A week or two ago I saw a trailer for the documentary The City Dark, which discusses the effects of light pollution on our environment.  I was hooked immediately by perfectly selected sound-bytes, beautiful music, and through my own fascination with the stars.  Check out the trailer on imdb here.  Each time I watch it I feel like lying outside in the grass and looking up.  Thankfully I am far enough outside of Boston to be able to do that once the sun goes down, but I did spend about four years living in the city, which made me realize I took stargazing for granted.  Ever since I was a child I have been taking trips up to New Hampshire and Maine to go on vacation.  I felt robbed when I would come back home and have to struggle to find Orion’s Belt (which was naturally my favorite constellation after seeing Men in Black) if I was able to find it at all.  I never realized how lucky I was until I tried finding it in Boston one night and instead found the 14th floor of an apartment building.  My junior year of college I have an amazing rooftop in Allston with a great view of the city.  Instead of looking up and wondering what the aliens were up to, I stared out towards Boston wondering who was still working at midnight on a Friday in the John Hancock Building.  Most likely the answer was no one, they just leave a lot of lights on, but that is what Boston’s light pollution reduced my drunken imagination to.  Not that Boston lit up at night is not beautiful, but is it worth missing out on the Milky Way?

There was one statement in particular from the trailer that stuck with me, “If our civilization, didn’t see the stars, and didn’t see how big the universe was, would they come to believe that they are more important in this much tinier universe because that is all they see.”  This was when I realized I have to see this film, and this is when I realized I don’t look up enough.  Is our lack of constant visual contact with the galaxy distorting our perception of the universe?  As I said earlier, I watched this trailer a couple of weeks ago.  I have had it in the back of my mind since then, and it resurfaced today when I read this article.  Eleven new planetary systems! A planet in a habitable zone!  As scientists are discovering more galaxies in the search for life outside our solar system, we are cutting ourselves off from a universe that we have only recently been able to reach out to and explore.  I have never really given this idea any thought until I saw this trailer, which is why I need to see this film so badly.  I can’t imagine the types of questions the actual film will raise.  Will twinkle twinkle little star become anachronistic?  What the hell am I going to sing to my children to put them to sleep!?!?!  Goodnight Moon, Goodnight City Lights.

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