Sometimes I look up at the sky and expect to see stars. I’m not exactly sure why, because I’m not often in an area with low enough light pollution to actually see them in the sky; It’s usually a black endless void that occasionally contains the blinking red and white lights of planes or a part of the moon—nevertheless I still look. 

Infinitesimal. I’m only one small particle among the larger infinity of the universe. There’s a lot of beauty in the realization that I’m just a speckle in the grand scheme of things—tiny and insignificant—and that there is more out there than what we see in our day-to-day life. For the universe is bigger and more wondrous that we could ever imagine; heck, it’s beyond human imagination. 

The Milky Way contains 100 thousand million stars, and it’s only one of billions of galaxies. Most stars are between 1 billion and 10 billion years old. Others are close to 13.8 billion years old—the observed age of the universe. I like to think that the sky we all look up to connects all of us in some way, acting as the acquaintance that introduces soulmates to each other. Not just the people in the present, but also the ones that passed. We look up at the same sky (noted, more polluted) as Aristotle, Cleoptra, Shakespeare. But only for the last century have we’ve not been able to see the incredible abundance of stars. 

When I look out into any city, I am one person out of many. The same feeling happens when looking out into the stars—how many more are out there? We are only one universe of many. Candidly, I believe that there is intelligent life somewhere out there, for the universe is ever-expanding. I think about the other life that’s out there, and what could possibly be happening simultaneously with our existence. 

Arcadia is Class 9 on the Bortle scale, so the stars are barely visible. We sit underneath the freckled abyss every night, but there’s a whole universe (and many other) out there that we will never see. It’s odd to say but I sometimes take the universe for granted. I forget that there are other impossible hypothetical possibilities out there. And hopefully, if we all do the right things and make the right decisions, there will come a time where future generations take the idea of space travel and interplanetary colonization for granted. 

But who’s to say that this fate is written in the stars? For all we know, it could just be stardust. A hysterical hypothetical possibility simply meant to remain here with us. And that’s also satisfying in its own way. 

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Dear Stars, 

I’ll truly never know if we will be more than acquaintances; but I’m thankful for your existence as it reminds me to be thankful for life.