Dec 26, 2024
This "backstory" is a part of a collection of articles that describes some of the obstacles that Seven Days reporters faced while pursuing Vermont news, events and people in 2024. To mark the total solar eclipse, Seven Days dispatched reporters across the state to document the varied ways that Vermonters and tourists were observing this once-in-a-lifetime event. News reporter Rachel Hellman joined Bread and Puppet Theater's purification orchestra/snowball fight in Glover. Food editor Melissa Pasanen watched chickens do chicken things at a Shelburne farm. Culture reporter Hannah Feuer boarded the Spirit of Ethan Allen, and music editor Chris Farnsworth tailgated at the Sunset Drive-In Theatre. Others went to a prison, mountaintops and the Statehouse. The editors, using their unassailable judgment, assigned me to stay put in Burlington and work with my colleague Courtney Lamdin to chronicle the city festival at the Lake Champlain waterfront. Their idea was for Lamdin and me to roam the city by bicycle, collecting quotes and anecdotes that we could compile in a concise introduction to the other reporters' more adventurous vignettes. The eclipse took place on a Monday afternoon, which meant we were all working under pressure to get our collective cover story filed, edited, designed and sent to the printer in time to appear in Wednesday's paper. [content-1] I wasn't thrilled with my assignment. What was there to say about a waterfront watch party? "Thousands of people sat by the lake and looked up to the sky?" The purification orchestra, whatever that was, sounded more exciting. I dutifully spent the morning interviewing waterfront visitors. Then I hopped on my bike to pursue something of a side quest. I had an idea that it might be interesting to watch the eclipse with someone who was helping make the festivities happen, for whom the eclipse was a hectic day at work. I thought of the city's decision to turn Route 127 into a massive parking lot — and of the parking attendants who would be watching tourists' cars while they oohed and aahed near the water. Out on the Burlington Beltline, I pedaled up to some flaggers who were directing traffic. I chatted with them for an hour or two and awkwardly asked one guy, David Faske, if I could watch totality with him. Our viewing location — on the pavement, near a Porta-Potty, halfway down a hill — was far from ideal. As totality…
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