Today’s the day! The total solar eclipse: August 21, 2017. People are either hyped up, indifferent, or totally clueless. But these nine people, in this beautiful video by Jess Fong, are passionate about today’s sights and significance. These nine witnessed the eclipse 38 years ago and can’t wait to see it today. Here’s what they have to say about how it feels to experience an eclipse and why today, and the future date of May 1, 2079 are both exciting and important.

1.

“There are insufficient superlatives in the English language.”

— Bill Kramer

2.

“No matter what I do, no matter how much I describe it, no matter how many videos you watch, they all fall short of being able to witness this for yourself.”

— Fred Espenak

3.

“You just never forget. You never forget that feeling.”

— Victoria Sahami

4.

“Don’t try to photograph it. Please don’t…You don’t want to do it. You want to take a look at it with your own two eyes.”

— Joe Rao

5.

“It’s black. It’s black, black, black like the blackest hole you can ever imagine, ringed with these beautiful wispy white coronal streamers.”

— Rhonda Coleman

6.

“Bright stars and planets are visible in the daytime sky. And you see the colors of sunset in every direction you look all around the horizon.”

— Fred Espenak

7.

“It’s not like night. It’s not like day. It’s not like twilight. It’s like nothing you’ve ever felt before.”

— Rhonda Coleman

8.

“Can you imagine how our primitive ancestors would have felt? Suddenly our world completely changing, and then them not knowing that the sun was going to come back. I mean, how frightening?”

— Kate Russo

9.

“In our everyday lives, we look up to the sky and what we see is this two-dimensional dome. And stars and planets and the moon seem to creep across that. When I saw a total eclipse of the sun, it catapulted me into a three-dimensional universe.”

— David Makepeace

10.

“You experience the music of the spheres, as Kepler called them, the mechanics of the solar system, in action.”

— Fred Espenak

11.

“Insignificance is not a word I would use. Actually, I feel very special, and all people should feel special that we’re alive and intelligent and conscious, and that we’re able to be aware of our cosmos.”

— Mike Kentrianakis

12.

“It makes you feel a part of the Earth. It makes you feel a part of the cosmos. It makes you feel a part of every single person you’re standing there with. Just for a brief time, we’re not separate. We’re all the same.”

— Rhonda Coleman

13.

“It gives you life insights that you normally get only at times when you’ve experienced loss. How life stands still. You have to take life day by day. You understand that all the things we worry about are really irrelevant. And life is precious. It’s fleeting. And it’s about the moments you have, and the people that you share it with.”

— Kate Russo

You can watch the video in it’s entirety, here: