I jumped up from my computer after reading about this unbelieveable comet headed our way....9.4 million miles away....five times closer than the sun and raced into the house announcing we were going to go see this remarkable sight.  "Drew, grab your sweater, Spencer, you too, we're going to go see a  comet in the sky."  They scrambled from in front of the tv, abandoning late night cartoons on the Cartoon Network to slap on their flip flops and help shut off all the lights in the house.  It was hysterical...we couldn't find a working flashlight, but Spencer saved the day with his PlaySchool version. It was really wierd to be standing outside with an unpenetrable darkness all  around us. Our eyes struggled to focus. 

Unfortunately, the cresent moon cast a veil of light and we thought at first we'd not see a thing in the sky.   "Look for the Big Dipper," said my friend. Drew shouted, "I found it , I found it!"  We all turned and there poised  center stage between the canopy of trees was the Big Dipper in all it's  glory.   "The article said it was to the left of the lowest star in the Big  Dipper," I said.  And sure enough, there it was....the comet.  Even with the moon as our unwanted spotlight we could see this incredible motionless vision.   We stood in awe as we traced it's tail with our fingers in the sky....listened to the sounds of the night creatures near by...and wished for a telescope to see it better.  "You can't tell it is traveling at 92,000 miles, can you?" Drew queried.  We fell silent again as we tried to ponder how fast that might be. 

Inspiration struck me as I remembered Dad's telescope in the attic.  It would not be easy to find it, but I did recall where it was amazingly enough.  "You  know I have a telescope," I threw out among the chatter and everyone stopped and said, "We do?"  So, off I went to find the telescope that once upon a  time ago sat perched in my backyard in McLean, Virginia.  Pointed heavenward,  I saw the face of the moon and felt my fathers hand on mine as he adjusted  the focus.  It was a night just like tonight, filled with the same kind of  excitement, of magic that touches you and remains forever. 

I pulled it out of it's dusty storage place and realized that the lens' were someplace else. And I didn't have a clue as to where I might have put them so many years ago.  But, I wasn't giving up.  Perhaps we would still be able to see something and so I carried the tripod down the stairs and out the doors to the waiting awe-struck audience. 

Carefully we positioned the telescope and nothing was in focus at all.  Drew and Spencer were quickly losing interest.  We fiddled with this and faddled with that...and it was obvious to everyone that we weren't going to be able to use the telescope without the lens'. So we all traipsed into the house...the boys flopped in front of cartoons again and I paced my room trying to remember where the lens' might be.  Not to be found in any drawer or any shelf, but, when I opened a basket that had not been opened in maybe five years or so, there in the bottom was "a" lens!  Oh!  And then another!!! And another, and another! I began to dance around the room.  "I can't believe it! I can't believe it!" I laughed. 

So armed with the Playschool flashlight, my friend  and I went back to our post at the one end of the deck and the waiting telescope.  Drew called after us "to come get him as soon as we could see something" and Spencer tagged along to keep an eye on us. 

It was truly the "Three Stooges" as we tried to screw this lens into that thigamajig and that thigamajig into the whatsit and the whatsit into the one 
end of the telescope.  Peering down the length of the scope we were unable to see even the faintest of light.  The harder we tried to figure out how to put all these pieces parts together the funnier it got. We nearly rebuilt the  telescope! 

Finally, after several exasperated attempts we paused and looked up once again.  In that instant we realized that we really didn't need to see the comet through the telescope as it was just as breathtaking with the naked eye.  So we stopped trying to improve on what was already a pretty special moment. 

It was as if something was telling us to take a deep breath of the fresh night air with just a hint of smoke from a neighbor's fireplace...and turn around to see the one's we loved so near...and to thank our lucky stars and the comet in the sky, for everything we had right now, this second and to ask for nothing more than just this.  And so . . . we did. 

   
 © 1998 ase