The Night Sky Sun

As some of you may have noticed, in previous writings, I have a fascination with other worldly bodies, in the astrological sense. I often take my telescope out and look heavenward. I don't know what I'm looking for but there is this intense pull, telling me the answer is out there. The answer to what I don't know. The question I don't know either. It's just there.

I enjoy sunrise and sunsets and the pallet of soft warm colors they produce when they illuminate this world. My other fascination is with the moon. The number of sunrises and sunsets can't compare to the number of slides I have of the moon.

The moon I often reefer to as the "Night Sky Sun." Just think about that. When the moon is better than three quarters full the light it casts on the night time surroundings gives an almost surreal look. Unfortunately the moon's light is not soft and warm like the rising or setting sun. It is a cooler light, which seems welcome on a hot summer night and even colder on a wintry snow scape. One poet / songwriter referred to the moon as a "cold hearted orb, that rules the night . . . ", and others have referenced the cold sterile illumination that is cast from the night sky. The full moon often brings forboding and a sense of the paranormal. While all of this may have some truth, I still see something else. Something deeper. The moon, in all of it's night time splendor, can often hide right in plain sight.

Sometimes it's up early in the afternoon, while the sun is hard at work, burning away trying to get a head start on the night. Other times it stays around long after the sun has risen in the morning as a stoic reminder to see that the transition between night and day is complete. Some of my favorite views are when the moon is just a fragile sliver hanging on the cusp of the day between dark and twilight. And while it is suspended, often near the western horizon the remainder of the dark moon is silhouetted in the transitional sky.

But somewhere between that slim crescent and the first quarter the true mystery of the universe is exposed. A very simple observation. No need for astrophysicists, rocket scientists or any of the collective acedemia. An observation so simple a child could see it and understand. And it is in this simplistic view that the true beauty is reviealed.

The illuminated part of the moon looks very much like a thumb nail. The white of the moons reflection is the part of the nail above the quick and the remainder the rest of the nail. Can this simple observation mean that our world is truly held in the hands of God and this is one of the few times he shows himself to us? Seeing the beauty and the majesty of our earth in the simplest of forms proves that a greater power is overseeing the entire process. A process that we corrupt, take for granted and over complicate just to serve ourselves? Is this how we define ourselves?

Has our quest for the unknown taken us so far afield we fail to see the simplest things? It is true that we cannot see the forest for the trees? I can see the tree, and it is good. I see the sunrise and it's promise of a new day. I see the sunset and know that the day is growing to a close. And I see the Night Sky Sun and know that we are truly in his hands no matter how we try to screw it up. Shine on Harvest Moon, Shine On!