So Many Stars!

The other morning, my five-year-old grandson, Caleb, was up early with me at about 6:15. It was still dark out, and, even though it was cold, I stepped out onto the back deck to view the cloudless sky. As a portent of winter, Orion guarded the early morning sky. Only a few other stars were visible. I called to Caleb to come out on the deck with me, and I pointed out the stars of Orion. He counted those stars and the few others that were still visible in the approaching dawn . . . “eleven, twelve, thirteen! Wow! So many stars, Grandma!”

So many stars, indeed! Last night, a friend and I walked to the clearing at the top of my driveway at the lake to view the sky at 2:45 a.m. It was very dark and cold. We saw why the Psalmist sang, "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above shows his handiwork" (Ps. 19: 1). We gazed up at the sky for so long that our necks became sore and we became dizzy.

Tonight, once again, we went to the clearing at the top of the driveway. This time, we were on a quest for the Coat Hanger, a deep-sky object in that dark valley of the Milky Way near Cygnus. We stood in the middle of the road where the sky is most open. I scanned the sky but couldn’t find what I was looking for. I moved my focus a bit to the right, a bit up, a bit over, but couldn’t zero in on it. Resigned, I commented out loud: “I can’t spot; it’s too . . . OKAY, I FOUND IT!” Then I looked away and found it again. And looked away and found it again. Now I knew where to look.

I handed the binoculars over and pointed out where it was. At first, the Coat Hanger was elusive, but within minutes, I could tell by the excitement in my friend’s voice that she had found it. She counted the stars in the horizontal part of the “hanger”: "One, two, three, four, five, six . . ." and the ones in the hanger’s hook: “and one, two, three, four.” I knew she had seen it clearly.

Then we put the real plan for tonight's outing into action. We spread two plastic picnic tablecloths on the driveway and we lay down and covered ourselves with a comforter to keep warm. From this reclining position, our eyes drank in the Milky Way, that fog of stars that stretched from the northwest across the expanse of the heavens to the southeast over the lake. To our left, the Seven Sisters of the Pleiades winked at us through the branches of the trees. The binoculars felt heavy as we held them to our eyes, but the resulting view showed so many stars!

We lay there for a while, just listening to the stars speak to us, all the while hoping no errant driver would turn down our driveway by mistake. Despite the diamond dust above us, we weren't very comfortable. My neck and back were cold, even though I had on a t-shirt, a sweater, a sweatshirt, a jacket, a scarf, a toque, gloves, and, under my jeans, pyjama pants as a second layer. But we were happy. We had found what we were looking for. And that wasn't easy, amid so many stars.