Images by Marcus J, taken at Orange
Some years ago my friend and I were watching the movie Star Dust, laughing our butts off while sitting there, captivated, by a film meant for children.
We joked that maybe we were too old to learn about the romantic adventures of a fallen Star, masquerading as a woman, but it seems we were about to be outdone. Two elderly women sought us out after the film, saying they hoped we each had a star watching over us, blessing us with their words.
My friend and I looked at each other, secretly chuffed to have stumbled upon ourselves, fifty years in the future – two silver-haired women, seeking magic everywhere and never growing up. --->
We joked that maybe we were too old to learn about the romantic adventures of a fallen Star, masquerading as a woman, but it seems we were about to be outdone. Two elderly women sought us out after the film, saying they hoped we each had a star watching over us, blessing us with their words.
My friend and I looked at each other, secretly chuffed to have stumbled upon ourselves, fifty years in the future – two silver-haired women, seeking magic everywhere and never growing up. --->
A philosopher once asked, "Are we human because we gaze at the stars, or do we gaze at them because we are human?" Pointless, really... "Do the stars gaze back?" Now that’s a question. – Star Dust
Kirisha and I can sometimes (ok, often) be dreamy dorks, nicknaming each other “Starry” and “Moon Beam”, but I’m happy to wear that dorkiness like a cape, because I’m obsessed with the night sky.
It’s difficult to pinpoint why, but when I look to the stars, I feel nothing and everything at the same time, completely enchanted by what looks like one million fireflies, dancing across a river of darkness.
For a brief moment you feel as though you’ve been lifted out of your body and transported, dancing up there with them.
And you can’t look away. Like a masochistic moth to the flame, you’re drunk on moon and star-light.
Content with less, but wanting more.
I think, what else is out there? Surely this can’t be it. And I imagine galaxies brimming with civilisations far beyond our reach, where epic cosmic battles are won and alliances forged. You might say I watch too much Star Wars, (yes, guilty) but Earth is just a single grain of sand in the vast ocean of the Universe, so anything is possible.
Endless possibility - that’s what the stars cheekily twinkle down to me.
I could stand there all night with a telescope in hand, gaping like a wide-eyed fool, until someone nudges me to come inside, because the chattering of my teeth can surely be heard from galaxies far, far away.
And it’s times like these that I wish I was a scientist, so that I could make some speck of sense of it all.
Then I remember that I barely scraped through math with a pass, and I’m content to carry on dreaming about celestial events and to ponder about the moon, that big glowing orb in the sky, changing her face and moving the tides.
 click for larger image |  click for larger image |  click for larger image |
Moving the water in our bodies too, some say; inspiring madness in people when she is full.
Our bodies are 70 percent water, after all, so maybe it isn’t so far-fetched that a moon which moves oceans, could also hold power over the water inside each of us.
Even if science doesn’t support this idea, my day job might. When I first started working as a consultant, my colleagues told me to beware of the full moon. This is when some clients become the most difficult, they warned. My colleagues, perfectly sensible people, who would never indulge in such airy-fairy nonsense (thank you very much), confirmed what I’d long suspected. I quickly learnt to be weary of the shifting moon too.
It may be that I suffer from an over-active imagination, but it pleases me to consider such marvels, all the same.
We are intimately connected to the cosmos, according to renowned astrophysicist, Dr Neil DeGrasse Tyson, who has the science to prove it. He says that our atoms are made of the same matter which lights up the sky, explaining it in the most beautiful way.
Our bodies are 70 percent water, after all, so maybe it isn’t so far-fetched that a moon which moves oceans, could also hold power over the water inside each of us.
Even if science doesn’t support this idea, my day job might. When I first started working as a consultant, my colleagues told me to beware of the full moon. This is when some clients become the most difficult, they warned. My colleagues, perfectly sensible people, who would never indulge in such airy-fairy nonsense (thank you very much), confirmed what I’d long suspected. I quickly learnt to be weary of the shifting moon too.
It may be that I suffer from an over-active imagination, but it pleases me to consider such marvels, all the same.
We are intimately connected to the cosmos, according to renowned astrophysicist, Dr Neil DeGrasse Tyson, who has the science to prove it. He says that our atoms are made of the same matter which lights up the sky, explaining it in the most beautiful way.
“So when I look up at the night sky, and I know that yes, we are part of this Universe, we are in this Universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts, is that the Universe is in us. When I reflect on that fact, I look up, many people feel small because they’re small and the Universe is big, but I feel big, because my atoms came from those stars.” – Astrophysicist Dr Neil DeGrasse Tyson
Never have I felt this connection more strongly than when I was in Orange, in rural New South Wales. My cousins and I had trekked out to the bush in a yellow truck, which broke down, leaving us stranded. We were swallowed in complete darkness, leading to a few heart-pumping moments, after finding ourselves tangled in the webs of some menacing spiders. But it was worth it, for the view.
In the absence of any light, the Milky Way looked as though someone had set it on fire. Maybe I need to get out more, but that was the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen, forever etched into my mind.
Nearly forgetting that I was meant to keep breathing, it seemed as though every cell in my body had exploded into a fiery blaze, just to mirror the stars.
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