Just past twilight I heard a call from the back yard. “Come,see.” I walked into an explanation and followed a pointed finger to be aware this was the great planetary alignment of 2025. Simple version is seven of the planets were visible to the naked eye. The span of viewing varied by where you were and fractions of time that passed between various looks. Earth was not visible to me because I was standing on its solid core and Pluto in far distant reaches has been disfranchised. This is our solar system : a sun star and what is bound to circling it by gravity’s pull.
This sighting wasn’t impressive even if it was unusual. What evokes breath catching gasps or demands that we drag a quilt to a open field, lying in quiet darkness to watch luminous glows fill the blackness above us are the multiple stars that seem to occupy all empty space. A comet or a shooting star at times interrupt the glow with its flash of motion. . Size may define a Nova or a Supernova. Astro scientists have a map locating a Black Hole whose gravity is so strong that not even light can escapes its clutches. Early sea migrations of humans were charted by noting the position of guiding stars.
Most of us have a star story. We can declare with delight the multisyllabic names of specific groups such as the Andromeda Galaxy and Cassiopeia Constellations. Some of our ties are about art. ” The Starry Night”could be a marketing tool to define stars’ amazing attraction. An author has a book about seven sisters with the defining connect being The Pleiades. Even I who can’t with surety find the Big Dipper and the North Star knew how to glance to the south of my sidewalk as I walked toward the morning paper in October and noted it was time for Orion’s Belt again. All drawings of stars are recognizable. A child comes running to a parent waving maybe four lines crossing on a sheet of paper and proclaims, “Look, I drew a star!” Midst such richness, a long ago Hebrew song writer summed up the dome above us and our reponse to, “Come, See!”
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?[c]
Psalm 8:3 – 4
Let Me Tell Ya 