I am trying to find inspiration for an essay. I feel empty and kind of down. No ideas. Good thing I’m outside playing with my kid. He finds everything amusing. What happens to us when we grow up? 

I look up and I stare at the sky. A tiny bright spot appears. Twilight still fills the sky, but they start to appear one by one. I stare at them and a river of pulses happens in my body. It is so majestic. When I see them, there are no doubts. Feeling small is no longer a burden but a blessing. More emerge. I am in awe. 

There is an explanation for what I’m feeling, looking up changes the brain’s blood circulation. My consciousness awakens. I only needed the stars.

Wanderer starts

How could objects in the sky affect us? They are just masses of elements, some undergoing nuclear reactions far, far away, others, a soup of gases or rocks all gravitating to being balls, like heavy bubbles.

For a long time humans couldn’t tell apart one from another. The Greek called a few celestial objects “πλανήτης” (planētēs) meaning “wanderer”, because they noticed their trajectories were different from the regular background of others. And because of this, they named them after their gods. I am a wanderer, but definitely not a God, at most I might be a little like Narcissus. 

Do you remember looking at a planet? Most people, unaware, have seen Mars as a red dot; in Asia they call it the “fire star”. The first time I looked into a telescope, it was pointed at Saturn. Those rings! I thought it was fake, a stamp on the lens.

Feeling small is no longer a burden but a blessing.

When I look up, I feel connected to all those who have stared at the sky. All those lives that have given us innovation: Galileo looking up for the first time at Mars through a telescope; the Mayans building a pyramid that makes the illusion of a serpent every equinox, and recently, SpaceX engineers landing a rocket on chopsticks. All of them wanted to expand the horizon for humanity. 

Looking at the celestial roof makes us wonder. Gazing at these specks sparks creativity. We organize the tiny dots in 88 constellations that divide the dome, like a beautiful ceiling, but enclosing us within walls, like a barrier. A prison. The chains are our ignorance, behind the jail lay the mysteries of the universe. An open invitation to escape, to explore the vast unknown. When I was a kid  I wanted to be an astronaut but I never dared to tell anyone. It was too mainstream, I used to say a taxi driver, instead. People laughed. Little did they know I wanted to drive people out of this world. To reach beyond the stars. 

Strange events 

In July 2020, I downloaded the Sky Guide app with the objective of learning more about an uncommon phenomena. There was a recently discovered comet. I prepared to leave home at 2 am. Headed to the darkest and tallest place I could think of. A few fellow gazers were there, I knew I was on the right path. After adjusting my eyes, I saw it. With my naked eyes. A dusty shiny silver comet. The NEOWISE F3. What a spectacle!

I remember thinking how ancient people would have given a divine interpretation to such a strange image. I couldn’t stop myself from doing so. Months earlier, in December, I almost lost my life to a strange infection. I coughed my soul out of my body until I finally was reunited with my family and started to improve. I was a 10 kilogram (22lb) skinnier version of me with a mental fogginess that still has traces today. The world changed completely for most of us during the period the comet was around, particularly the peak happened when the comet was visible. Perhaps it’s more than just a coincidence.

Cosmic events happen all the time and we don’t notice. Especially now with all the fabricated lights. Is hard to escape from light pollution. I must confess I have never seen the Milky Way. We have changed beautiful landscapes in the wild for cozy cities. Los Angelinos experienced the discomfort of having a power outage, years ago. Police reports poured in, but the cases were beyond the expected vandalism. LA was surprised to see a sky full of lights. They were reporting our suspicious-looking galaxy! 

I’ve missed my opportunity (ies!) to see the Aurora Borealis in California. What significance would the ancients have given to such extraordinary events. Does it mean anything to you? The sun has been more active, burping flares. I hope the sky provides some wisdom.

Our tiny universe

There are infinite numbers of luminous spheroids of plasma held together by self-gravity  [w] with even more infinite numbers of planets. We could give one galaxy to each person on Earth,and we would still havetons to spare. Your own birthright galaxy. Sadly, we are on Earth fighting over, what!? Darkness and ignorance. 

Oh! I have to pause my contemplations and run! My son is taking away another little one’s toy by force! I have to intervene. He is less than two, but he is a big go-getter, entitled, beautiful, and curious brat. We begin inclined towards selfishness but not all of us learn to share. Society fails to spark humanity in many of our children. We deprive many minds from an abundance mentality. I’ll do my best to be a guiding force to my son, showing him that he is and has enough. 

Where was I? Ah, yeah! Plots of majestic landscapes for you to explore. The catch is: you have to get there. I dream of humans helping each other to reach our own personal space. Where we can be free. Sending rockets not missiles. Together in a quest to conquer only one thing: our limits. 

Son, the sky’s the limit… if we share. He is too young to even understand the irony of the sky being infinite. That there are no boundaries, only our mental constructions. I also forget it quite often. Let’s get home, 5 more minutes of play –I call.

My north stars

We are in the most beautiful place in the universe. I have to constantly remind myself of that. I am where I am supposed to be. I am what the universe gifted me to be. There are just too damn many distractions, artificial brightness. Shiny diverters that dazzle us, blinding us from seeing true beauty. We circle them like moths. We keep crashing hard into the black glass of our desires. Are they even ours? Are they true? Is this the best life we engineer for ourselves? 

I take another look at the sky. Airplanes. Flying machines, I love them. I wish I could fly my own. I have to work harder so I can take lessons. I need to do better work if I want to inspire people to build spaceships. I am not being influential enough. Hugo, stop! Look beyond. Gaze at the stars.

We are connected with the celestials through  light. Photons travel unrecognizable distances to land in our brains, not different from the neuron’s energy that makes you blink or think. Energy pulses. Subtle light causes a huge rush in our bodies. The energy of the universe enters my eyes. 

Let’s continue our family routine before it becomes late. We don’t want to mess up our sleep. This family needs structure if we want to be energized. Wow! I am blessed to have my bear cubs. I call my wife Osita, little bear. She is my Ursa major, and now I have a Ursa minor who needs story time.

Is easy to get lost. You know who doesn’t get lost? Those who know the sky. Those who see the start and recognize where to go. They have their own GPS. A guiding map. It’s there for all of us, but we forget. 

We are surrounded by people that shine shy. Well, some are very bright, so we call them movie stars or any other kind of influencers. I want to inspire people, but just as we forget that the Sun is a star right here, I forget that my main focus should be on my own tribe, my shiny sun and moon. I want to make my son proud of me. Maybe I will someday. In my fantasy I tell him: “I helped us, human and life, to reach farther and further”. 

“How?” –he asks–  “I only asked people to look at the stars, they did the rest.”

I keep a Kurtzgesagt poster of the Night Sky in my office, and there is an awkward space due to the disparity between the American frame and the European poster. I fill it with photos of my family. Together, I have a map of my guiding stars. When I feel off, I look at  the pictures and I feel located.  I remember where I am, where I am going, and why I am doing what I do. There is no darkness. Only my own personal space, full of stars.