Beautiful Starry Nights in Tampa, Florida

Starry Nights 

It was an amazing revelation to hear two of my wife's relatives say one recent night that it is such a joy to be able to see the stars in the sky.

We were both "taken aback" by the statement and wanted to know more.

What we take for granted so often is such a joy for others who haven't experienced the same thing.

What we immediately found out upon discussing this with these special cousins, a mother and her adult son, was that as residents of the City of New York, they can't see the stars at night. There is an overcast that prevents it.

So, now, when we go outside at night, we thank God for the stars and that we can see them well and enjoy them.

This will be etched in our minds forever, since we had no knowledge that everyone can't see the stars.
Maybe you, the reader, have enough experience with this to know it already, but if you didn't know this fact, hopefully the stars and "Starry Night (Vincent van Gogh)" will be more meaningful.

It's interesting that our seven year old granddaughter's favorite 2011 Christmas gift is a beautiful, blue guitar from Tampa's famed Luna Guitars company, and it's called Starry Night. It makes for some beautiful sounds and its exquisite design is so beautiful to look at with the same blue, star filled sky.
Now that we can think back to this year's trip we took to Peru and spent a lot of time in Lima, we are able to recall that we couldn't see the stars at night there, either. Now we know also that it's not just an occasional not being able to see the stars type of thing.

In some places, like in New York City and in Lima, Peru, to name just two, seeing the stars at night is impossible. Lima is beautiful like New York City, but in the daytime, we couldn't see the sky either, except for an overcast look,

These are strong cases for removing smoke stacks and air pollution causes, aren't they, not to mention illnesses that might be caused from all of this pollution?

Well, could we go as far to say that when you can't regularly see the stars at night in any location, maybe there is too much pollution?

Getting back to basics, it's important to realize that God put the stars in their places and we usually can look up on a dark night and see them.

What a pleasure to be able to enjoy a starry night, and in Tampa, Florida, that's the case!