Night Sky

Not long ago I wrote about how I finally got contacts but, I'm sorry to say, I just don't wear them that often. Busy-ness, forgetting, and hassle-factors all aggravate the reality that is this neglect. I did manage to go camping once while wearing them, and had a epiphanic moment while looking at the stars. My well-loved and often-sought night sky. But the stars I see in the light-polluted, contact lens-free display of my backyard has no comparison to the brilliant vista I witnessed, outhouse-bound, in that dewy field. With my contacts: breath-taking!

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Why are we, humankind, still so captured by the star-studded sky? (Popular radio songs come quickly to mind, among many similar pop culture references.) Why do we look up and feel a budding incomprehension but dreamlike wonder? How do we see something--recognize it with our eyes--and yet still be unable to comprehend its spanse, its meaning? It touches our brains and our souls, our sense of beauty, but we know it just enough to know that it is unknowable--our cognizance can't take that in. We see one level of indescribable beauty only to realize that in each twinkle of light is a blazing wonder of heat and color and sense...We hold a grain of salt to our tongue and attempt to grasp the sight and contents of the ocean.

But at least it pushes us to try. We continue to look at the night sky and are awash in a tingling awe we don't understand. But we recognize it, and continue to gaze.