“Well, Arlene, a professional astronomer has to go to college to study astronomy, or, in other words, to learn about the makeup of the Universe. Then they spend their whole life looking at objects in the sky through their high-power telescopes, trying to gather more information about known objects or to discover and categorize new ones, like Edmund Halley did.
“Now, time is up. Tomorrow—I mean Monday—there will be a test on what you learned today. Be sure you know the names of the eight planets and everything about them: their relative sizes, the relative distance of each from the Sun, and the other things I taught you about them. And be sure you know the details about the Earth and the Sun. For example, you should know the exact distance between them, and the size of each. And to make it interesting there will be extra credit if you can remember details about the other planets too.
“Now, it’s almost two, and it’s time for American History; we don’t want the 8th-grade students neglected, do we, Beverly?” the teacher joked.
—2—
A collective groan rang through the schoolhouse when the spellbound children heard that their fascinating science lesson was over. However, no one was more disappointed than Leona. The discussion about the Universe, especially about Halley’s Comet, had stimulated the little girl’s active imagination. What she did not hear that day were things that scientists would not discover about Halley’s Comet, or even the Solar System, until years later. Some of the facts that scientists did not know about Halley’s Comet until years later was that it was roughly ten miles long by five miles in diameter; and that the period of its orbit varies somewhat due to the gravitational effects of the Sun’s planets, with 76 years being the average. In addition, future scientists would eventually learn its precise composition, and also discover that it was one of the dimmest objects in the sky, except, of course, when it returned from its long journey for a rendezvous with the Sun—and Earth. It’s unlikely, however, even knowing those facts, that Leona’s newfound interest in Halley’s Comet would have been made any greater. Indeed, lack of that knowledge likely made the comet much more intriguing and possibly more mystifying to the little girl. As it was, she sat at her desk for the remainder of the day just daydreaming about the marvelous things she had learned.
After school was over, Miss Hutchinson was outside wishing the children a happy Thanksgiving and watching them make their way home, when Leona walked up to her and gently tugged on her dress.
“Miss Hutchinson,” she said.
“Yes, Leona?”
“I want to be an astronomer like Edmund Haley.”
“You do? Well there aren’t many women astronomers, Leona; in fact, I don’t know of a single one.”
“Can’t a woman be an astronomer, Miss Hutchinson?” the 8-year-old girl asked.
“Well, I don’t see why not. I suppose if you want to become an astronomer, it’s up to you. In this country you can become anything you want to be. But it will be harder for you to find a job, being a woman and all.”
“I’m not a woman, Miss Hutchinson,” Leona objected. “I’m a girl.”
“I know you’re a girl now,” the amused teacher laughed, “but by the time you are ready to be an astronomer you will be a woman.”
A puzzled look appeared on Leona’s face.
“But you have a long ways to go and a lot of things to learn before that happens,” the teacher explained. “And if you really are serious about astronomy then you have to study really hard so you can make good grades and go to college.”
“Oh, I’ll study real hard, Miss Hutchinson. And someday I’ll become an astronomer and find a comet, just like Edmund Haley did.”
“I believe you will,” the teacher answered. “In fact, I’m sure you will.”
Leona smiled, and as she turned to walk home, Miss Hutchinson heard her ask:
“Only, what can I name the comet when I do discover it? Haley’s Comet is already taken.”
Chapter 29
The Dream
When Leona arrived home from school on the day she learned of Halley’s Comet, she could hardly wait to tell her mother about it and about her dream of becoming an astronomer.
“Mama! I learned all about the Universe today. And I learned about a comet that has the same name as ours. It’s called Haley’s Comet. And, guess what, it can only be seen every 76 years. And the last time it was seen was in 1910, when I was born.”
“Well, isn’t that a wonderful coincidence, Leona,” Margaret said.
Of course, her mother already knew about the comet of 1910, but it had slipped her mind until her excited little girl mentioned it and jogged her memory out of its long nap. Regardless, to keep from spoiling Leona’s news and obvious enthusiasm, Margaret didn’t let on that she knew. And it worked, because hearing the interest in her mother’s voice only enhanced the 8-year-old’s excitement and heightened her need to share her newfound knowledge of Halley’s amazing comet, encouraging Leona to continue her part of the conversation with fervor.
