Stargazing

Tonight Saturn is so very bright and strongly yellow in the northern sky. I don't remember it being so bright before. In the city I don't use a telescope in recent years. I cannot escape bright street lights at the studio. Years ago when Pablo was young and Leif was an infant we put together a 6 inch reflecting telescope. I painted Johansen & Sons on the tube. That was in Cairns. I remember the first time we saw Saturn in the telescope. We found it low in the eastern sky. It was the strangest sight. The rings were nearly edge on and it looked like a ball with a nail through it.

I regularly go to the web sites for the Martian rovers and the Cassini space craft at Saturn. These photos are from Cassini. I dream of being at Jupiter or Saturn and being able to wake up to this wondrous sight. Other people want to go to the Grand Canyon, I want to go to outer space. I look up and see Alpha Centauri and imagine being there and not looking back at Sol, but looking further afield to other stars and new dreams.