Last night, just after midnight, I was out in our back-garden trying to get our family pet rabbit in. The rabbit has the whole garden to munch in during the day - but yesterday evening our dog, Mike, got in the back garden and chased the rabbit - who immediately took flight and hid behind the shed.
So there I was, wandering around tha garden and bathed in beautiful moonlight. Looking up, I could see that the moon appeared to be full, and that there were a few back-lit clouds streaming across the sky. It was a stunning sight. The fields and trees around my house had that mysterious gloaming half-light - there and not there. I love that. You can see why, before the advent of effective lighting, the full moon was an opportunity to travel safely. ("The Lunar Men" by Jenny Uglow is a fascinated read, by the way).
This morning, quite by chance, I read an article about the 'Harvest Moon' on the BBC website. The only thing that I knew about a Harvest Moon was that it was the title of an LP by Neil Young. A Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the Autumn Equinox (September 24th) and was used by farmers to extend the day when harvesting. And this year the Harvest Moon and the Equinox coincide. The article also says that the next time that they will coincide will be 2029. So not quite once-in-a-life-time, but clearly not-very-frequent.
[Incidently, since you ask, I did manage to get the rabbit safely into her hutch for the night. White rabbits, apart from being famous for disappearing down holes, are quite easy to see under a full moon!]
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