“I think that the man who discovered the comet was one of my ancestors. He was an astronomer in England, and I’m gonna be just like him.”
“What do you mean, dear?” Margaret asked.
“I’m gonna study hard in school so I can go to college and learn all about astronomy. Then I can be a professional astronomer, like Edmund Haley.”
“That’s nice, sweetheart,” Margaret said, almost condescendingly, thinking her daughter’s latest dream was just a passing fancy. “Would you like some milk and cookies to eat?”
“No thanks, Mama. I’m gonna wait on the porch for Papa, so I can tell him about Haley’s Comet.”
Margaret had trouble believing her ears. None of her kids had ever turned down milk and cookies before.
“Gee, Leona! I knew you enjoyed your new school, and that you were thrilled to be learning new things, but I’ve never seen you quite this excited before. Are you sure you don’t want me to bring some milk and cookies out to the porch, so you’ll have something to munch on while you’re waiting for your father to come home?”
“Okay, Mama. Can I have molasses cookies?” Leona yelled as she ran for the door.
Margaret shook her head in amazement and began to laugh. After bringing a glass of milk and two molasses cookies to Leona, she said:
“Your father is hardly gonna believe me when I tell him you almost turned this down.”
Leona waited impatiently for almost forty minutes on the porch; and when she finally heard the familiar sound of her father whistling an even more familiar tune as he walked briskly up Ohio Street, she immediately jumped off the porch swing and ran to meet him.
“Papa! Papa! Where were you?” she yelled. “I have something to tell you.”
—1—
The rest of the day Leona told everyone she met about Halley’s Comet, even if they showed no interest whatsoever in the things she was telling them. While sitting on the porch swing late that afternoon she made detailed entries about the comet in her diary, one Margaret gave to her the previous Christmas. If Leona had not been so enthralled with writing the day’s happenings into it, she might have overheard her parents through the open window near the porch swing. They were relaxing in the living room while discussing Leona’s newfound enthusiasm.
“This is the first time I’ve heard any of our daughters mention college,” Margaret said. “And, to think, it’s little Leona.”
“That’s not too surprising is it, Maggie? She’s always been the most studious and inquisitive of the bunch, not to mention her having the most vivid imagination God has seen fit to grant to anyone.”
“I know, but still, she’s so young.”
“Age doesn’t matter when you’ve discovered something that catches your fancy, the way this comet does Leona’s. I remember when I was a little boy in Basswood Ridge, I wanted so badly to be a fireman. But as I grew olde
r I lost interest in that and decided I wanted to be a carpenter instead. The same thing will probably happen to Leona.”
“I doubt it. I can’t see Leona wanting to become a carpenter,” Margaret laughed.
“You know what I mean,” Murdock said, raising his eyebrows and shaking his head in mock disgust. “She’s probably just going through one of her phases. You know Leona. First she wanted to be a dancer, now an astronomer, and next week it’ll be somethin’ else.”
“Maybe your right, Murdy, but I’ve never seen her this excited about anything. But I suppose if any of our kids has the chance, or maybe I should say the determination to reach their goals, it’s Leona. She may daydream a lot, but one of these days one of them will come true; mark my word.”
—2—
After jotting down the day’s most important happenings in her diary, which to Leona were the things she learned about the comet, she reached for a book lying beside her on the swing. It was one of the books that Miss Hutchinson had used to prepare her lesson on the Universe. As soon as the teacher saw how interested Leona had become in astronomy, an idea came to mind; and that day after school she said, “Wait up, Leona,” before hurrying back inside to retrieve the book for her curious 3rd-grader.
As Leona began leafing through the book, she fondly pictured the smiling teacher in her mind’s eye, and couldn’t help but smile herself, recalling the cheerful expression on Miss Hutchinson’s face when she walked up to her with the book in hand. Leona also recalled her and the teacher’s words, as if they were being spoken right then and there.
“Here, Leona. You can borrow my book for a while, if you want to,” the young teacher said.
“Thanks, Miss Hutchinson! I promise to take good care of it, and bring it back next Monday.”
