Last night was a clear night for south Louisiana. The stars shone as bright as they could, given the light pollution, which unfortunately existed some miles outside of Baton Rouge. It was clear enough, however, to see something not seen often around here - the planet Mercury. Soon after sunset, I found a clear view to the western horizon. Venus, the evening star, was all dressed up and ready to dance. As promised, in Venus' 4 o'clock position, was a fainter but definitely visible Mercury. Wow. I could imagine, hundreds and thousands of years ago, people watched the night sky and saw how the stars' pattern remained the same, except for what were the planets. That must have confounded those ancient astronomers - what were these possessed points of light that moved separately from the template of stars? What sort of genius were Copernicus and Galileo to figure out that we're part of a solar system of planets orbiting our sun?
Several years ago, when I was working a summer job, one of the employees brought a telescope on a clear night. Although I was a faithful and hard-working employee, I was still on graveyard. I could hear my boss telling his supervisor: "Yeah, Ingram's good - he's real good - he's just not ready for the show yet." Anyway, this fella was a bit of an astronomy buff. He set up his telescope, tweaked it, and said "Take a look." I said "What am I looking at?" He said, "You'll know". I put my eye to the lens and saw - it all its glory - Saturn and its rings. I was like the cartoon character whose jaw dropped four feet. It was one thing to read about and see pictures of Saturn and the rings, but quite another to actually see it! Wow, I thought. So those science books weren't lying to me after all. He next then focused on Jupiter - I could easily see the four moons Galileo saw, as well as Jupiter's cloud bands. I couldn't see the Great Red Spot, though, and my astronomer friend confirmed that it was on the other side of the planet. Still, though, truly amazing.
Something about he night sky that always draws me to look, to really look. To imagine those worlds out there, the life on those worlds. Some silly part of me imagines the space station Deep Space Nine out there, Benjamin Sisko, Garak and Julian Bashir. I've been lucky enough to be out in the wilderness, hundreds of miles from a city, and see the night sky so full of stars I had trouble making out the familiar constellations. It's a bit of a letdown, even a little depressing, as I watched Venus and Mercury, to know the other thousands of stars that are out there, but unseen in that particular night sky.
