“The cosmos is all that is, or ever was, or ever will be.”

“We are star-stuff.”

— Dr. Carl Sagan

It is no secret that I love to stand outdoors on a clear night and drink in the beauty of the moon and the stars and the planets and celebrate how wonderful it is to be a small, but significant, speck in the midst of all-that-is.  How fitting that Carl Sagan’s birthday should fall at the time of the full moon.

Last night was a beautiful night for star gazing; but my eyes are always drawn first to the incredible moon, who in her present fullness rules the night sky.  Like the tides of the ocean, I feel drawn by her magnetism, ebbing and flowing as she goes through her phases; and on a full-moon night I can stand for a very long time, just gazing at her beauty.  What pulls me away from her radiance is the realization that, of all that I see when I gaze toward the heavens, the moon is the smallest and least significant of all the lights that shine through the night.

Far beyond the lunar mirror that reflects the light of the hiding sun, there are planets.  Some show themselves as I look to the heavens.  Right now, Jupiter asserts his presence, looking like little more than an extra-large star.  As I stretch my imagination and try to wrap it around the idea that each star is like our own sun, I feel myself drawn far beyond the obvious moon and into a vastness that defies my imagination.  Are there other specks like me standing in their own back yards and gazing at their own moons and dreaming that maybe I exist?

If we are part of all-that-is, then truly we are made of star stuff.  I close my eyes for a moment; and when I open them again, the lights in the sky seem brighter than ever.  I turn my eyes inward and imagine the spot of light that is the star stuff deep inside of me.  Some folks say that when they stand outside under a dark night sky, they feel very alone.  They tell me that the darkness blurs the world around them and leaves them feeling abandoned in the night.  It is easy to feel alone when there is nothing visible to assure us that the world still exists; but if we let the stars pull us into the vast universe of all-that-is, we will understand that we are never alone.  After all, we are made of star stuff.