“No hurry, dear. You take you’re own sweet time,” the delighted teacher said as she waved goodbye to her excited pupil. “And say hello to your mother for me. Be sure to enjoy your mother’s Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow. I’m sure it will be just as tasty as all her other meals, likely more so.”
While lying on the porch swing that afternoon with her head resting on a small, fluffy pillow, and the astronomy book positioned on her chest, 8-year-old Leona struggled to read its many challenging words while staring in amazement at its fascinating illustrations. For some reason she suddenly became tired and fell asleep with the book opened to a drawing depicting Halley’s Comet passing the Earth on its way toward the Sun. And during her nap Leona had an experience that would be the first of many such experiences in her life: a dream so vivid that she would remember its details long after it ended; indeed, for as long as she existed.
—3—
In her dream that afternoon the little girl was on the back porch, sitting by herself on the swing watching the stars pass overhead, just as she had done hundreds of times before. Only, this time the stars seemed so much bigger and so much brighter than she had ever seen before. Not only that, they were not floating motionless in the sky the way they always appeared to be. Instead, Leona realized that the stars were moving across the sky faster than the fastest clouds she had watched go floating by. Then it hit her: There were no clouds in the beautiful eerie-blue sky, as there should be on this late November day, only speeding stars; and it wasn’t nighttime, it was daytime, when only the Sun should be visible, and most certainly not small stars. Although she thought that peculiar, Leona could not stop watching the stars speeding by.
One star caught her attention. It seemed to be falling to Earth directly toward her. As it became bigger and bigger she wanted to run away from it, but for some reason she sat completely still, almost frozen in time, watching the yellow star slowly turning a yellowish-green color. But to Leona’s amazement it didn’t stop there; the closer it came the more colors it took on. Parts of it were becoming red, and blue, and green, and purple, and orange, but not the ordinary hues she had seen before. Instead, all were fluorescing and giving off the most beautiful light imaginable, even more lovely than the most beautiful rainbow that Leona had observed from the window of her bedroom.
“I bet not even the Aurora Borealis is as beautiful as this star,” she thought.
After a few seconds the beautiful star—now twenty feet in diameter, she reckoned—abruptly slowed down just as it was about to impact on the Earth, and hovered a few feet off the ground right in front of her. It was hovering over her mother’s beautiful flower garden, its multicolored lights making the flowers appear more beautiful than they had ever been. Then it hit her: It was November and there shouldn’t be any flowers budding. Suddenly, right after Leona was finally able to rise to her feet, the colorful star began to move toward her, and its glow began to illuminate both the air and the earth around the wide-eyed little girl, creating a surrealistic multicolored spectacle. As the star slowly approached and was no more than twenty feet away, it stopped and gave off a similarly colorful mist. The cloudy mist extended from the mysterious star toward the 8-year-old, looking much like an expanding comet’s tail. As it engulfed Leona, she felt herself getting weaker and weaker until she drifted into what could only be described as a deep hypnotic sleep.
Chapter 30
Haley’s Comet
When Leona awoke from her hypnotic sleep, in what seemed like no time at all, the little girl looked around, expecting to be on the back porch of her home. Instead she was on what appeared to be a large, smooth, shiny-black rock. The rock was surrounded by the colorful, nearly transparent mist, and it was flying through the sky at lightning speed, making a soft whooshing sound as it overtook and passed other heavenly objects, many nearly as colorful as the one Leona rode. Off in the distance Leona could see the Moon getting smaller and smaller in front of her; at least, that’s what she thought. But finally it occurred to her that it wasn’t the Moon she was seeing after all, but the Earth. The Earth as no one had ever seen it, and would not see it until years later when space-travel endowed others with the amazing gift only Leona now possessed: the gift of viewing the magnificent round ball she called home, so splendidly painted a soft blue and white, floating peacefully in the dark heaven. And despite its seemingly growing smaller and smaller with the passing of time, it was huge, this magnificent Earth. Maybe five times larger than her body.
Suddenly, Leona realized that the heavenly rock that she was hurtling through the heavens on could not possibly be a star, because a star’s surface was gaseous and would be much too hot to stand on; indeed she would have been burned to a crisp by now. As Leona pondered the curious object she was riding, something inside of her said, in an almost silent whisper:
“This is your comet, Leona.”
