
Ê-kotâwît pîsim.
The eclipse.
A moment when our own shadow became large enough for us to see.
May we have the courage to recognize it.
May we have the humility to learn from it.
And may we remember that darkness passing across someone’s face does not mean their light is gone.
Partial lunar eclipse
August 27, 2026
Êkwa.
Walk gently.
