I am a self proclaimed star gazer, my husband translates that to space nerd, but my daughter prefers the term “nerb.” The nerb is spoken between bubbly baby talk and usually produces a couple of bubbles when she really gets going. Sort of like staccato “nerb nerb nerb nerb.” You will note the lack of any type of interpunctuation, it is just “nerb.”
But they are both correct. I got my first telescope when I was ten. I remember the day clearly. It was Christmas and it was one of those presents that a lot of kids in my age wouldn’t have known what to do with. It was also one of those gifts that the gift giver has always secretly wanted themselves. But what it also did was give us a chance to bond with one another. The weather was as you can imagine cold, there was a light snow on the ground, but the sky was crystal clear. As you can imagine I was absolutely determined to go out and try it out that night.
As you may also imagine my father was a willing participant. We spent about three hours that first night looking at the sky. We were both inexperienced, we could tell you that we saw stars, but that is about it. Over the course of the next year we both got better and we spent countless night looking at the sky together. We witnessed some of the many amazing wonders that our galaxy has to share. We chased speeding comets, danced through stardust, and learned the names of everything that we could.
It became a past time for us that continues to this day. Our equipment has gotten better and few of our family and friends understand the hobby, but they don’t need to understand it for us to enjoy ourselves. My husband expressed interest once, we even tried to wait for a meteor shower, but the spectacle was understandably uninteresting for him.
As you can imagine this is a topic that has interested me for a long time. As I was trying out the gallery I decided to use that as the subject for photos. Well, one thing led to another and I made a whole gallery post. Now I want to try it again and make it a little more coherent. I might even turn it into a series, who knows.
