On Tuesday, I start my day with a walk to the Metro and a trip downtown for a yoga class that is well worth the extra effort. It's not a studio class, but one organized by the teacher for just a small number of students. After work, I ride the Metro one stop down to Takoma Park to meet Pam for another great yoga class with one of my yoga teacher training instructors.
It was cold and clear in the morning, still dark a little before 6 am as I headed out. We've had a lot of cloudy weather this winter and I haven't done a lot of stargazing for a while, so I looked around to see what the sky looked like. Over in the southeast, not high up in the sky, was a bright dot that was much brighter than anything I've seen other than the sun and the moon. I thought, that must be Venus. This was confirmed by a little research later. In fact, Venus is at its brightest this week, according to the Sky and Telescope website.
After work, as I waited on the train platform, the evening sky was growing pale, and the moon hung overhead to the east. I knew that Jupiter was up there in the same area, but the sky was too bright to see it. The train came, and when I arrived in Takoma Park just a few minutes later, the sky had dimmed enough that Jupiter was clearly visible, a little bit above the moon.
The planets are a connection to a larger scale of space and time than I experience in daily life. While far away from the special planet that supports our life, they're related to Earth in the gravity well of the Sun, sailing around in orbital motion for the past several billion years. My awareness of them is recent, reminding me of how my experience of life depends so much, not on what exists, but of the small fraction that I am aware of. What else is out there, just waiting to be noticed?
I'll be watching over the coming weeks to see how long Venus and Jupiter can be my morning and evening Tuesday companions.
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