Sometimes I ponder random things while staring up at the night sky. Tonight’s random pondering was centered on how incomprehensibly huge the Universe is. For example, from where I sit it seems like our planet Earth is pretty big. It takes three or four days of driving just to get from here to Michigan. But we are the fourth smallest planet in our own solar system. And that solar system is so big that it took Voyager One 35 years just to get past the outermost planet, and will likely take 300 years to reach what scientists say is the actual edge of the solar system. And that doesn’t get us anywhere even remotely close to the next nearest star. So, as I sit looking up into the night sky, what I know is that I am staring into distances beyond anything I can even come close to comprehending. Which, it seems to me, leaves me with two options. I can shut down in mind numbing overload, or I can open up in soul expanding awe and wonder. I suspect you can guess which one I choose. It’s just way more fun. I find awe and wonder in the vastness of space, and I find it in equal measure in a tiny bit of ultra green moss lying in front of me on a hiking trail. The possibilities are literally endless. So I’ll keep staring at the stars, catching my breath as a meteor streaks half way across the sky, stopping to ponder a cactus in bloom, paying attention to the way frost freezes on the metal fences, and all of the countless other ways that leave me full to overflowing with awe and wonder. I have come to believe that it is one of the main reasons I am here. So I think I’ll just keep doing it.