During the last week of February, and especially on the 28th, four planets will be on parade just after sunset near the western horizon with two more hovering above. An internet search can provide approximate locations. Only Mars will be absent from the show. It’s a view that should not be missed. It is estimated that an alignment such as this one occurs, perhaps, just once every 100 years. And, when it happens, it’s a chance to do more than just look outward.
All of the planets in our solar system orbit the sun on separate planes, and at different speeds and distances. They are never truly close to one another. Instead, and only just from our viewpoint, every so often they seem to bunch together. We call it an alignment though the planets never appear in a straight line.
During this phenomenon, just as we can see them, Earth is also simultaneously in the spotlight of all those distant worlds. The alignment, then, is an opportunity to recognize that every photo can become a selfie, every glance outward can provide introspection, and every step forward can reveal past steps. As it is on Earth, so it is in space—for what is seen can also identify, define and give context to the observer.
Later this month we will be able to see—with the help of a telescope—nearly every planet at the same time. And, while there is no one on those planets to look back at us, we have the ability to turn our eyepieces around. What that outbound view can uncover is not just a fleeting gathering of our solar system neighbors, but also a consideration of all that led up to that gathering, in space and on Earth. We can ask ourselves what meaning that offers. And, we can imagine what we would see if there were, indeed, to be a selfie taken of the observers.
As the sun sets, try to catch a brief glimpse of Saturn, Mercury and Venus just above the highlands west of Nogales, with a mesmerizingly bright Jupiter standing watch over them. That all of these objects, many millions of miles apart, should look so close together should give us pause. And, in that moment, while we form our opinions of each of the planets, we might ask ourselves what that tells us about ourselves.
A digression: how is it that two people can have such opposite views of great movies or books or important figures in history? How is it that there are some for whom geographical wonders like the Grand Canyon elicit but a shrug? Clearly, our responses say as much about ourselves as about the object in question.
Perhaps, now more than ever, it is crucial to understand the viewer just as much as what is being viewed. The study of the stars is not unlike so much of what we study on Earth. We are discovering and learning new things every day. And yet, such serious problems continue to confound us. It is as if for every new achievement we seem determined to refute or negate something already known and rightfully accepted. We may be, as Joni Mitchell wrote over 50 years ago, stardust and golden, but we still seem caught in the devil’s bargain.
There’s a purity we see when looking at the planets. They may have changed over the past four billion years, but it has all been without our interference. We have watched a comet break apart and tear into Jupiter. We now know that flowing water on Mars was lost when its atmosphere was stripped away. We have learned that Saturn’s rings, still magnificent, will one day disappear.
We accept all of it because it’s solely nature, and it is entirely out of our control.
That’s simply not true of our own planet. We play a role. Though that seems brutally obvious, it is clear that we still desperately need to be constantly reminded of that fact. That’s what we can see while taking in the beauty of an occasional planetary alignment. We can reverse the lens, as if in a selfie, and think about what we’ve done and what we need to do to maintain this home of ours that, among all other things, still lets us admire and stand in awe of the heavens.
Harold Meckler can be contacted at byaakov54@gmail.com