Lost in the Stars

Let’s talk about my love affair with space today.

I have always been fascinated by space and all things celestial. I mean, who isn’t? Who can stop themselves from staring at the beauty of a sky full of stars or a pale hanging full moon? Who can avoid having their mind be absolutely blown when they first learn about the nine(Now, eight) planets of various colours and sizes? When you hear that we are going around the sun and not the other way around? Unbelievable! Life as you know it is completely changed. Well, it is, if you’re me.

It started simply enough. When I was very little, I could not get over the magical phenomenon of stars. How those tiny twinkling lights came in the sky every night and disappeared before I woke up. How the moon was a different shape every day. How some stars were brighter than the others. How sometimes I would catch the moon in the day and feel triumphant, just like I felt when I raced the sun and moon from my car window. (And never won!)

Indian culture values star a lot. Hindus have their own branch of astrology and when a baby is born, a map of all the planet positions at the time of their birth is used to predict the kind of person they will become and the life they will have. Thus, my first celestial education was cultural, courtesy of my parents. I learnt about the myth of the pole star, called the Dhruva Tara, named after a little boy named Dhruva. I also learnt about the Saptarishi, the constellation named for the 7 great sages of the Vedic period and many many more fascinating stories.

Then, came to primary school, where I truly and firmly realized that I adored all things to do with space. I loved to hear about the planets, the galaxies, the suns, the moons and the comets. I bought encyclopedia on encyclopedia and read them cover to cover and more still. I thought, I never could know enough about space, and I still stand by that. I even bought a children’s telescope and spent so much time futilely tinkering away at it. (I lived in a metropolitan city and it was a pretty weak telescope, so there was very little hope.) By the time I was 11, I had decided that my life’s goal was going to space and decided that I just had to become an astronaut.

I eventually came back to earth and began to calm down my PDA with space. I expressed my love for it by reading science fiction, more encyclopedias (I was a big encyclopedia kid), watching for stars and constellations whenever I could and most importantly letting people I was comfortable with know every space fact I could remember. As I’m sure they will unhappily vouch, the latter is a personality trait that has still not changed.

As an adult growing up in the heart of urbanity, I hardly get to see the stars in the sky. I adore going on vacations to the mountains or the hinterlands and getting to watch a sky full of stars. There is nothing quite like it. On one particular vacation, we were lucky enough to be staying at a resort that had a high-resolution telescope at hand, and you bet your heart I had a gala time with it. I saw galaxies and the divots of the moon and whatnot, it was the highlight of my vacation, and that is saying a lot because this vacation involved lots of strawberries and I adore those.

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Photos I took through the telescope lens!

I still love finding constellations, saying the random hello to Venus or Mars and if I’m lucky, Jupiter and most importantly, tracking important celestial events and trying my best to catch them, despite the suffocation of living in a concrete jungle. Recently, the big one I failed to see was the comet Neo Wise. I left my house for the first time since the pandemic in hopes to catch it, so you understand that I really tried. On a regular day, there are meteor showers that I rue missing and stay up at night to hopefully catch.

I long for a future where I can travel to catch these wondrous phenomena, where I can visit observatories and get up close and personal with stars, moons, planets, comets, solar systems and galaxies. As I bow out, I wish upon all the stars to always be just as mesmerized by a sky full of stars as I am today and I was at 3 years old. Here’s to hoping that the magic never ever dies!

THIS POST’S QUESTION: Are you obsessed with space as well? Is it like my obsession or completely different? Comment below with what you think about it,I’d love to hear from you!