Totality just concluded here in Tórtoles de Escueva, Spain. We were baptized by the moon’s shadow, which swept overhead at more than 7,000 mph (10,000 km/h). It was transformative and ineffable; spirituality and science were, for a few fleeting instants, intertwined. The feeling of totality’s approach is like none other. It’s foreboding, closing in like an ancient, supernatural presence older than time itself. It’s earthen, ominous and terrifyingly tellurian. The waning sunlight seems sinister. Anxiety is inescapable. Totality itself is a stark contrast. Its occurrence is calculated down to the millisecond, yet it always manages to arrive as a surprise. The sudden nightfall is disorienting and jarring, but comes with inexplicable beauty. The moon’s erasure of the sun appears as a perfectly-circular, jet-black void in the sky — darker and more hollow than anything a human will ever otherwise see. It’s an abyss. But from behind it emerges the corona — the sun’s atmosphere. Soft, glowing-white tendrils radiate into space like the hairs of an angel. The pencil-thin lines are contorted by the ever-evolving magnetic field of an enormous nuclear fusion generator 93,000,000 mile away. It protrudes like a promise that light will return. It’s impossible to not become emotional or overwhelmed when greeted with such majesty. Totality is somehow both eternal and instantaneous; for a few moments, existence itself seems to change. Onlookers are transported to a surreal reality; the sky becomes a portal to another universe. In a sense, it is — hardly 1 percent of the world’s population will ever stand in the moon’s shadow. For just one minute and 40 seconds, we were at the centerpoint of a perfect planetary alignment — the sun, moon, and us traced a line through the cosmos. Totality itself is like a celestial blessing. It’s comforting and reassuring, like a visitation from a, since-departed old friend. It feels cleansing, like an inflection point in life. Personally, eclipses feel like bookmarks between chapters; as darkness washes over, one chapter closes. The reemergence of brilliant daylight marks a new beginning. This was my sixth time in the moon’s shadow, and fourth time with a clear view of the corona and the second time with a busload of friends and family by my side. The next total solar eclipse is in 355 days; I’ll be there. I look forward to being reunited with my long-lost friend again.

A total solar eclipse is a spiritual experience. As a scientist, it's impossible not to feel faithful in something when looking into its eye. The coincidences needed to create such fleeting, ephemeral perfection are too astronomically improbable to be pure chance.