A Boat, A Sky, A Passion

I grew up around boats and spent some time at sea. My natural affinity for mathematics led me to an appreciation of celestial navigation. I became fascinated with the spherical trigonometry which makes possible the "magical" transformation of celestial observations into one's latitude and longitude. Studying celestial navigation, I learned basic astronomy - how the sun, moon and planets move.

There is nothing quite so awesome as the night sky as seen from the deck of a small boat far at sea. Far enough from land on a moonless night, the sea is utterly black. No light pierces the darkness, save perhaps the feeble glow of your own running lights, and yet all around you is in motion - the deck beneath your feet, the sea in all directions, the wind blowing gently but incessantly. The experience can be disorienting. In the midst of all this energy and motion, the fathomless vault of the sky overhead stands in staggering contrast. You pitch and sway, but the jeweled heavens stand frozen above from horizon to horizon - and oh, what a sight! With nothing to pollute the light of billions of distant suns, the sky is quite literally bursting with structure and pattern. One can read navigation charts in the brilliant glow of the Milky Way.

No landscape changes as incessantly as that of a seamen and yet each night the familiar sky re-emerges again and again. No wonder ancient mariners found comfort in the night sky. No wonder they placed symbols of their deepest fears and their greatest heroes in the familiar patterns of the stars. Each night brings a familiar face to the ceaseless motion of the day.

However, a serious study of astronomy is a terrestrial enterprise. Mine began much more recently, when I built a Dobsonian telescope and began regularly exploring the sky with my young son. That was six short years ago. Six years of watching the steady progression of the constellations sweep across the sky as the Earth plies its annual route around the Sun. Six years marking the planets in their own orbital dances. In that time, I've learned a great deal, especially an appreciation for how much there is still to learn. Perhaps most importantly, I've gained a sense of the machinery of the cosmos. The casual observer glancing occasionally at the sky sees a static, cold thing, frozen in time, perhaps uninteresting. But observe over time and an entirely different picture emerges. To see the moons of Jupiter swing around their Jovian master, to watch the shadow of Io traverse the face of Jupiter in a few hours, to measure Venus's progression through phases of giant crescent to tiny gibbous and back again - all these merge together over time into a rich tapestry of the eternal celestial dance playing out all around us, just over our heads. Those with a little patience are copiously rewarded!

From time to time, I teach astronomy to elementary school children. I tell them one of the most important things they can do now and for the rest of their lives is go outside at night and look up. Astronomy is as simple as that. Really, that's what all astronomers do, for that's where astronomy truly begins and ends. Whether you're on a snow-capped mountain, in a featureless desert, in a deep river canyon or on the pitching deck of a small boat at sea, don't forget to look up. You will see those old familiar friends there and perhaps a new wonder or two. And if you are far from home, perhaps feeling a bit lonely - a bit overwhelmed by daily life - those familiar friends of the night sky can bring comfort. They always do to me.