Stop stressing and stare at the closest supermoon we've seen in 69 years

This Monday, the early morning night sky will be treated to an extra special supermoon. You may be asking yourself "what’s the point?"; It feels like there’s a new supermoon every other month, and there are other bigger things to worry about right now. Well, here’s the deal: it’s going to be big — the closest supermoon the Earth has seen in the past 69 years.

The Moon’s distance to Earth isn’t a constant because our satellite is in elliptical orbit — meaning its proximity to our planet is always changing. Meanwhile, the Moon goes through phases, depending on where it is in relation to the Sun and how much sunlight it receives. Whenever the full moon phase coincides with the Moon’s closest approach to Earth — known as perigee — that’s when we call it super.

These two events happen at different rates, so it takes a while for them to sync up. "Just like if you’re in your car, and you’ve got your turn signal on and you’re behind a car with its turn signal on, every once in awhile the turn signals sort of appear to sync up and fall out of sync," Noah Petro, deputy project scientist for NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter mission, tells The Verge.

There are differing definitions for a supermoon, though. One interpretation is that a supermoon occurs when the full Moon is within 90 percent of its closest approach to Earth. That’s why it may seem like we get a supermoon every other weekend. But for NASA and others, the definition is a little more exclusive: it’s the closest full moon that occurs during the 14-month cycle of full moons. Under that umbrella, we really only get a supermoon about once a year.

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