- Neha Makhija
Empty, empty, empty. There was absolutely nothing in sight. The nothingness was uncomfortable, unnatural, uncanny. Frantically, she looked everywhere at once. Her hands and head worked in tandem, hysterically going through every cupboard and cabinet, investigating every shelf and drawer, rummaging through all sorts of containers and jars. Nothing.
Even the cheese slices in the fridge were over. Yes, there were some apples around, a papaya too, unflavoured biscuits and those distinctly funny tasting chips. But she wasn't going to eat that. It wasn't like she was famished. Actually, she wasn't even remotely hungry. She sat down on the floor rather despondently, giving up on her snack search. She was just bored.
But the universe is so awesome. It is literally awe-inspiring in the truest sense, unlike the undeserving mundane that we overuse the word awesome on. The smallest mysteries of the universe are inexplicable to the greatest minds that have ever lived. There are more things to think and do than the number of seconds you've lived. Or ever will live.
That was all excessively wonderful, yes. But what was she supposed to do about this? She was still bored.
Her eyes were supposed to be resting. No internet, no books, no television. Only natural stresses to your eyes. Have adequate light around you. Make sure it isn't harsh, industrial light. Have like a soft, fluffy sort of light. A light light. Blink naturally. It’s good for you. Fine. She swore she would be completely natural. For the next fifteen minutes.
Thirty seconds down.
“This is useless”, she declared to the headlights of a car that were blinking furiously from across the road. They blinked back in agreement. The billboard flickered in approval. A red signal flashed its assent from a distance. An aeroplane went by, twinkling in concurrence. A lone star sparkled its endorsement from heavens above. She blinked. That star was weird.
She wasn't quite sure; she had no firsthand experience with stars. But there was something striking about this star. It was big and bright and twinkled as merry as jack in the box, a far cry from the usual variety. The usual variety of stars, she reflected sadly, were mere dots, visible only by gawking at every part of the sky until your eyes popped out. Maybe this was the North Star, the beacon of explorers through the ages...except it wasn't in the north. It could be Sirius, the Dog Star; she knew that it held the distinction of brightest star in the sky. She opened the constellation app on her phone, pointing it starwards like a sceptre. The map on screen swung into motion, and arrived at a fragment of the sky containing obscure, seemingly minor stars she had never heard of. There were the planets Venus and Mars in the mix too. Could this ‘star’ be Venus? It was called the evening star after all.
But it twinkled. Planets don’t twinkle, right?
She stared at with focused ferocity, trying to gorge out its mysteries by ogling. Giving up on that, she keyed in “Do planets twinkle??” on her phone. (Yes, her eyes were supposed to be relaxing, but she was sure staring your eyes out didn't count as repose either.) Deftly and experiencedly, she judged all the results. No, no, not really, sorta, not as much as stars, yes, no. Hank Green
suggested, rather cryptically, that planets don’t scintillate- at least not as much. Maybe this was Venus; that would explain its larger size. Or maybe it was ongoing battle between the Black Eyes and the Whirlpoolians, and the Whirlpoolians had just dropped their first quasar bomb (just=24 million years ago).
She treasured mysteries, and was happy that she was always going to have stuff she didn't know, but the fact that this star/not-star would set pretty soon and she would never know what it was, saddened her. It would be so different, if she could see the thousands of stars hidden behind the city lights every day. She would be able to, painstakingly, chart out all the dots and their movements. She would be able to see the stuff of NASA pictures, seafarer fables, big-budget Hollywood movies, Van Gogh and of explorers’ tales.
Technology was a boon, she had decided on that early on. And stars were clearly visible in the fourteenth and fifteenth century, but the Hundred Years’ War still took place. It is not like the presence of twinkling specks brought complete wisdom and inner peace to everyone underneath them. But she still yearned for the stars. Why, why couldn't they have both technology and stars? She didn’t want firecrackers. Firecrackers tried too hard, trying to pack in loud colours and vivid noises where a simple twinkle would suffice. And no matter how advanced the firecracker is, you can always spot the smoke it leaves as it huffs and puffs into non-existence. It was a pitiable substitute.
She wanted stars.
Would she really give up streetlights, house lights, nightlife, headlights, the entire night transportation system to look at dots which were available to her in glorious HD right on her fingers? “YES”, her heart whispered fiercely. But she wasn't so sure.
~
In case you're having trouble finding it in all that science, the reference to the Royal Family here is the Hundred Years War, which was fought between the Kings of England and France in the Middle Age, so technically, it's alright. Apart from that, it's about stars.
I've known Neha for a few years now, and the most fascinating thing about her is that everything fascinates her. Literally, everything. I've seen her write odes to popcorn, because that's just who she is.
Neha also
has her own blog, Colossal Curiosity (HERE), on which she writes about things like Solar Impulse, the slowest plane in the world. Don't miss it if you like slow planes or popcorn (or science, or Neha). She also just joined Twitter a few months ago, and last week was her birthday! So go and say 'Hi'. And happy birthday.
N
