"The stars are made of the same atoms as the earth."

I usually pick one small topic like this to give a lecture on.
Poets say science takes away from the
beauty of the stars -- mere gobs of gas atoms.

Nothing is "mere."

I too can see the stars on a desert night, and feel them.
But do I see less or more? The vastness of the heavens stretches my imagination -- stuck on this carousel my little eye can catch one-million-year-old light.
A vast pattern -- of which I am a part -- perhaps my stuff was belched from some forgotten star, as one is belching there.

Or see them with the greater eye of Palomar, rushing all apart from some common starting point when they were perhaps all together.

What is the pattern, or the meaning, or the why?
It does not do harm to the mystery to know a little about it.

For far more marvelous is the truth than any artists of the past imagined!
Why do the poets of the present not speak of it?
What men are poets who can speak of Jupiter if he were like a man, but if he is an immense spinning sphere of methane and ammonia must be silent?"
-- Richard P. Feynman (1918-1988)

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I am currently in the midst of a massive "pulling in" on LJ, posting a lot less than I used to, reading a lot less, and using filters for posting and reading within that. If I "friend" you, I might not read your journal very often. I am trying to change the way I use LJ in order to successfully complete two degrees over the next few years. I will also unfriend anyone who unfriends me or deletes a journal, unless I know the reasons why I shouldn't. If you friend me, and I don't already know you from elsewhere, I might not reciprocate. If we have a lot of friends or interests in common, I'll probably check out your LJ off and on for a few weeks and see how we might fit into each other's time and energy allotments. I apologize for all this, it's very different from how I've used LJ in the past, but it's necessary.

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afsers -- For folks who are somehow affiliated with AFS exchange programs, including exchange students, host families, returnees, volunteers, etc.
birdlovers -- For people who watch, feed, study, or otherwise love wild birds.
bisexual -- Topic-specific journal for bisexuals and allies, and about bisexuality.
geographile -- Currently dead-quiet journal for people who love geography and its related sciences, might change over time.
helpers -- "When I was a child and would see scary things on the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.'" - Mister Rogers
marybobary -- For people named Mary.
oaklandca -- About Oakland, California.
ohlonecollege -- About Ohlone College, Fremont, California
ouchygrumpy -- For griping about pain and other funkiness related to chronic illness and conditions.

Want to be my "friend," by LJ's definition?

1. I don't reciprocate friending for most people I don't know from elsewhere "online" or in real life. I used to, and over a handful of years on LJ, I accumulated too large a friends list for me to manage and be fair to everyone. I had to ignore some people, and that didn't seem right. Thus, you can friend me if you like, you don't need to ask, but I'll likely only reciprocate if we somehow have some other connection that feels close enough to me, online or offline. I might, but won't necessarily, go start reading your journal now and then when I have time, and if I feel like a connection is there or could be there, I'll reciprocate. But I might not. It depends on how overwhelmed with life in general, and LJ on a smaller scale, I'm feeling at the time.


2. When/if I reciprocate, or if you're already on my friends list, or if I add you to mine, you should read these posts about my posting filters: 1, 2.

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