The Night Sky

There are those who say we've lost the night sky. Especially in urban areas where the light pollution leaks upward to create an orange glow. And it's true. There are fewer stars in the city. In northern Wisconsin you'd swear you can see entire galaxies of stars. And the woods are deadly silent. You hear crickets, maybe the wind, maybe the fire. It's beautiful.

But there's beauty in the city too. Just past my porch, there's a streetlight sifting through the green leaves. The sound of the Orange Line in the distance. A plane crosses the sky like a shooting star, with red and green lights on the wings. The dimly lit porch across the street. The rooms sitting silently inside their windows.

In the wilderness, there's an expanse of nothing that stretches out over bodies of water. In Manitowoc, there's the lighthouse, the marina, Memorial Drive twisting it's way to Two Rivers. In San Diego, there's the Ocean Beach pier. The ghostly restaurant. The waves crashing inward. The lonesome fishermen crawling through the night.

Even if the streets are barren, there's the strings of lights fading into the distance. On a highway in Wyoming there's just you, and the asphalt, and the yellow lines. The darkness is deafening. In the city it's the same. The yellow lines. The symmetry. The angles. The stoplights turning from red to green.

The city. The wilderness. Both beautiful if you know where to look.

Beauty is where you find it.