live: aurora borealis

A post about the events of my daily life.

There is no time of your life quite like college. These four years are perhaps the only opportunity to live so close to all of your friends, pull three all-nighters in a row, eat anything you want at all times of the day and night, decorate your room with a mixture of Justin Bieber posters and neon pink crates that your mom swore you would need, sleep in all day just because you want to, and travel to southern Ohio with thirteen of your best friends at the drop of a hat because some website claimed that you would see the Northern Lights there.

Yes, you read that last one correctly. Yesterday at around 1:30pm, Zach found out from accuweather.com that there was a solar flare coming towards earth’s atmosphere that would create a spectacular aurora borealis at 9pm… in southern Ohio. Granted, we probably should have seen that something about this seemed very odd, considering that most of these light shows occur 2,000 miles north of southern Ohio, but it was an opportunity to get fourteen people to pack into two cars and drive two and a half hours to Adam’s Lake State Park and lay on the ground for three hours hoping for a miracle. The closest we came to the Northern Lights was a flaming shooting star right above our heads, but that didn’t matter. Somehow, in the craziness of a spontaneous adventure with friends during the sentimentality of the last two weeks of college, we were all perfectly content to just enjoy each others’ company under a not-so brilliantly lit-up sky.

I loved talking about everything from summer plans to intelligent life on other planets to the origin of life on earth with these people. It’s tragic to think that after four years of adventures like these, this might be the end of our journey together. I have thirteen wonderful friends right now though, and thirteen wonderful brothers and sisters in Christ for eternity, and that is enough.

Just for kicks and giggles, here is the map of aurora borealis visibility that convinced us to drive to Ohio:

And here is the map of what actually happened:

As you can see, we were just a few miles off target. But I will say this: if you have not canoed to the middle of a very still lake in the middle of the night and seen how the stars reflect perfectly in the water, my dear friends, you have not lived. If you’re lucky enough to have an amazing boyfriend like I do, you can even convince him to do all of the paddling and lay on your back while he spins you in circles. The result: the most beautiful light show I’ve ever seen.