Eclipse for Indoor workforce and Shut-ins

In Des Plaines, the sky was gray and very cloudy. It was warm, but not hot as that cloud cover kept the sunshine mostly blocked. There were only momentary glimpses when the cloud cover was very thin and you could see the sun and moon. The dance between the sun and moon was overhead, almost to the top of the sky, but lower by a tad to the southwest.

As the eclipse began, the air became eerily still, like sometimes before a storm. No birds sang. No dogs barked in the neighborhood. The awkward stillness suddenly burst with the sound of evening crickets. Oppositely, the cicadas were silent. Half-light shadows faded as the moon cover grew. At the maximum of the eclipse here, it seemed more like daybreak than evening - a pale, low light without shadows. At the moment when there was the most moon cover, the little gray clouds thinned their covering for just a second. This spectacular of nature became visible with just enough cloud cover to see it with your eyes without harm to them. And then it was gone again, for us, until 2024.