“But how can this be a comet?” she wondered. “Miss Hutchinson said a comet is made mostly of ice, dust and gas; not rock. This should be an asteroid; not a comet.”
Then, upon seeing the colorful, alluring glow emanating from it, she thought: “But this isn’t a rock either. Rocks don’t change color and glow like this. And Miss Hutchinson did say that the Sun can make comets glow. So I guess this could be a comet after all. But it must be a very special comet.”
Then she heard her inner voice once again say, more loudly this time and with much more authority:
“This is your comet, Leona.”
After accepting the wisdom of her inner voice, the little girl’s eyes lit up and a huge smile appeared on her face.
“If this is really my comet, then I’m gonna name it Haley’s Comet,” she said.
After Leona’s excitement waned, her attention returned again to the Earth. In doing so, it wasn’t long before she discovered that this mysterious comet she found herself riding seemed to give her untold magical powers. When she unconsciously wished for a closer look at the beautiful planet she had somehow just departed, it happened. Magically her eyes were able to zoom in on any portion of the Earth she wanted to. And it occurred to her that if she wanted to she could zoom in even further to s
ee, with more detail and clarity than she thought possible, the Earth’s glorious and sometimes mystical features.
—1—
The first time she zoomed in, the Earth grew from 5-times to 100-times her size and she was able to make out some of the larger mountains and rivers that peppered its landscape. Unconsciously again Leona thought about how wonderful it would be if the Earth would stop rotating for a while, so she could linger on some of its more majestic sights, and amazingly it happened. And, by chance, when the Earth did stop, she was staring at the Ivory Coast of Africa, where, according to her teacher, the slave trade first began, back in the early 1500s, long before her nation even existed. She immediately thought of President Abraham Lincoln—the founder of the Republican Party—and how he freed the slaves in 1864. Then the Civil War came to mind. Thinking of the photos she had seen in her U.S. history textbook—depicting large southern battlefields littered with dead Yankee and Rebel soldiers—brought to mind images of the vast Sahara Desert in North Africa, where extreme droughts often laid waste to hundreds and even thousands of its defenseless inhabitants, both animal and human. But instead of seeing a barren desert, Leona found herself over the beautiful Serengeti Plains of Tanzania, just south of Kenya, following two very graceful cheetah chasing after a heard of antelope. Leona seemed to be flying no more than fifteen feet above their heads as they zigzagged this way and that way while chasing their elusive prey.
“But am I really flying?” she wondered; or was it just the magical powers that the comet blessed her with, allowing her mind and eyes to be the co-pilots of her magical aircraft, controlling her destination and the speed at which she arrived there. “So that’s why they call it the mind’s eye. I’m seeing all these amazing things, even though I know they can’t be coming by way of my eyes. Can they?”
No matter. The fact that she was able to take this fantastic journey was the only thing of importance to her at this moment. It wasn’t long before Leona was marveling at even more exotic wildlife and vegetation. Soon she saw huge gray elephants: likely distant cousins of the Wooly Mammoth that roamed the earth during the ice age, some 10,000 years ago. The gigantic modern pachyderms were pulling leaves from the branches of tall trees; their little ones staying close by, playfully mimicking their mother by tugging on small bushes that hugged the ground. Not far away was a herd of female lions, some on the prowl, others lurking in sparse patches of deep grass; both groups apparently looking for food while the lazy male lions, made majestic by their golden crown of hair, lay blissfully in the shade of an acacia tree. Off in the distance Leona saw a herd of stampeding wildebeests sending dust high into the air, apparently spooked by the hungry lions. Also on the run were a few long-necked giraffes and a hundred or so graceful gazelle, beautiful spotted antelope, and distinctive black-and-white-striped zebra. Coming to a river she saw a giant hippopotamus wallowing in the mud. It was by far the fattest animal she had ever seen. Close by was a crocodile entering the water, and not far away were two ferocious male rhinoceros posturing for a fight, their heads lowered and their horned noses digging into the ground, throwing dirt as a warning to the other.
Journey With the Comet Page 27
