A recent visit to the R.H. Fleet Science Center in Balboa Park informed us of the Venus transit to take place on June 5th. We would have to come back for the safety glasses because they were sold out. June 4th we drive back to the museum to get our glasses – $2. When looking through them at anything but the sun all you can see is complete blackness – well, besides all the light that comes in around the sides. I am looking forward to having seen two astronomical occurrences in one year; the prior being the annular eclipse.

I grab the camera and a lawn chair and head outside to the clearest sky, yet in Imperial Beach, at 3:00 pm. Caleb donates his glasses to make lens cover boxes for our cameras. I will have to remember to hold the box over my lens when I zoom in, but the image caught is amazing, and blurry. Even with these glasses on the sun is so bright. I can only stare for an hour before my eyes begin to hurt. I have captured my proof digitally and can now return to my regularly scheduled plans – whatever those may be.

Size is a very relative description. Seeing another planet look like a pea on a plate when passing between the sun and Earth gives me a different perspective on size. I hope everyone that cared to see it got the opportunity, either this year or in 2004, because it will be more than 100 years before it happens again – a true once, or twice, in a lifetime moment. It’s one thing for NASA or Hollywood to show this on TV; it’s a whole other experience to see it for yourself.