五分钟看星空及由此引起的思考

Date: 2008.11.05

Title: 5 Minute Sky Watch and Some Thoughts


Last night I watched night sky at my front yard with binoculars. The temperature was about 8 degree; the wind was mild, clear sky.It was almost the perfect condition for sky watch.

At 11-12 pm, Orion is clear as it could be against south east sky just about the horizon (more precisely, rooftop), readily viewable from my bedroom (now Ali’s room) window. The star cloud between the belt of Orion and the right bottom start was able to be seen effortlessly through binoculars. Its mysterious glow was appealing as always.I also watched the most famous start cluster Pleiades, nicknamed “seven sisters”.

After 5 minutes, I retreated back home, felt wholly contented.

Respect Uniqueness and the Importance of Inner Self

The whole viewing session took only a few minutes. You probably think it was an insignificant event, which would be easily forgotten during the next minute house chore.
You might ask: why bother to write about it?

This is a perfect example of that, as human being, sometimes it is very important for an individual to have his or her own moment (space or time). A seemingly unnoticed short period of uneventful life is so important to his or her inner self, but for others, it was so trivial and worthless to even bother to mention.

Human beings are social animals. Social interaction is essential mental nutrition for us to live healthy and to remain sane. On the other hand, because every creature is unique, there are moments belong to his or her self only, and they simply cannot be shared and comprehended completely by anybody else but the “self”.

We need to recognize and respect these uniqueness, first and the foremost in ourselves, and secondly, but equally importantly in others. We should respect our own and other’s space, feelings and emotions, perspective and point of view, respect the difference and individuality expressed along with them.

These rules apply to children too. I emphasize children because they are easily ignored due to their vulnerability and lower status in family and in societies. It’s easy to recognize their tangible needs, but overlook their inner needs – emotions, feelings, opinions and point of views. Even in the cases when those inner needs of our children are indeed dealt with, they are often filtered and sometimes distorted through the will and mind of adults. Adult in general should be more sensible and pay more attention to the expression of needs and feelings of the children’s inner self.

I Need to See Orion

I spent time to write this event because to me this is one of the most meaningful and satisfying 5 minutes I spent this year.

You might think and say: False claim! Foul play!! No way!!! You are bragging and utterly exaggerating!!!!

Well, I do not at all expect you to comprehend it, as this is one of the unique private moments that I mentioned before which only I myself own it, (now I can say, maybe part of it could be shared with my daughter).

Let me explain why.

How It All Started

Last year, I started a new hobby – sky gazing with my daughter.

Sky gazing is one of my childhood dreams which never have had chance to fulfill. With equal enthusiasm from my daughter, we equipped with telescope, binoculars, camera and astronomy books, and spent many wonderful evenings scaling the universe. The satisfaction was immense and many fold: precious time and shared experience with my daughter, fulfilled childhood dream, knowledge of our solar system and universe, and new perspective and appreciation of nature, environment and life. We also went to sky party and took pictures of the sky.

Those shared moments with daughter are so precious. They are not just dad played with child. Those are genuinely shared interests between two parties, in which the role of dad and daughter are blurred and disappeared. We were playmates who happen to be dad and daughter. These are the activities each of us would like to do alone. Doing together simply multiplied the scope and intensified the enjoyment and thrill. Although in body form I am a dad, however, in soul, I could be equal partner with my children. In heart, in many aspects, I see much more in common between adults and children than it was projected by common understanding (by socially and culturally accepted common perspectives). e.g., there are the moments when we enjoy watching” Tom and Jerry” and many other kids movies and when we read Dr. Suess together. I can go on and on, but I don’t like to be too much side-tracked away from the main topic at this moment.

Like Visiting Old Friend

This year, we had been occupied in other activities: gymnastics, evening stroll, taking photos, watching Tom and Jerry as a bedtime routine, replaced reading Dr. Seuss and kids group outings. The whole spring, summer and autumn went by and we never brought out our sky watch equipment once. Now it’s winter again. Although we have filled life with full of activities this passing year, we were somewhat felt pity (something even felt guilty) that we didn’t do any start gazing.

It is a waste of clear sky! And we treasure those good times we spent outside last year and we always want to relive that experience. That is why I said at the beginning that the mere 5 minutes star gazing is so important to me.

It is like visiting old friends. You are full of memories of good times and always wanted to see them again. However, you are overwhelmed by daily chores in order to fulfill the duties that life calls upon us. Although you thought to visit them once in a while, but you never did it until this moment when the urge had grown so strong to the point of no more postpone.

In those five minutes, I watched my favorite constellation Orion with the same awe and inspiration I experience every time I stared at it.

Me and Orion

we started developing interests in night sky last summer with easy target “the summer triangle”, reconnected with childhood old friend” Big Dipper” and Polaris. We also checked out the moons of Jupiter and the famous Saturn ring. I was gradually gaining familiarity and interests with the summer night sky. However, once in a while, If I woke up too early in the morning, I would notice a very distinguish pattern of bright stars right from my bedroom window. It was strikingly bright, and the pattern is unmistakably clear. I was able to tell that this is not part of the summer night sky. I was tried to locate it in sky map but had no luck. Its unique pattern had imprinted in my brain long before I knew it was Orion, even then I could see and feel that it was something important and special. Later when I learned that it was one of the brightest summer sky constellations in Southern hemisphere. There are more bright stars in Orion than in any other constellations in night sky.

I spent more time with Orion than with other part of the sky. I took quite a few long exposure pictures of Orion at home, at front yard and in the cold wild field in the early morning hours. In a 4 inch refractor telescope, the view of the cloud in Orion is unearthly beautiful, its lighting is frightening mysterious.

Then in the rest of the 5 minutes I checked out Pleiades, the most desirable object in the sky to be enjoyed with binoculars. With naked eyes, I can almost recognize it when I saw a patch of lights in the sky, but I can not 100% sure that it is indeed the brightest collections of starts, the“Seven Sisters”. In the view of any binoculars, however, it is indisputably clear even for the first time star glazers. No other group of night sky objects as bright, clear and full of characters in the view of a pair of 10X binoculars.

I Am Contented

Now the winter is coming meanwhile many priority tasks are pilling up. I may not have another chance to bring out binoculars or telescope under the night sky again this year. However, with the 5 minutes amazing experience I had last night, I have somehow made a connection with all the wonderful times we had last year, and with the “old friends” in the night sky. I am quite content and would leave no regret behind.

(Post-Note: An unexpected bonus out of this: when I was writing this article, my daughter read part of it and got quite involved. She commented a few times when she read through parts of this article which relate her: “Daddy, it’s so nice of you in writing this and this”. And she commanded me to write: “My daughter’s favorite night sky object is the Milky Way”).