A magical visitor is expected tonight, the Comet Lulin, making it’s last swing by us as it zooms out of our solar system.

A green mass of ice and gas, it is due low in the late night sky. While I wait I will meditate on the vast expanse above me. Living as I do so far from cities, my nighttime sky show is dense and glorious.

After a spate of cloudy/foggy nights, at midnight it is inky moonless dark and as clear as freshly Windexed windows. The San Juan Islands are dotted with lights, and Anacortes glows in the background. All the usual beacons and lighthouses are on duty—old friends I miss when weather keeps us apart.

I wait, but no comet yet.

A freighter eases down the Strait glimmering like a mirage. This is my familiar nightscape, the one that gives me comfort, the one that makes me feel connected to all the other lights in a giant, connect-the-dots picture—an ungainly constellation without a Greek pedigree.

I wait, but cannot see the comet.

Of course there are plenty of picturesque lights just a mile away across Discovery Bay. Those lights are visible on all but the foggiest nights, but they hold little allure for me. I’ve driven all those streets, know people there, have been in some of those houses. That is my extended known world.

I wait, but perhaps it is my eyes that cannot see the comet, for the comet is surely there, streaking toward Regulus in the southeastern sky.

What intrigues me are the more distant lights, ones I can’t assign to anything in particular. Those abstract lights can be whatever I believe they are, and they fill my mind with stories spun from photons, wave sounds and the darks shapes of islands anchored in this vast expanse of saltwater.

I wonder if my future is waiting for me there, another life pacing the shore, impatient for me to live it, to step into like an exotic new dress wildly patterned with vibrant orchids and hibiscus?

Meditating on night, becoming a black blank, I channel Comet Lulin in my mind’s eye at least. There it blazes across my imagination, flirting with Saturn, trailing green prayers across the galaxy.

Here is my prayer: With your distant perspective, Lulin, bless us earthlings with the wisdom to save our own gob of rock hurtling through space. And while you’re at it, Lulin, help us to put on some speed.

MEDITATION VIDEO

Thanks to an astronomer in Japan, we can all see what we missed. Enjoy this brief view of Comet Lulin.

CONTEMPLATIONS

• What are you still waiting for in your life?
• Is it worth waiting for?
• Are you too impatient?
• What steps could you take today to move closer to your goal?

Enjoy some other sky shows here.