Seeing Orion’s belt

Before we started as freshman in high school, my class was sent on a weekend trip outside of New York City. It was then that I got to know my best friend and several other people that would leave an impression on me. One of the things I remember well from the trip was laying in the grass at night and looking up at the dark sky. I had hardly known the location of the stars after spending most of my life in the brightness of the city, but our future science teacher made us look carefully and use our imaginations. Like many other times before, I strained my eyes to find some pattern in a dark sky awash with glowing dots. The stars were beautiful to me, but in contrast to the architecture of New York — the bright windows of office buildings and skyscrapers — dispersed without any pattern.

Many years later, I moved about 30 miles outside of the city to Connecticut. My neighborhood was far from a dark, wooded place, but any place is after New York City. I was able to see a lot more stars than I ever had before. My husband would point out constellations that he learned as a kid.

Did I see Orion? With three stars for the belt, legs and outstretched arms. The big and little dipper. I couldn’t see them after staring up from fields and looking out the window on long drives, using constellation plotting apps, or compasses on my phone pointing north and south.

Recently, we were walking at night together and I looked up at the apparently rare Christmas full moon. It might have washed out the stars around it, but all of a sudden I noticed a line of three stars. Orion’s Belt!

I had that wonderful feeling of learning something new. Someone else pointed out the stars to me a few weeks later, and I nodded. I know what’s up there. I can see the three stars that make the belt, the head and the arms outstretched. I know exactly where they are after staring up so many times.