The Self-Fulfilling Moon

The moon looked full Sunday night, but it probably has a day or two before it’s really full. I just glanced at it and didn’t look for the shadowing at one edge.

For several months, I was on rotation at a mental hospital. Full moons came and full moons went and we never noticed any change in the patients’ behaviour. The tales we heard of these people going even further out of their minds just did not happen to us and, I suspect, did not happen elsewhere. I remember that a fellow went absolutely bonkers one day, but there seemed to be no correlation with the moon.

I had a friend who was in AA. He said that he told people the full moon drove him to binges of drinking, but when he got into the AA program, he admitted it was just an excuse to drink more than usual.

Also, I’ve heard that “Auntie Flo” pays her monthly visit around that time more than any other during the month. But now I learn it’s all anecdotal and the gals sometimes notice the near-full moon I mentioned up top; it’s got a spread of, perhaps, five days. The stats just don’t work out and seeing what you think is the full moon a few times, plus hearing of others, tends to make facts out of erroneous data.

I hope it’s not a case that the moon doesn’t like us, but it’s moving away at the rate of 1.5” a year. At one point, it was 17 times closer to us than it is now; there will come a day when it’s not much more than a large, brighter spot in the sky.