For most of my life I lived where comets couldn't be seen; I'd become convinced that only astronomers with monster scopes and super ephemera could possibly see comets. Heck, just seeing the Milky Way or an aurora was a big deal... and then we moved to Maine, where the Milky Way fills the sky regularly, and where auroras sometimes also the fill the sky with shimmer and sheets and curtains of color.
Then, two years in a row, we had comets that were naked eye, walk-out-on-the-deck-and-see-it visible. I had a job that had me driving all over the state... and I could see the comets easily while I was driving up and down I-95 for work...
But by then I'd found that I was missing comets; that it wasn't unusual for there to be several viewable comets in the sky at once. I'd gotten good at the naked eye viewing and once or twice managed to spot "binocular and small scope" comets without an instrument, right from our deck.
So now we have a small telescope, and binoculars, and clear sky. Comets are (when visible, at least) more changeable than planets, more lasting than meteors, more ephemeral and less predictable than eclipses; they can be colorful (Comet Macholz was green. Really green.)and they are a connection to a universe we can't change by legislation, and one that falls outside the ordinary.
Sense of wonder. I feel a kinship with the wanderers. And who knows -- one day I might be able to discover or rediscover one. Actual, practical astronomy is still within my reach! That's cool.
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ninetydegrees
Re: Comets?
2005-03-25 13:39 (UTC)For most of my life I lived where comets couldn't be seen; I'd become convinced that only astronomers with monster scopes and super ephemera could possibly see comets. Heck, just seeing the Milky Way or an aurora was a big deal... and then we moved to Maine, where the Milky Way fills the sky regularly, and where auroras sometimes also the fill the sky with shimmer and sheets and curtains of color.
Then, two years in a row, we had comets that were naked eye, walk-out-on-the-deck-and-see-it visible. I had a job that had me driving all over the state... and I could see the comets easily while I was driving up and down I-95 for work...
But by then I'd found that I was missing comets; that it wasn't unusual for there to be several viewable comets in the sky at once. I'd gotten good at the naked eye viewing and once or twice managed to spot "binocular and small scope" comets without an instrument, right from our deck.
So now we have a small telescope, and binoculars, and clear sky. Comets are (when visible, at least) more changeable than planets, more lasting than meteors, more ephemeral and less predictable than eclipses; they can be colorful (Comet Macholz was green. Really green.)and they are a connection to a universe we can't change by legislation, and one that falls outside the ordinary.
Sense of wonder. I feel a kinship with the wanderers. And who knows -- one day I might be able to discover or rediscover one. Actual, practical astronomy is still within my reach! That's cool.