Star Dust

Stardust drifted down and I’m pretty sure I felt it lightly kiss my cheeks as I stood face-to- pre-dawn-sky with a wild look that only a blue-white meteor streaking across the sky gives me. My scream of delight echoed down the mountain and across the valley. A coyote might have howled in answer.

The massive fireball seemed to slow time and even now, as I sit pondering it, the meteor seems suspended in space and time. Forever etched in my mind, I see it.

I returned from Waterrock Knob last evening of imaging the comets…two of them…and visiting with other night sky lovers. I didn’t expect to awaken so early, but meteors call. And the Orion Nebula…I’ve missed it. A lot. It’s a part of my life since it shared some of its mystery last winter. It felt like a dear friend returning to my life.

We’ve had so many cloudy nights for months, with only one or two mostly clear nights. Last night’s viewing was near perfection with no moon, clear skies, two comets, a meteor shower…a star gazer’s dream.

Stars open me to the vastness of Infinity and are a key to unlocking my inner infinity. Being under their blanket of swirling, twirling light grounds me in the present moment and reminds me that human problems and politics and all of that are simply a tiny blip in time  and space. Madmen leave a mark, but a very tiny and insignificant one in the eons of existence. May I remember this truth.

When weather and celestial events come together like they did last night and this morning, I find my inner constellations glowing bright again and my heart beating strong with the beauty of the Universe.